Hamper

All the submissions to Connie's press went into a rectangular basket with a lid and a handle. It sat in the hallway between kitchen and piano room. The lid was up and pressed against the wall when the basket was full.

Each visit, after I settled in and Connie read my latest pages, I went to the hamper and dug out the oldest submissions. Depending on how carefully we read, I made four or five trips to the hamper each session.

Once in a while we were too efficient and reached the bottom. The next week when I called to check in Connie would say, "well, I'm afraid we don't have much." And that meant we might not meet, or that we would sort her personal correspondence instead. But when I called after being away for a weekend or two, she would say, "the hamper's waiting for you. It's overflowing!"

At the funeral, Connie's son recognized me but couldn't figure out why. I told him that I worked for her.

"Oh, you're Beth! I have to talk to you about the basket."
The basket? It took me a minute to figure it out. It is a basket, I suppose, but it was always The Hamper to us.

Today I met with Connie's son. He lives in Philadelphia too, but he has been at his mother's house since she died. He brought the hamper with him on the bus. It had clothesline wrapped around it and tied into a stronger handle. It should have been strange to see it outside Connie's house, but it wasn't. It was just nice to see it. Connie's son and I went over submissions together. I explained the routine. We got all the way to the bottom. Tomorrow we will write letters. I don't know what will happen after that.