How on earth did I get to be my mother's age? Aren't I really only in my 40's? This is just one of the little klinkers in life - - you don't get older in your mind.
There are so many wonderful days to remember. For a long time I would remember my high school days at Marshall High School. Never was one of popular girls, but that's ok my life since has been one long journey with twists and turns. Here I sit now, nearly 68 years old just thinking about things.
How many times recently I've been too busy to spend time with a friend or neighbor. Seems like when I was a kid or younger anyway, there was always time. Growing up I remember my folks getting together with my Aunt Carrie and Uncle Burt, Aunt Ginny and Uncle Al every Friday night and playing penny anny poker. My sister's and I along with my cousin Suzanne would pretty much just hang around. Sure loved the colby cheese and crackers they'd have for their snack...that was at Aunt Carrie's house. When we went to Aunt Ginny's, their treat for us would be ice cream, something we rarely ever had as kids in our house. I have a favorite bowl, and loved the feel and sound of it. At our house, I don't even remember the snacks, just that a couple of times our "rich" Aunt and Uncle from New York would come and set up a projector for us kids. The "movie" of choice was always a Charlie Chaplin movie. They were silent, of course, but we laughed at all his antics and thought he was surely the funniest person alive. They slowly we'd drift off to sleep. Sometimes we were told to go to bed, but my older sister and I would sneak back down the stairs and peer at them through the slats in the bannister.
Our house at the time was a victorian style white house with a huge wrap around porch. My folks rented it for $50 a month and that was hard for them to come up with the money. When they raised the rent I remember mother crying because we didn't have the resources to come up with the money. I still remember the ugly wallpaper in the living room, in fact I remember every room in the house. Mother used to wash the lace curtains at least twice a year and then put them on a "stretcher" to dry. A stretcher was a wooded frame that was adjustable; now I have no way of knowing the exact measurements, but it must have been at least 84" long and 63" tall. The frame was enindated with the pointed end of a straight pin every 1/2 inch. By placing the curtains on this frame they kept their size and shape. When you removed them there would be a plinky plink sound as the material pulled away from the pins. This was set up in the dining room near the windows. I think everyone at that time had a buffet...more like junk collectors as the to was always covered. Mother set the ironing board up in front of the buffet, then get the "sprinkled" bag of clothes that needed ironing out of the refrigerator and have at it. She did a fabulous job.
One thanksgiving our Aunt and Uncle from Indiana along with their two boys, Jerry and Tony were visiting. Mother and her sister always had such fun together. It was that Thanksgiving that the kitchen ceiling fell....right onto the kitchen table and stove. No one was hurt, but that old time plaster was thick and heavy. We had thanksgiving dinner, but several of the special dishes they had planned never made it to the table. I loved that old house and hated to leave it. All my friends lived on that street, Marshall Avenue. We were lucky as kids because it was right behind the Sinclair Gas Station, run by Dorman and Denver Wigent... Sparrow Allen was a thing to look at even at my young age. He was one of their helpers. Shoot I must have been around 8 at the time. Mother used to let us run over there to get a coke out of the machine--5 cents or a candy bar for a nickle. There was a coal yard in the alley behind our house and Al Shebels auto repair shop. If you weren't careful you'd track all that old coal dust home with you. But living there was special. We found a secret entrance to the our special place. Just through the gate we made by pushing the boards aside, there was a gigantic culdren, we imagined it was a witches pot. Skippy Zerbal lived in the house that backed up to it, she was a classmate, but I don't remember us playing together very often.
The Bolengers lived right next to us. Walt was the mans name, but I don't remember his wife's name. Just that she was always quiet, it was Walt that did most of the talking. They also had a son, but he was a lot older than any of us. I'm sure we annoyed them with our noisy playing, but they were nice about it. For some reason the name Mrs. Barringer comes to mind...ah, I think I remember correctly, she was the very attractive, elegant lady that saved her newspapers for our school paper drive and always had them neatly bundles up and tied. Most of the kids tried to get to her house first. She wasn't a close neighbor,however. There was Mr. and Mrs. Marsh, I just loved Mrs. Marsh; the house they lived in was actually broken down into 4 apartments. Mrs. Prettyman lived above the Marshes, don't remember anything about her husband, he may have passed away. The next block, and on the same side of the street as us (until I got to the ripe old age of 7 I had to stay on "my side of the street) for safety reasons. I remember all the houses and most of the people that lived in them, but most of all I remember they must have had the patience of Job, because the constant noise from roller skating up and down, up and down, must have driven them nuts.
To borrow a phrase from "Ma", but I digress! I can remember so much of my youth on Marshall Avenue. Mrs. Goodwin, probably the best kindergarden teacher there ever was. She was always kind, the grandmotherly type. To this day I continue to like room temperature milk and cookies. lol.....I still have the class picture from my kindergarden class, in fact I just loaned it to Vicki to publish for the high school class reunion this year. 50 years....oh my!
Marshall Avenue was a long street and I was allowed to go three blocks North only, which was really at the top of the hill. Most days we all put on our clamp on rollers skates with the metal wheels and skated up and down the sidewalk. There is nothing like the sound, everytime you'd go over a crack in the sidewalk, it would make a clicking sound. Everyone loved skating. We even had a fort on the corner. Actually it was a huge bunch of tall schrubs that had been hollowed out in the center to make room for several girls to sit and yack. Come 5:00 p.m. everyone had to be home for supper. After supper and dishes we were free to go out and play again. I'd usually go to my friends house 2 blocks up, but when it started getting dark, I'd have to go home. It was really scary so I'd run down the middle of the street as fast as I could. Winded by the time I got home, but no boogie man got me either.
Pierce school was kitty corner from my house and in the summer they'd have "summer school". Nothing like the summer school of today. Our summer school was fun had nothing to do with studying and learning the three R's....It was held outside on the double playground. Each area had some type of activity going on. I liked it when they would bring those old molds and pour some white liquid into it. In a short time it'd harded and we'd get to paint whatever we made. I remember making two pieces of fruit and using a twisted something for a hanger, we'd paint them. I was so proud to present them to mom for her kitchen wall. There was story hour. We'd all sit around the volunteer on the ground and listen to her read us a story. Another favorite was making key chains from plastic braid (they still have that stuff today.) Seems like we could go either in the morning or afternoon, yet I remember playing at the playground all day..It's just one of those "dim" memories. Just remember that it was always fun. Must tell you about the swing set. It wasn't like the sets today even on school grounds. This one was at least a mile high, or so it seemed at the time. It was probably only 15 feet high, but what a rush if you were one of the lucky kids that pumped so much that you were able to catapult yourself over the top bar. Mostly it was those show-off boys...that I secretly admired...that were stupid enough to do it. I'd probably beat the tar out of my kids or grandkids for even thinking about it.... Relax younger generation..that was just an expression that was as common to use and "cool", shoot we beat the tar out of everything in those days.
When we moved into our paintless house, I soon found friends in that area and remember going out into Gwins garden area in the spring to catch garden snakes. Well, I never said I was very bright then. As I got a bit older, I used to love going into the fields with Nancy Puff and Linda VanderVeen and just walking around. Somewhere I think I still have a picture of all of us resting on a fallen tree. We didn't do anything exciting, but it was fun just walking around and talking.
The town was and is my favorite place. At the West end there is a fountain. I'll see if I can find a picture. Everyone should see this beautiful fountain/park during the summer when they turn the lights on and the water if flowing. (Hope they still do it cause it was beautiful, even took my grandson to see it.)
We moved into a house that had absoluely no paint (and didn't for several decades). It was there that I turned 13... I received a turquoise, portable radio that I thought was the greatest gift anyone could receive.
