In the Year 1982: Part II

Title: Norman Rockwell 1982 Calendar & Engagement Book

Author: Unidentified Kansas City woman (Ms. Rockwell)

Date: 1982

Discovered at: 2nd Chance Thrift, 1229 East 63rd Street

The cover promises: Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’ …

Representative quotes:
Wednesday, July 28:
“lunch — met Becky for lunch at Main St. Deli egg salad on bagel
Jog — Loose Park w/ Dotty
Went to Macy’s w/ mom — bought couch! bought swimsuit too — now broke”
Sunday, July 11:
“Becky + I walked to Quik Trip for rolls laid out in sun — BB sick
Alameda vs Crown Center softball at Swope Park”

In January, your Crap Archivist dished in this space about the woman affectionately dubbed Ms. Rockwell, a mysterious diarist whose 1982 datebook allowed us an enticing glimpse into the joy and tumult of a young woman's life — as well as the Kansas City of 27 years ago.

There were thrills: drinks at Fred P. Ott's, dinner at the Pam Pam Room, a job amid the glamorous set at a Plaza hotel. There were triumphs to cheer: the dieting, her jogs up and down Ward Parkway, her habit of abbreviating dinner as "dins." And there was suffering: Clark's DWI! That trip to Fort Worth where her weight — charted in her journal margins almost every day of the year — leapt nine pounds in three days! The long day she sat through On Golden Pond!

We discovered a young woman on the cusp of adulthood. She had a real job and her own apartment but still called her parents' house "home." She lived with her friend B.B. and had recently become an assistant personnel manager, a position that included, among its responsibilities, the oversight of payroll. ("Ugh!" she writes.)

When we last peeked at the book, spring had begun to come on, and Ms. Rockwell's entries were growing richer in detail. We hoped that our Ms. Rockwell might flourish in love just as she was flourishing as a diarist.

Twenty-Seven Years Ago This Month

In the first weeks of April, Ms. Rockwell's calendar thickens with events. She and her mother enjoy a shopping spree, hitting Loehmann's, Country Mouse and Marshall's, and scoring three dresses and one skirt. On April 3, between visits with "Becky" and an aunt, Ms. Rockwell switches her closets from winter to spring. April 7 brings snow. Two days later, she buys her parents garden tools from Dolgin's and then bakes a pie.

Easter weekend finds her at Royals Stadium (the Royals beat the Tigers 5-2, with two perfect innings from Dan Quisenberry), sunbathing after church and eating with her parents. The sunbathing quickly swallows her life. By her record, the next weekend includes more than five hours in the sun. That week also contains a major revelation:

"Thursday, April 15

lunch — errands, cleaners, magpie etc.

jog — hills by myself

took moped in."

A pie-baking woman with a moped. What isn't to love, Kansas City?

As the days heat up, Ms. Rockwell continues to tour local restaurants with a zeal that would impress Walt Bodine. She visits Coco's, Butterfluff, Plaza III, Uno's Pizza, Winstead's, Stroud's, Whopperburger, R.G. Maxwell's and many others. She makes up for it with the jogging.

A Summer of Sadness

As always, Ms. Rockwell seems of two worlds, a young woman at home with the Plaza set but also at ease at the Taco Via counter or scarfing a QuikTrip breakfast on Mother's Day. Her party habits reinforce this impression. Just a week after writing "formal at 103 w/ mom," she and B.B. host a Saturday-night kegger.

Meanwhile, her friends' weddings and showers clog the weekends. And though Ms. Rockwell occasionally admits to a crush or identifies a young man as "cute," there's no mention of dating in the first half of 1982. She never complains about this; her love life just seems to be in a building (or rebuilding) phase.

This probably made all those receptions a little awkward.

In June, the high spirits of the spring ebb. She frets about the Monday payroll, accuses herself of "pigging," endures a cold, braces against summer storms and power outages, and gets pulled over doing 39 in a 25.

Then, in July, the sadness comes. On the second day of the month, she writes, "Don't feel like jogging anymore — just eat normal — sick of trying." Of course, she seems not to have taken into account just why she might have felt so listless: She had given blood that very day. Even a night of Plaza ice cream and facials with friend Becky doesn't help much. The next night, a Saturday, Ms. Rockwell stays in. And Independence Day is a heartbreaker:

"breakfast w/ m+d

Royals game w/ Greg — fun

Cried — don't know why sad."

Between "cried" and "don't know why sad" she draws a frowny face.

Fortunately, there's a time-honored solution to this kind of ennui, one that Ms. Rockwell wisely allows herself:

"Went to Haagen-Dazs w/ BB."

Better still, she writes, after that night's Fourth of July party:

"fun times

crush on E."

There's hope! Even better than ice cream is the healing power of a crush, that tingle of possibility that comes when you dare to let yourself fall a little.