Update on a literary 'first family'

Like many of you, no doubt, I already knew how to read by the time I started school. I’m not suggesting I read brilliantly, and the language of Shakespeare still confounded me for the first couple of years of my formal education. But, I could still read after a fashion.

Consequently, I was a little miffed when I was hit with my first ‘reader’. I mean, really, it was so rudimentary. That’s not to mention plotless, and just plain dull. I suppose it revolved thematically around the basic values of a remarkably verbally challenged family. I write, of course, of the Dick and Jane family. Odd how no surname was given, leaving one to wonder if Mr. and Mrs. Dick and Jane senior were in some sort of witness protection program. Anyhow, for want of a last name, I’ll just refer to the whole family as the Dicknjanes.

Now, the Dicknjanes appeared to live in pretty much everytown. An everytown that was, by the way, populated exclusively by white people. I suspect they may have lived in Springfield, just like the Andersons of Father Knows Best and, for that matter, the Simpsons. As a point of interest, has it come to your attention that the family placement of the Dicknjanes is the same as the Simpsons? Bart, Lisa and Maggie are all pretty much the same ages as Dick, Jane and Sally.

Mr. Dicknjane (Father, as he was called) worked somewhere. He wore a fedora and carried a briefcase, and wore a suit, of course. I think he sold insurance up and down those 'streets and roads.' Mrs. Dicknjane was a housewife. All women in Springfield were housewives, and they wore house-dresses and aprons, always. She was a country girl for, if you remember, Grandmother and Grandfather lived on a farm.

They were no doubt decent folk, went to church of a Sunday, voted for Ike, and spoke exclusively in monosyllables. “Look-look-look,” said Father, showing Grandfather the underwear ads in the new Sear’s catalogue. “Ho-ho-ho,” said Grandfather, who was visiting because he’d had to haul a load of turnips into market. “Father-father-father,” said Mother, furrowing her brow and tapping her pretty little foot.

Anyway, that was pretty much it, way back then. Yet, I have always wondered whatever happened to the Dicknjanes, especially Dick, Jane and Baby Sally. Spot and Puff we can assume haven’t been with us for years.

So, considering the fact that Dick, Jane and Sally would be getting mighty long in the tooth by now, and will have gone through all the changes that their generation had to endure, it might have gone something like this.

Dick: Dick didn’t amount to much in school. He preferred being out in that little red wagon rather than applying himself to his studies. He dropped out after ninth grade and fell in with a bad crowd. After pulling an abortive 7-11 heist, he was sent to Juvie for two years. He did his time, and acquired an unremitting drug habit. When he was paroled he tried to get into the army. But, his record precluded that happening, which was just as well for him, since Vietnam was in full swing.

He drifted to San Francisco and worked briefly as a roadie for the Grateful Dead. However, they fired him after he screwed up a couple of gigs. Added to which, his excessive drug use even offended Garcia. Fancying himself a songwriter, however, Dick tried to sell a couple of pieces to Jim Morrison and Tim Hardin (two of his heroes). When he was told that both had OD’d, Dick lost heart.

When last we heard he was working at a rehab in Utah and had developed a mentorship role in the life of client, Lindsay Lohan. Attempts to verify this have been unsuccessful.

Jane: Unlike her brother, Jane prospered in school. She skipped two grades and entered Vassar at the age of 16. It was there that she fell in with very left-leaning uber-liberal students, and came into conflict with the Dean of Women when she, in a speech to the student union referred to Jane Fonda as ‘Hanoi Jane’, but meant it as a compliment.

Unmarried, Jane has been a political activist for all her adult life. At first a strident feminist who believed Andrea Dworkin was too soft in her antagonism towards males, Jane became increasingly proactive, and only fell into dispute with authorities when she marched under the banner ‘Abortion on Command’, believing that her philosophy would be the solution to overpopulation. This last step of activism sapped her credibility, and eventually she settled into life as a rent-control advocate in inner city New York. She has been fully estranged from her parents since the age of 20.

Sally: Not too much is known about Sally’s life, although there are those who believe that pneumatic actress and bon vivant Pam Anderson is actually Sally.