Rootabaga Stories | Page 7

on his diamond
toenails, 'Attaboy, li'l bunny, attaboy, li'l bunny.'"
"Yes I hear you talking but it is like dream talking. I wonder why your
accordion looks like somebody stole it and took it to a pawnshop and
took it out and somebody stole it again and took it to a pawnshop and
took it out and somebody stole it again. And they kept on stealing it
and taking it out of the pawnshop and stealing it again till the gold wore
off so it looks like a used-to-be-yesterday."
"Oh, yes, o-h, y-e-s, you are right. It is not like the accordion it used to
be. It knows more knowledge than it used to know just the same as this
Potato Face Blind Man knows more knowledge than he used to know."
"Tell me about it," said Any Ice Today.
"It is simple. If a blind man plays an accordion on the street to make
people cry it makes them sad and when they are sad the gold goes away
off the accordion. And if a blind man goes to sleep because his music is
full of sleepy songs like the long wind in a sleepy valley, then while the
blind man is sleeping the diamonds in the diamond rabbit all go away. I
play a sleepy song and go to sleep and I wake up and the diamond ear
of the diamond rabbit is gone. I play another sleepy song and go to
sleep and wake up and the diamond tail of the diamond rabbit is gone.
After a while all the diamond rabbits are gone, even the diamond chin
sitting on the diamond toenails of the rabbits next to the handles of the
accordion, even those are gone."
"Is there anything I can do?" asked Any Ice Today.

"I do it myself," said the Potato Face Blind Man. "If I am too sorry I
just play the sleepy song of the long wind going up the sleepy valleys.
And that carries me away where I have time and money to dream about
the new wonderful accordions and postoffices where everybody that
gets a letter and everybody that don't get a letter stops and remembers
the Potato Face Blind Man."


How the Potato Face Blind Man Enjoyed Himself on a Fine Spring
Morning
On a Friday morning when the flummywisters were yodeling yisters
high in the elm trees, the Potato Face Blind Man came down to his
work sitting at the corner nearest the postoffice in the Village of
Liver-and-Onions and playing his gold-that-used-to-be accordion for
the pleasure of the ears of the people going into the postoffice to see if
they got any letters for themselves or their families.
"It is a good day, a lucky day," said the Potato Face Blind Man,
"because for a beginning
I have heard high in the elm trees the flummywisters yodeling their
yisters in the long branches of the lingering leaves. So—so—I am
going to listen to myself playing on my accordion the same yisters, the
same yodels, drawing them like long glad breathings out of my glad
accordion, long breathings of the branches of the lingering leaves."
And he sat down in his chair. On the sleeve of his coat he tied a sign, "I
Am Blind Too." On the top button of his coat he hung a little thimble.
On the bottom button of his coat he hung a tin copper cup. On the
middle button he hung a wooden mug. By the side of him on the left
side on the sidewalk he put a galvanized iron washtub, and on the right
dis an aluminum dishpan.
"It is a good day, a lucky day, and I am sure many people will stop and
remember the Potato Face Blind Man," he sang to himself like a little

song as he began running his fingers up and down the keys of the
accordion like the yisters of the lingering leaves in the elm trees.
Then came Pick Ups. Always it happened Pick Ups asked questions
and wished to know. And so this is how the questions and answers ran
when the Potato Face filled the ears of Pick Ups with explanations.
"What is the piece you are playing on the keys of your accordion so fast
sometimes, so slow sometimes, so sad some of the moments, so glad
some of the moments?"
"It is the song the mama flummywisters sing when they button loose
the winter underwear of the baby flummywisters and sing:
"Fly, you little flummies,
Sing, you little wisters."
"And why do you have a little thimble on the top button of your coat?"
"That is for the dimes to be put in. Some people see it and say, 'Oh, I
must put in a whole thimbleful