Wax Cups and Buffaloes

It’s a heart-wrenching thing to clear out your parents’ house for good. For me, it was the only family home I had ever known. Yet when the time came, I found that I was simply not interested in most of the art objects and bric-a-brac that, at one time, I thought I might like to keep.

That’s why I find it odd that one of the mementoes I saved was a small red wax paper cup that resided in my mother’s bedroom desk. “Hit the Jackpot at Harrah’s” is printed in yellow and white on the side and it holds about a dollar’s worth of pennies that she once touched. Actually, it should have been filled with nickels.

My mother was one of the smartest persons I’ve known. Phi Beta Kappa, University of Rochester Medical School, New York Times crossword puzzle every Saturday. But she also longed for down-to-earth pleasures (see Rackets and Racquets, October, 2010) and often went to the casinos at Lake Tahoe with the other ladies of our South Knoll Road Gang. Fortunately, they had a place to roost once they got there, since the Ratto family – one of the original SKRG families – had recently moved to South Lake Tahoe and welcomed their company. My mother, Rita Baroni, Alice Montgomery, Laverne Schwartz, and even Lois Roberts made the pilgrimage several times a year.

While they did play Keno during mealtimes at the casinos (the Rattos even occasionally won pretty big prizes, in the tens of thousands of dollars, I recall), their game of choice was the nickel slots. You couldn’t get any more down-to-earth than placing five-cent bets in a smoky casino. But, of course, the goal was not to win jackpots (though that was definitely a perk); it was to spend girl-time together, sitting side-by-side on padded chrome and red plastic stools and challenging the one-armed bandits with a free cocktail in your hand.

Sometimes, I would get to come along, usually in the company of Lynny Montgomery, my best friend and almost-neighbor. At the Rattoes, we got to camp-out in sleeping bags on the deeply carpeted floor and gaze up at the popcorn ceiling, which sparkled magically with flecks of mica, like the clear Tahoe night sky. During the day, we would either play at the house - if any grown-ups were in - or go to the casinos with our mothers.

Once there, Lynny and I would be left to our own devices, which mostly meant hanging out in the kids’ lounge. There were vending machines, a snack bar, and a single television. Video games would have been fun, but this was back in the 60’s, so we made do with pin-ball machines instead.

I didn’t like the kid’s lounge very much and therefore don’t remember most of the time we spent there. I do remember how creepy I found most of the other youthful inmates, with their hard eyes and knowledge of mysterious pin-ball etiquette such as how to put a quarter on top of the machine to claim your turn. I suppose we were all pretty creepy at that age, but you notice it less when you’ve grown up around your own friends’ particular brand of peculiarity. No, I preferred to wander around the brightly carpeted casino with Lynny until it was time to go home for lunch or dinner. We were never abandoned for very long. Besides, what I was waiting for depended on how successful my mom had been.

After a delicious Italian supper cooked by Mrs. Ratto, my mother would present me with her winnings. Not to keep, but to comb through for special nickels for my coin collection. I emptied the bulging wax cups of coins on the carpet and proceeded to ferret out the ones I was still missing. Mostly, I was hoping for Buffalo nickels, which had been minted up until 1937, only thirty years previous. Today, a Buffalo nickel in my change would stop me dead in my tracks, but back then it wasn’t that unusual. On rare occasions, I even found Liberty Head nickels in my mom’s haul, like this one:

The Liberty nickels instantly conjured up images of me walking into a Main Street soda shop somewhere in Kansas territory and ordering an ice-cold sarsaparilla soda.

Rarely, did I come away from those weekend trips empty-handed. My mother’s Jackpot cups were my mother-lode. Now, all that the red wax cup in our hutch holds is copper pennies. But, in reality, it is filled to the rim with memories more valuable than gold.