Traditions
It became a tradition for my mom, dad, my brother Ken, my sister Kathy and me to go to our grandparent’s house for a meal on New Year’s Day.

It wasn’t the traditional New Year’s Eve foods of pork and sauerkraut; it was something a lot less traditional. My Dad would buy a couple of cans of oysters and a gallon of vanilla ice cream. He always bought the little wafer-like oyster crackers. We would take it all with us when we visited.

Granddad Miner had a small farm and had fresh butter, cream, and milk. He had lard from the pigs that he had butchered and Grandma had apples that she had canned. Grandma would bake two apple pies. Her crusts were nice and light from the lard that she used and the apples were seasoned just right for the filling.

As soon as we walked inside, my glasses would steam up. I would enter their house and be assaulted by the cinnamon-spicy aroma of the pies and the warmth of the coal cook stove in her kitchen. There would be the scent of percolated coffee adding richness to the festivities. When we appeared, the ice cream would go into the freezer and the oysters would go into a large pot with the creamy milk, butter and salt and pepper. Nothing else was needed to make a rich light soup. All we had to do was to wait and waiting was hard for us kids. The pleasantly warm smells made our stomachs growl. At least mine growled.

Grandma would get up occasionally to stir the pot. We would all watch in anticipation for her to nod that the meal was ready and were disappointed when she returned and sat back down. When it would seem I could wait no longer, Grandma would say, “Let’s eat.” There was no need for a second call when the oyster broth was cooked and ready to be served.

Grandma would use a large ladle and lift out steaming broth and a few of the meaty oysters into bowls; smaller ones for us kids, and larger ones for the adults. When the savory soup was placed in front of me I would take a deep sniff, wanting to just have a taste of it, but I knew that all had to be served and after grace was said, the crackers would be passed around to pour onto the broth.

I always wanted to lift the bowl and drink it right down, but I would take one spoonful at a time to make it last as long as I could. Besides the soup was so steaming hot, I would have scalded and blistered my throat. Grandma would ladle out a bit more to everyone until the pot was empty.

The adults would sip coffee and talk. We would squirm in our chairs wishing the apple pie and ice cream was already in front of us. But as children, we couldn’t ask and had to wait to be served.

Eventually Grandma would rise and fetch the pies. My mom would get the ice cream. Our eyes sparkled in anticipation.(Apple pie and ice cream was not a common occurrence. Grandma sliced the pies. A large wedge was placed on a saucer and Mom would scoop a heaping mound of the frozen treat on the pie. Spoons were traded for forks and the forks hovered over the dessert.

We drooled until everybody was served and then dove in with gusto. Barely a crumb was left on the plate when we were through. Tummies full and appetite sated we moved away from the table to play dominoes or Parcheesi.

Some sadness would creep in. We would have to wait another full year for the oyster stew and apple pie with ice cream.

 

Aunt Estella

Aunt Estella was a very routine oriented, excessively neat, Christian woman. I have a story that illustrates all three of these characteristics. When she had visitors who stayed overnight, she would fret until they left. It was when they left Sunday evening that bothered her most. She would fret over the “soiled” bedding until after midnight. She hated to have the dirty linen in her house.

She would wait and stay awake until a few minutes after the clock struck twelve before she began stripping the bed.  She would carry them to the basement and put them in the washing machine. She couldn’t do it ant sooner, because it was Sunday and she couldn’t do work on the “day of rest” and she certainly could not have dirty linens in her house overnight. Hanging them outside as weather permitted or tossing them in the dryer could wait until morning.

I can share another tale about her excessive neatness and her overwhelming need to have things clean, occurred one winter day. It was a cold day. She thought that her windows were dirty and that she needed to clean them. She gathered the cleaning solution, rags, and her ladder and carried them to a spot at the backside her house.

The ground was frozen and icy but that didn’t deter her. Those windows were dirty, they needed washed and she was going to clean them. She leaned the ladder against the wall of her house. The backside of her house was three stories; the basement, first floor, and the top floor of bedrooms. As she climbed near the top of the ladder, the bottom slipped on the ice and she tumbled down. She broke her arm. Crumpled on the ground behind her home, she had a choice to make; bear the pain and drag herself to the front of her house where she could be seen or to stay there, succumb to hypothermia, and die. She cradled her arm and made it into her house to call for an ambulance.

Her desire to clean and wax extended to her front porch stoop. Her front concrete stoop was coated with dark green enamel paint, which was slippery enough, but Estella would wash and wax them, making the stairs as slick as ice.

When she would finish cooking, after eating, she would immediately wash the dishes. Each time, she would wipe the whole counter and then would wax it as well.

She had a pair of parakeets until she decided that they made too much dirt. She didn’t replace them when they died, but cleaned and kept the cage. Filling it with silk flowers, the cage on its stand dominated a corner of her dining room.

The final story that shows how clean that she liked her house talks about her floors. The rooms were either carpeted or linoleum tiled. She covered the heavy traffic pathways with home braided and woven rag rugs. The rugs on the waxed tile areas were slippery, but the thing that she did to put it over the top; she covered each of the woven rag rugs with newspapers to keep the braided rugs clean. She would change the papers when they became worn, torn, or soiled.

Brown Leather Shoes

My mom Sybil was getting frustrated with my younger brother. Ken had discovered the small stream that flowed behind my parents’ house. He learned that he could wade, splash, and keep cool as he played. When he waded, he didn’t take off his shoes and socks and that was the problem. His shoes were made of brown leather. When they dried they would become stiff, hard, and unwearable.

It was then she had an idea. She decided to buy him a pair of tennis shoes. Mom said, “When he wades with the tennis shoes and soaks them, there would be no problem. I can let them dry and he can still wear them.”

The next time Mom went shopping in Connellsville, she bought a pair of low topped, blue canvas shoes for Ken. They were cute and navy blue with white laces. Ken liked them so much, he wore them home. I know my brother and I am sure that he sat in the back seat of the car and stared at them the whole way home.

The next day, Mom was looking out the back window of the kitchen and saw Ken wading in the water. She could hardly believe her eyes. Ken was splashing, kicking the water, and having a great time. The thing that surprised Mom was Ken was kicking the water and in his hand was the pair of shoes. The socks were tucked inside of them and he was barefooted.

Mom went outside to investigate. She was puzzled and asked, “Kenny, why aren’t you wearing your tennis shoes in the water like you did with your brown shoes?”

Ken’s reply was succinct and filled with childlike logic, “What, my new blue shoes!”

How can a person argue with logic like that?

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At home we got our water from a spring. The water was always cold, clear, and sweet tasting. The water was fed by gravity that flowed through galvanized pipe from the springhouse down a long slope into our home. Eventually, the pipes became corroded and needed replaced. The ditch needed to be reopened to replace the pipe. The ditch that needed opened would be about one thousand yards.

Dad would dig when he got home from work, and he would assign about five yards for Ken and I to dig while he was at work. When Ken and I took turns, it wasn’t too bad. I would use the mattock and he would spade out the loosened dirt and rocks, but Ken would get tired and do something to make me upset. I would try to retaliate and he would run into Mom and she would send me back to work and keep him in the house.

As I headed back to work, I glanced back and he was shooting me a big smile. I ended up digging the ditch myself most days. One day we came upon a rock in our part of the ditch. We tried to dig it loose, but it lay across the path of the ditch. We dug to both sides and it still extended wide on both sides. We dug the dirt off the top and dug more ditch beyond the rock, leaving it in place.

When Dad came home, he was not pleased to see that the rock was there and we hadn’t dug it out until he tried to dig it out and couldn’t. He even used a sledge hammer to try to break it into smaller pieces, but it wouldn’t break. The size of the rock was about the size of a kitchen table top and nearly two feet thick. We eventually dug the dirt out from under it and passed the new pipe beneath, leaving the rock in place.

Unavoidable

My sister, who was eight years younger than I and four years younger than Ken would occasionally wander into the bathroom when my we were standing to void into the commode. We usually didn’t lock the bathroom door. The older people in our house knew that if the door was closed, the bathroom was in use and would not come in.

One day Mom walked into the bathroom, the door wasn’t closed. Kathy was standing in front of the commode holding her “outsie” belly button and was peeing down her legs. She had seen the boys doing it. She was crying, because she couldn’t figure out why she wasn’t able to do the same.

So Mom had to take the time to explain to her that boys and girls were made differently and that she would have to sit when she went to the bathroom.

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Like most toddlers, Kathy went through a stage where she would peel off her shoes, socks, pants, and shirt. She would run through the house clad in only her diaper or her panties. When she wore her underpants, the seat would sag and be baggy. When my dad saw her, he would say, “It looks like a family moved out” because of the extra room in the seat of her pants.

Her appearance earned her the name of “droopy drawers.”

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Mom stored purses and hats in the bottom drawer of the tall dresser in her bedroom. Kathy would often go into the bedroom, pull out that drawer, and play with the purses and hats. Sometimes she would amuse herself for more than an hour. We have one picture of her with a pork-pie type hat on her head and a large purse hanging on her arm. The best part was she was wearing a pair of large framed sunglasses that had slid down and was perched on the tip of her nose.

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Talking about purses, when I was younger Mom had just bought a new purse. I don’t think she even had a chance to use it. I was younger and curious.

Taking a pair of scissors, I cut the handles. I don’t know what I was thinking of when I did it, but I cut them.  I do know that after Mom found out, I was thinking I would never do that again. She gave me a reminder that lasted for several days. She wanted me to be sure that I wouldn’t do anything like that again.

This is a correction, Kathy was the person who uttered the gardenia phrase.
Can’t You Read?

My brother Ken was always outspoken and adventurous, even as a child. He had frizzy red hair and a fiery attitude to match. One incident that comes to mind happened during “income tax season.”  Mom had a small office and helped people prepare their taxes. It was something that she had learned from my Granddad Beck. Mom’s office was a room set aside at the side of our house. It could only be reached from the driveway by walking past the front door of our house along a covered walkway.

Too many times Mom’s customers had come to the front door and knock to come inside, thinking that it was her office door. Mom finally made a sign to post on the front door directing them to her office area. The sign read, “Use other door” and had drawn an arrow that pointed down the walkway toward her office door.

Ken was at home when two older women came to have their taxes done. They came to the front door and knocked. Ken was inside watching television and ignored them.

They knocked a second time and Ken ignored them again, thinking they would soon read the posted sign and move on to Mom’s office.

When they knocked the third time, it upset my brother and set of his temper. He went to answer the knock and open the door. The ladies smiled and started to come inside, but Ken stood his ground and they couldn’t get by him to come inside.

Ken had only opened the door part way and the ladies couldn’t come inside. He said, “Can’t you read?”

They smiled again and tried to come inside after saying “Of course we can.”

Ken said, “Then read” and slammed the door in their faces.

They stood there, stunned for a few minutes and finally noticed the sign and walked down the walk to Mom’s office to keep their appointment time.

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At my grandfather’s large farm house we would usually fight to sit on a tall step stool. It was usually placed between Grandma Becky and Granddad Ray when it was time to eat and the grandchildren were there.

One day Granddad had come inside for lunch after working in the barn most of the morning. He took off his barn boots and put on his slippers. He always wore his slippers in the house. After he had washed up, he came to the table for lunch, but the strong smells of the barn were still heavily clinging to his clothing.

Kathy dragged the stool away from Grandpa and closer to Grandma instead of sitting midway between them both. Grandma asked, “Don’t you want to sit by your Grandpa.”

Kathy looked at Granddad and then he looked back at Grandma and said, “Well. He don’t smell like no gardenia.” which caused Granddad to chuckle.

A quick and amusing sidebar, my grandmother always bought Grandpa a new pair of slippers for Christmas. She had my mom to always shop for the same type of brown leather slippers. The reason that Grandma had my mom do the shopping for Granddad’s slippers was that Mom had the same shoe size and her father.

OOPS
We were shopping with our mom, Sybil at a large grocery store in Connellsville, Pennsylvania.  We were walking along side of the shopping cart occasionally asking for something that we saw like all kids do. Kathy, my younger sister was reading the products as she walked along; “Toothpaste, Kleenex…” she paused and then asked, “Mom, what are tampoons?”

                My mom stopped, leaned over, and hissed into her ear, “S-h-h-h, I’ll tell you later.”

                We finished our shopping. Kathy was quiet. She stopped reading the products and seemed contemplative. She said nothing more. Mom paid for the groceries and pushed the cart to the car. We helped to unload the cart and then climb into the car for the drive home.

                Mom hadn’t much more than exited the parking lot when Kathy asked, “Mom, what are tampoons?”

                Mom’s answer was the same, “Kathy, not now, I said I would tell you later.”

                I never knew what mom told Kathy later, but I am sure that Kathy reminded Mom to tell her what tampoons were.

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                My first child Amanda went through a stage where she became a vacuum cleaner and picked up anything that was on the floor; lint, a piece of thread, a bit of paper. She would carry whatever she had found and carry it to the nearest adult and hand it to them. She was toddling around in her diaper looking for things to collect.

                Most of us had gotten into the habit of holding out our hand and take it without looking.  One day when we were at my parent’s house, Amanda had been picking up things and giving them to Kathy. For some reason she had singled Kathy out as the recipient of her gifts.

                Amanda toddled over to Kathy and held out her find for Kathy to take. Kathy was talking and instinctively held out her hand. When Amanda deposited her “treasure”, Kathy thought it felt heavier than what Amanda had been finding.

                Kathy stopped talking and looked in her hand. It was a turd. The bowel movement must have fallen out of her diaper and she picked it up off the floor, carried it across the room, and handed it to her aunt Kathy.

                Now my sister, Kathy always looks before she accepts anything from a kid.

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                The next story involved my daughter Amanda again. She was a bit older and we went to my parent’s house for lunch after church. Amanda was carrying around her small purse. She opened it and took out a little white tube. She was rubbing it across her lips.

                My wife Cindy being curious asked, “What do you have Amanda?”

                “Iptick.” (Lipstick.)

                My wife said, “Thank goodness she didn’t take it out in church.” The “Iptick” was a  tampon in a plastic holder.

Oh Poo

I was driving in Mount Pleasant with Anna my daughter in the passenger seat. We were stopped at a traffic light and saw a car coming in the opposite direction. It slowed and stopped on the other of the stop light. When I looked at the windshield, I thought that I could see the silhouette of the driver with sun glinting off the surface of the sunglasses she was wearing. The way the sun was shining, the inside of the car remained dark and only the glasses stood out.

I turned to my daughter, sharing my thoughts with my daughter, saying “All I can see of the driver is his sunglasses and it looks like his eyes are glowing.”

Anna replied, “Yeah, but I can see her silhouette too, but her eyes do look like they are growing.”

When the light turned green and the car started to pull forward, the angle of the sun on the windshield and the silhouette of the woman disappeared and the so did the glasses. What did appear was totally unexpected.

The sun on the windshield revealed that a bird had crapped on the windshield and there were two splotches of white poop positioned exactly in front of the driver’s face. It looked exactly like the mirrored lenses of a pair of sunglasses.

I think the thing that amazed me the most was the poop was directly in front of her face and that she could see around it to drive her car.

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Another story that includes poop involved my dad. He had been outside working, probably washing his car or mowing the grass. He decided that he would go back inside after he had finished. He walked up a small hill beside of the garage. When he came into the house he was upset. A bird flew over while he was walking up the hill and dropped a load on my dad. Not only did the bird poop in Dad’s hair, but managed to put some of it inside of his ear. The poop was white, runny, and plenteous. Dad made short work of it. He headed directly to the bathroom and scrubbed until it was all gone.

Like the old adage, “Aren’t you glad cows don’t fly?”

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Okay, since we are talking about poop, I will tell a hunting story. Ken, myself, and our dad were hunting in our usual place near Somerset, Pennsylvania. We had taken Dad there for years. Dad walked to his spot and saw hunter’s orange in his area. He changed direction and sat nearby. The orange was in eyesight. All day long Dad sat and watched for a deer. Dad didn’t see the orange move all morning. When he left the area, he walked closer so he could see the “hunter.” What he saw was something odd. What he saw was just a hunter’s hat. The hunter had apparently taken a dump and had used the hat to clean his bottom and left the hat behind. Dad hadn’t walked down to his spot because of a phantom hunter.