Tuesday, September 20, 2022

Thinking back about Carmela Feb. 5, 1986

  

Carmela was a stumpy woman straight out of a 1930s situation comedy, who looked and acted old, but was not old, that supporting utterly dependable character the rich people in such flicks always depended on to make things run smoothly.

She wore old lady’s dresses and old lady’s perfume, and during the first years that I worked for Cosmetics Plus, she sat outside Donald’s office like a guard dog. She fiercely defended his privacy, if only in the nicest way.

She drove a Baracuta, the envy of all the workers in the warehouse complex, who grumbled about such a fine machine being wasted on such a character such as she. As with everything else, she drove it like an old lady might, and only to get to work or to drive her sister somewhere.

While Donald boasted about being a self-made man, it was Carmela he depended on, until later, when he expanded and bolstered his image as a modern businessman by bringing on younger, more modern women to as part of the secretarial staff, leaving Carmela as something of an outdated model, dependable yes, but hardly hip.

She was moody even back in the old warehouse, a condition some claimed was the result of “that time of month.”

Most assumed she was still a virgin, an old maid from birth, and later when the warehouse expanded, some cruel members of the staff offered $100 to any guy brave enough to take her virginity.

There were no takers, even among the well-meaning, because she had a put-off air that would only let a person get so close, but no closer.

She reminded me of a petrified aunt, a large nose, deep set back black eyes, a dark complexion. She was short and perched like a bird behind her desk, utterly efficient, but not someone to inspire even the most remote sense of tenderness.

Jokingly, people said she walked like a duck and talked like a goose, and quacked when upset, her head and shoulders moving side to side.

Sometimes, when I came upon her unawares, I found her starting off into space, her expression filled with intense loneliness, which vanished the moment she became aware of me.

She lived with her sister somewhere in West Caldwell in a garden apartment, and constantly complained about her mostly male neighbors who constantly parked in her parking spot, especially in winter after a snow storm.

She and her sister were twins; I never met her sister.

Carmela spoke of her sister as if an echo, a mirror image of herself. She spoke of her often, but it was as if she kept her sister in a drawer, putting her back when not needed.

Nobody seemed to know much about Carmela’s parents, or what made these two sisters cling to each other the way they did. I always got the feeling she felt as if her parents were always looking over her shoulder.

Donald didn’t seem to care much about where she came from, only glad he had her when he did, and always jumped when she asked him for something.

When she complained later at the new office about the increased work load, Donald went and hired an army of young women to help her.

None of them ever met with Carmela’s approve, and eventually, she became more and more isolated as they flocked together, often ignoring her.

 

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