Green Granny
Long before “going green” and
recycling was hip, my grandparents were doing it. It was nothing new to them.
Where do I start? Old catalogues were never tossed away. They were put inside
the outhouse, the privy. My grandparents’ privy was deluxe. It had two holes; a
large one for the adults and a smaller one for the children. The covers were
cut at an angle so they would not fall through. When I went inside, I always
hoped I would find some dull, flat pages because the shiny ones left sharp corners
and little to clean my bottom.
Left over food scraps were fed
to the chickens or added to the pig slop to help fatten the animals. The
animals’ manure was spread on the fields to help the crops to grow. The crops of
corn, wheat, oats, and hay were foods that fed the animals and people. Egg
shells and coffee were tilled into the garden to enrich the soil.
A produce huckster would stop at
my grandmother’s house and sell her at reduced prices what he knew would spoil
before the weekend. It was his last stop before he would drive to his home. She
would cook, can, or serve it to her family. He would give her produce that had
started to spoil and outer leaves that would not sell. She would cut out the
spoiled spots and toss it and the leaves into the pig slop and use what she
could save as food.
Walking into Grandma’s kitchen,
I would see plastic bags hanging after she had washed them to allow them to
dry. Folded and stored, she would reuse them. Washed plastic margarine bowls or
Cool Whip bowls and lids were used to store leftovers or sent home with
visitors containing food.
Pencils were used until they
could no longer be called stubs. Used envelopes received in the mail were kept
to make grocery lists or to keep score when we would play “Muggins” dominoes.
She would look at the pictures
of clothing in the catalogues. (Before they made the migration to the
outhouse.) Pinning newspapers together, she would make patterns and sew school
clothes. Scraps of fabric and old clothing magically were transformed into
works of art as she hand stitched the different designs of thick quilts.
Newspapers were used to start
the fire in her coal stove or lit, they would singe the hair off the plucked
carcasses of the chickens or used as a catch all when cleaning fish.
Empty cans became spittoons for
my granddad when he chewed his “Cutty Pipe” tobacco. (He was a miner and chewed
to remind himself not to swallow the coal dust.) The metal Spry or Crisco cans
became shining miniature Christmas trees when they were cut into strips and
curled away from the seamed backbone of the tin. She would put a shiny ball on
the free end and a bigger bulb on the top. One year she made their Christmas
tree out of wire tight from ceiling to floor and attaching pine boughs to it.
Orange crates became table, chairs, and a small cupboard for her girls at
Christmas. Cocoa tins and small boxes became doll sized sofas and chairs when
padded and covered with bright fabrics.
Even the ashes from the wood stove could be used to make lye. The lye
would be used to blend with some of the lard from the butchered hogs to make
soap. Wash water was used to was the white clothing, then the towels and
sheets, darks, overalls and work pants, and if it wasn’t too dirty, the rugs.
The water was used to water the geraniums in her flower boxes and on the
gardens’ plants.
The only clothes dryer she knew was a length of rope and clothes pins,
making use of wind and solar power.
Yes, my grandparents were definitely ahead of the curve.
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