The Story of Mary Shiminski

(Author’s note: The graffito on which this fable is based is – or was – actual. For several years during the ‘seventies it adorned a black railroad bridge outside Brattleboro, Vermont. During this time I knew nothing of its origin, but, whenever I passed beneath it, I used to smile to myself and meditate on its significance. At last, with no reference to any sort of history, I decided on the truth of the story of Mary Shiminski. Later I read in the Boston Globe another version of the story. I refer those interested in historical truth to the newspaper files; for my part I have chosen a truth that I believe to be of a higher order, maybe the highest order of all truth. Perhaps it is worth noting that, like many such truths, it begins with four well-known magic words.)

 

Once upon a time there lived on a farm just east of Brattleboro a girl named Mary Shiminski. The only child of a Polish immigrant and his Polish wife, she grew up gradually between the milkstool and the kitchen, eventually turning into a young lady as shy and as sweetly massive as the cows she tended morning and night. Not that she was fat, not at all, but merely large: tall, big-boned, muscular, in the manner of many country girls. Her hair was light brown, her eyes blue, her skin fair; but walking anywhere she hunched over like a soldier between foxholes. Furthermore, she wore shapeless cotton dresses and arranged her hair in sad, shapeless buns, all of which made her seem blurry, out of focus.

On weekdays between morning and evening milkings Mary Shiminski rode to Brattleboro High School on a bus, sat through eight periods and lunch, and rode the bus home again. School made her miserable. She was a poor student, faltering in English grammar, totally inept in plane geometry. Although strong, she lacked the grace and coordination necessary to excel at sports. When sides were being chosen for basketball, she was always the last person picked. Constantly called for traveling with the ball, she occasionally threw it to a member of the opposing team, by accident and with such force that at least two girls were knocked silly when an errant ball rapped them full in the face.

Worst of all, her classmates treated her with derision – if they treated her at all. “A klutz,” some called her and laughed; or others, the more popular students – the cheerleaders and the class presidents – ignored her completely. One boy, Lester Tibbottson, teased her regularly. “Hey, Mary Shiminski,” he would yell at her, “you’d better get in-ski!” Even though Lester gangled and had acne, his words stung her, senseless as they seemed. So through classes, across playing fields, and about hallways she slouched with almost pathological timidity. If some fairy godmother had appeared out of thin air to give Mary Shiminski a word that would have allowed her to turn instantly invisible, why, she would never have been seen again at Brattleboro High School. But that is not precisely what happened.

Instead she came to the March of her senior year. One day Mary Shiminski’s yellow bus was carrying its charges homeward. They were all jostling each other and joking – all save, naturally, Mary Shiminski herself, who sat huddled in the rear, vainly trying to make herself smaller. Suddenly the bus jerked to a stop in the middle of the road right in front of a railroad bridge. This was odd because there were no houses nearby – only a Howard Johnsons’s – and nothing blocked the road ahead. From the front of the bus came exclamations of surprise, and the jostlings and jokes stopped.

“Mary Shiminski!” shouted the bus driver. “Come up here!”

In fear and trembling she stood and stumbled toward the front of the bus. No one spoke, and in fact many were holding their breaths. The bus was as silent as a prayer.

Painted with huge white letters on the black railroad bridge was a message: “MARY SHIMINSKI, I LOVE YOU!”

For nearly two minutes she stood there open-mouthed, looking at the sign. Finally, from behind the bus came a distinct honk. When at last Mary Shiminski turned and began the long walk to her seat in the rear, a faint blush covered her cheeks. Her eyes were downcast and she moved slowly. But all the way down the aisle a small smile hovered like a hummingbird over her lips. Only when she sat down and folded her hands in her lap did the other passengers break the silence, whispering excitedly:

“Who do you –”

“—suppose –”

“—wrote –”

“—that –”

“—there?” twenty-seven voices all asked among themselves.

However, Mary Shiminski sat isolate and wordless the rest of the way home. As the bus stopped at her house, she rose to get off with that same small smile on her lips, standing straighter and taller than any of the others had ever seen her before.

That evening, the cows milked and the family seated at table eating dinner, she finally spoke her first words since she had arrived home (although as she had never been much of a talker, this fact was not in itself noteworthy).

“Mama. Poppa.”

“Yes, dear,” answered her mother. “Don’t you feel so good? You didn’t eat much.”

“Somebody loves me.”

“Sure they do. Me and your mother do,” responded her father.

“And God,” her mother added quickly.

Nothing more was said. But the next morning when Mary Shiminski boarded the school bus, the others could discern about her some signs of transfiguration. Her back was straight. Her hair shone down to her shoulders, polished by at least a hundred strokes of the brush. And though she wore one of her customary cotton dresses, it was cinched tight around her waist with a shining white sash.

As the bus passed under the railroad bridge, everyone looked back through the rear safety door to see “MARY SHIMINSKI, I LOVE YOU” (even the bus driver in his mirror, who saw it backwards) – everyone, that is, except Mary Shiminski, who sat smiling demurely into her lap. And then, without being really aware of it, everyone was suddenly staring at Mary Shiminski.

By the next week changes were blowing through the halls of Brattleboro High School like gusts of bright wind. Most of them in one way or another concerned Mary Shiminski. One day in English class she received an eighty-seven on a grammar quiz and correctly diagrammed the sentence, “Alice wore her new shoes to the prom even though they did not fit,” on the blackboard. Then in plane geometry she proved beyond doubt that when two parallel lines cut a pair of intersecting lines on opposite sides of the vertex, the resulting triangles are similar.

Later in gym class she was the fourth person chosen for basketball, an honor to which she responded by moving up and down the court with newfound grace and speed. Although she did not score a basket, she passed to her teammates precisely, and only once did she travel with the ball. At the end of the period the teacher asked her to consider trying out for the girls’ varsity softball team.

During this week one final phenomenon began to emerge, primarily by B.H.S. fashion meteorologists. Many of the more popular girls were taking to wearing, instead of their kilts and cardigan sweaters with circle pins, plain cotton dresses belted with brightly colored sashes. Some wore purple, but the general consensus seemed to favor white.

At the conclusion of one of these marvelous days, Mary Shiminski stood at her locker, taking from its straight, thin interior her jacket and lunchbox and books. Suddenly she heard behind her a familiar taunt: “Hey, Mary Shiminski, you’d better get in-ski!”

She cringed involuntarily until she remembered not to; but even as she turned, resonant tones rang out, “Dry up, Tibbottson, you nerd!”

The resonant voice belonged to the captain of the football team, long regarded by all the cheerleaders – and many other girls, for that matter – as the most eligible boy in school. (“What a hunk,” they gasped at each other, leaning breathless against the lockers as he passed by.) He continued, speaking now to Mary Shiminski. “Say, you wanna go out? I got my Camaro, and we could go to a show.”

She looked in confusion first at her armload of books and lunchbox and jacket, then at Lester Tibbottson’s acned and gangly face – which was unaccountably contorted with disappointment, agony, frustration, and impotent fury – next at the football captain smiling easily, finally back to Lester Tibbottson. All at once her eyes grew wide.

“You,” she said, and she was still looking at Lester Tibbottson. “It was you. Wasn’t it. That painted that sign on the bridge.”

She left both of them standing there and walked quickly to the bus. All the way home her face was as blank and empty as a stump.

 

(Author’s note: This moment is, of course, the crisis of the story of Mary Shiminski. What will she do now? She might regress, become again the ugly duckling she was before, having thus been so shocked by her intuition. Or she might continue on blithely, smiling, ignoring the identity of her fairy godfather ((godbrother? godadmirer?)), accepting such attentions as those of the football captain. But wait. There isn’t any choice here, not for me, not for you, not even for Mary Shiminski. Remember, we are dealing with truth, and therefore with a clear and inalterable and ordained path.)

 

She did not attend school the next day. This was strange; even before the appearance of the sign she had scarcely ever missed school. The bus driver slowed as he came to the end of her road. Seeing no trace of her, however, he stomped down hard on the accelerator, as if to hide his regret. She did not attend school on the two days following, either, but this was less strange, for those days were Saturday and Sunday.

On the day of her absence, the word was flashed all over Brattleboro High School:

“Did you hear that –”

“—that nerd ­­–”

“—Lester Tibbottson –”

“—was the one –”

“—that painted the sign –”

“– about Mary Shiminski?”

So when Monday rolled around at last, the bus riders’ curiosity was at fever pitch. Their noses were flattened against the glass, their tongues hanging from their mouths like pink socks on a clothesline. But when she climbed onto the bus, they saw only that she was lovelier than they had suspected, even lately. Her hair was thick and glossy and the color of honey. Her cheeks were pink and perfectly clear. She kept her body as straight as Queen Victoria once did, moving with wonderful ease down the aisle. Her starched cotton dress was pure white, and a bright red sash seemed to dance like fire around her waist. Finally, her face was illuminated by a smile of unspeakable joy.

Very few of the other boys and girls even noticed that she carried a two-and-a-half-foot-wide roll of shelfpaper, and no one remarked on it. Arriving at school, Mary Shiminski, the roll stiff beneath her arm, immediately sought out a custodian.

“I need a stepladder,” she said.

He seemed about to object, but her smile dazzled him into submission. “Where?”

“In the lobby.”

He fetched it like a puppy, then stood watching while she unrolled the shelfpaper and taped it above the doors to the auditorium. He was her only audience; the bell had not yet rung to allow students into the halls. After Mary Shiminski had climbed down, she and the custodian stood looking at what she had put up. Then the bell did ring, and the rest of the students came chattering in, only to be brought up short, shocked first into mumbles, then into silence, as they confronted for the second time in two weeks the utterly unimaginable: “LESTER TIBBOTTSON” (read the sign) “I LOVE YOU, TOO!”

 

(Author’s note: And so ends the story of Mary Shiminski. I have to confess here that it has been my story as well; in a way I am Lester Tibbottson, acne and all, or at least I am Mary Shiminski’s fairy godparent, who wrote ((and truly)), “MARY SHIMINSKI, I LOVE YOU! on that black bridge, who thereby wrought upon her such miracles as have been seen, and who in this telling will now set her free to ((with those four final magic words germane to this kind of truth)) live happily ever after.)