Curtain opens on small kitchen, glass door to backyard smudged with dog nose prints, bright Mexican oilcloth on table. Dirty dishes and a vase of sunflowers. Covered dish with melted butter oozing out the sides. This is AUSTIN, TEXAS, 1952, summer. Radio announcer cries: Oh, it’s a hot one! Gonna be over 100 again for the 14th day in a row! Music begins. Western swing.
LYRICS: Honey honey honey, oh won’t ya love me all the time?
Willowy blond girl, about 12, wanders on from stage right, opens icebox door, stands staring.
VOICE OFFSTAGE, screaming: Shut that thing unless YOU wanna pay the electric bill! (GIRL selects one peach, eating it in tiny bites as she wanders the kitchen, picking up common household items and examining them as if they are brand new inventions.)
GIRL: Now this is a garlic press! Saves all that chopping and dicing time for housewives the world over! And this—this is one of those egg-salad-making thingies. It cuts a hardboiled egg up into eensy beensy bits! Then all you do is add—wait—
She runs to the icebox, riffles its contents, emerges with a large jar—
Miracle Whip!
VOICE OFFSTAGE: Over my dead body!
GIRL: Oops. Hellman’s Real Mayonnaise. (Whispering) We’ll go ahead and use Miracle Whip! She’ll never know the difference! (GIRL waltzes with Miracle Whip.) One-two-three, one-two-three, won’t you come and dance with me! One-two-three, one-two-three, la-de-dah, la-de-dee!
VOICE OFFSTAGE (plaintively): Amy Lou. Amy Lou! Is this entirely necessary?
GIRL (stifling giggles): Is this entirely necessary? Hee hee hee!
VOICE: Amy Lou. Honey? Okay?
GIRL: I don’t hear nothin’. I don’t hear nothin’!
VOICE (obediently): Oh. Sorry. (Typewriter clacks, stopping and starting in the usual manner. GIRL continues dancing, but silently, stopping only to force the peach pit through the neck of the flower vase. Typewriter continues.)
GIRL: Mom! Are you just writing the alphabet again? Are you? You better write that story. You better start.
VOICE: (plaintive again) Dang it, Amy Lou. . . (typewriter begins again, this time far more hesitant. It is the real thing this time: words on paper. Amy Lou listens for a moment, smiles, hops around the table on one leg, loses her balance momentarily. The vase falls over, does not break, water runs slowly across the oilcloth and onto the floor.)
VOICE: What was that?
GIRL: Never you mind, Mombo! (She steps in the water, examines her foot, suddenly draws herself into perfect posture and marches downstage like an injured soldier, dragging the wet foot behind her, stopping just short of toppling into the orchestra pit.) I love my life, ladies and gentleman. It is a beautiful summer day and I love my life.
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