FROM WHERE I SIT WHERE DID THAT COME FROM

It’s uncanny, but guess what?   Some of my eccentricities and habits have been acquired from my Mom.  Like Esther, I tap my foot when I’m impatient and rub my first and third finger together.  I also save clippings from magazines and newspapers on our refrigerator.  Mom would affix favorite quotes, poetry and jokes with tiny magnetic fruits to our white frig at the jail.   I now find myself taping cards from friends, artwork, jokes and invitations to the front of our frig just like Mom.  She had a magnetic frig; I don’t, so I use tape.

It’s unsettling how many of our parents’ habits might have annoyed us as kids, but today we have those habits.  Who can control the “Ufda’s” and “Ya’s” that slip off our tongues?  Who hasn’t shaken an angry, pointed finger and said, “I told you not to do that”?   How many of you iron like Mom?  Remember collections popular in Mom’s day?  Evelyn Husom had a large salt and pepper collection displayed on her kitchen wall.  Mom collected china cups and saucers; now they’re gathering dust in my cupboard.  Others collected plates commerating a church anniversary or silver spoons, some with the name of a place they had visited or a gift from being a bridesmaid.  Candlesticks, china and glass figurines, teapots, and tiny vases were also collected.  Did you save Mom’s favorite, food-splattered recipes for “comfort” foods from the fifties?  Vegetable soup is simmering on my stove today, but unlike Mom’s recipe, I don’t add rutabagas.  

Mom must have had a dozen aprons.  The bib aprons protected her dress from grease splatters when she fried side pork and even acted as a hotpad to take things from a hot oven.  When girls waited tables at showers and weddings, we usually were given a fancy apron made of netting and ribbons...pretty fancy, but not very practical.  

Like many moms did when we were growing up, my neighbors Jan, Suzy and I hang laundered sheets on a clothesline outdoors to dry.  As they flap in the breeze, sheets absorb that fresh, outdoor aroma.  Climbing into a bed of those fresh smelling sheets is sure to guarantee a good night’s sleep.  We three gals are the neighborhood dinosaurs: we string the clothesline in the backyard or on the deck and hang sheets.  Perhaps several of you still have embroidered dish towels, a gift from your wedding shower, that tell us specific duties for each day of the week. Monday is wash day; Tuesday is ironing day; Wednesday is sewing day; Thursday is market day; Friday is cleaning day; Saturday is baking day and Sunday is a day of rest.  Where can we get those towels today?  Does anyone use them to dry dishes?

Esther planned her week with specific chores for each day.   Monday is Manic Monday for me: I combine the duties of several days into one so I can have several days free of duties.  I wash, dry and put away several loads of laundry, scour the bathrooms and kitchen, dust mop the wood floors, and try to get my husband to push the vacuum up and down the stairs and vacuum the rugs.  Once the house smells good and clean, on Tuesdays I can bake chocolate chip cookies, poppyseed bread and maybe a rhubarb pie or fruit tart so I’ll have something on hand to serve unexpected guests.   Mom’s baked goods would go fast: she had coffee parties most days at 10AM and 3PM for the courthouse gang.   Every other week her card club would meet.  They used to call themselves a sewing group, but as time went on, they played more cards than they sewed or knit.  Florence Vegoe had them try various crafts, but that wasn’t always successful (that project of strange bowls of sugared fruit sat on Mom’s dining table for years).

Gathering friends for coffee and cookies was Mom’s speciality.   I enjoy playing bridge and having dessert with friends every other week.  We always have one or two players who say, “No dessert for me; I’m watching my weight.”  Those thin gals usually nibble at the nuts and candy placed on the bridge table and end up eating a few bites of dessert.   After all, the desserts are irresistible!  

Mom and Gladys Charbonneau used to call each other every day to check in.  As they aged, they felt it necessary to check on their friends to know if they were feeling OK.   Calling and emailing my sister Barb and friends has become more habitual for me.  Just like Mom, weather is a prime topic as we commisserate about the frigid days, our aches and allergies, but we also like to hear what each other is reading.   Most of my pals are avid book readers.  We still read a daily newspaper, but like our kids, some are reading the news on their smartphones, IPads or computers.  A few friends have cancelled the daily newspaper and don’t watch the news on TV; they say that listening or reading the daily news boosts their blood pressure.  

Remember your Mom knitting afghans, glueing pinecones to make a wooden wreath, sewing sequins on net tablecloths and making fake fruit bowls with that sugared look?   I don’t have those artistic habits, but I do try watercolors and acrylic painting.    I used to keep a journal, like Mom did when Dad was a sheriff and we lived at the jail.  Buddy, my Beagle pal, and I’ve picked up her daily habit of taking a daily walk around the block, down to the lake or downtown to grocery shop.   

Polka music by Whoopie John was Mom’s favorite music to listen to on our Philco floor model radio.  When she was cooking supper, she’d take a break and try to get Dad to polka around the dining room table.   He’d protest, saying he had two left feet.   No polkas for me, but when I’m cleaning, nothing beats 1960’s music by the Beatles or the Kingston Trio.  

Geraniums were Mom’s favorite outdoor flowers, which she would save during the winter and let them bloom red and pink inside on wide windowsills at the jailhouse.  In her dining room windows she grew purple and magenta gloxinas.  Like Mom, I take my summer geraniums inside for the winter, and their blooms add cheer to long winter days.  

Often we don’t realize why we act the way we do.   Where did our habits come from?  As we look back on our growing up years, we’ll acknowledge we’ve inherited many of our parents’ habits.  Mom and Dad had a greater influence on us than we might think.  1108 words

From Where I Sit Nosy or Friendly Neighborhoods?

FROM WHERE I SIT     Nosy or Friendly Neighbors?   May 12, 2014

Pat DeKok Spilseth

Walking through my neighborhood, I see that Joan and Barb have been in their gardens, and Gayle has hung a spring wreath on her front door.  I hear noisy construction trucks roaring down the street with lumber for three new houses; the school bus is picking up kids for school; Kay and Dave are out walking and a few hoping to lose weight are running hoping to lose weight.  I know almost everyone in my neighborhood.  Buddy, my Beagle, is a magnet for me to meet new neighbors.  

In the small towns my husband and I grew up in, everybody knew everyone in town.  Sometimes, they knew too much.  Some folks would have preferred their business to remain private.  Neighbors were our friends: together we celebrated baptisms and confirmations with the expected treat, an “open Bible cake”.  At weddings, aunts or neighbor ladies poured coffee from the church’s elegant silver coffeepot and served plates of sandwiches of “dollar buns” with a slice of ham, pickles, assorted cake slices and mixed nuts and butter mints in pink, yellow and white.  

Our local weekly newspaper had a society columnist who called townspeople for social news.  She’d print the names of guests visiting local people in the Social column of the weekly paper, which everyone in town avidly read.  We read that paper front to back. What better way to keep up with who won the weekly raffle and meat giveaway, who got married, who died and what names were printed for city and county misdemeanors.  That’s the spot nobody wanted to see their name!  When Dave’s dad Maynard was cited for fishing without a license, he took a trip to Mpls to see his married daughter the day the paper came out.  He didn’t want to face the teasing of his pals.

Sometimes the newspaper editor got “heat” from upset readers.  When Shannon, an Irishman who came to town dressed in a kilt, published “The Green Sheet”, he reported tiffs going on in the city.  He wasn’t afraid of printing all the juicy gossip, no matter if someone important was involved.  He feuded with the editor of the local paper, which had been in existance for many years.  When that established editor/publisher was Ed Barsness, “The Green Sheet” labelled him BarnsMess.  How insulting!  Shannon didn’t garner friends, but he did report the news, at least what he considered news the public should hear.  The public was tantalized, waiting impatiently to read the latest scandal. Shannon didn’t last long in our small town, but while he was local, he caused quite a stir.

When a member of the community passed away, neighbors brought in tuna and hamburger casseroles, jello salads, chocolate, marble or spice cakes, bars and cookies.  Eveyone was a baker who used real butter, sugar and white flour.  Family and friends gathered on these occasions for comfort and support of their loved ones.  Tasty, homemade food was meant to be a comfort for those who had lost a family member or friend.  

When a barn or home burned, a child drowned or was hurt in a car accident, a family member was deathly ill or a spouse died, friends, with accompaning food, gathered to help.  No one in need was left to fend for themselves.  Neighbors gave neighbors rides to the doctor, picked up groceries, cleaned houses, and cared for the children of the afflicted.

Growing up on a farm, Dave’s dad would take the family on a Sunday drive to check out neighbors’ fields.  Who had already been planting or harvesting?  Who had new farm equipment?  Who had a brand new car?  Tongues really wagged if they’d bought a Cadillac!  My folks took a Sunday family drive to visit relatives and friends who lived in Starbuck or Brooten or out in the country near Glenwood.  Serving lunch to visiters was always expected.  We ate sandwiches with pickles; kids drank Kool-Aid, and parents drank coffee with Norwegians, tea among the Dutch relatives.  Pastries had been baked, not bought at the store.  Moms were stay-at-home moms who cooked meat and potato dinners, baked cakes and cookies, sewed our skirts and aprons, washed, ironed and cleaned the house. 

A few busybodies knew everything about their neighbors.  Country folks had certain “rings” for their phone calls.  Some “rubberneckers” listened in on other’s phone calls when they heard a certain ring, not their own.  Soon everyone knew who was dating the neighbor girl or boy, if some kid got in trouble at school or with the law, and if someone was drinking too much.   I wonder if at the fast-growing Friendship Villages in Florida neighbors are as informed as we were in small towns and the country?  

Today I live in a metropolitan city where life is different from life in the small towns where we grew up.  We don’t know everyone; many work quite a distance away from the neighborhood and are rarely home.  We found a home on a lake with friendly neighbors who worship with us at a small church closeby and shop at the local grocery, hardware and drug stores.  The public library, restaurants and banks are five minutes away.  All our needs are supplied nearby.  Like many neighborhoods, mine has a few odd ducks and some people who don’t speak to anyone; they’re very private, rather unfriendly.  In a way, that’s fortunate for those living next door.  There are no obligations.   Some neighbors are only summer residents, using their lake house as a getaway from the city’s heat.  We like living in this neighborhood near friends we enjoy and whose support we can count on, but we still have privacy.  962 words

FROM MY WINDOW Main Street Stories

In the small town where I grew up, Main Street offered all the shops one needed in the small town where I grew up. That was the place where everybody congregated on Saturday night.  There was the kids’ favorite, Potters Dime Store; mothers’ grocery shopping was done at Bob’s or Harry’s, and drug needs were filled at Setters or the Corner Drug just off Main Street.  After working in the fields all week, farmers either sat in their cars or on car fenders, smoking and visiting with other men.  Men were waiting for the “little woman” to complete her grocery shopping for the week,  and he might have an “itch” for a bit of recreation.  He could order a beer and shoot a game of pool in the low lit back room at Dick’s Recreation.   

A kids’ allowance and babysitting money was usually enough for a ticket to the movies at the Glenwood Theatre.  Usually there was a kid-friendly Saturday western starring John Wayne, Alan Ladd or Roy Rogers.  Maybe there’d be enough change to buy a box of popcorn and some Mild Duds.  A kid would sit in the balcony of the theatre and watch teenagers making out or view the thriller with a pal downstairs enjoying a double wide aisle seat.  

With a wide smile, Lee Sorset would be standing on the street corner outside Potters.  He knew everyone in town and wanted to hear their latest news.  Sometimes, on the corner of the Minton Hotel several enthusiastic purveyors of the gospel, with Bible in hand, would stop passersby to inquire, “Are You Saved?”  They were a curiousity for me as a kid, but rather frightening.  Was I saved; it was a deep thought for a kid?  Though I attended Sunday School and confirmation classes regularly, I had a few doubts...

On the northeast corner of Main Street Harry’s grocery had the best selection of candy cigarettes, big red waxed lips, tootsie rolls and coconut Neapolitan candies…even better than Potter’s Dime Story at the other end of the city block.  The candies were in cardboard candy boxes from Henry’s Candy Company and stacked just behind Harry’s checkout counter.  I loved the 3 for a nickel deals on Tootsie Roll Pops, especially the grape, orange and cherry flavors.  Sweet tarts, dots of pink, yellow and green on the long white waxed strip of paper, lasted for minutes on my tongue.  Black licorice pipes were fun to smoke, but the big red waxed lips lent a bit of glamour to my life.  Bit of Honey, wrapped in the red and yellow paper, was chewy; the pink, white and chocolate coconut squares tasted so sweet, they sometimes made my teeth ache.  I wasn’t big on visits to the dentist.  Buzzing drills hurt my ears as well as my mouth when they drilled holes in my cavities for those ugly silver fillings that Doc Gilman was big on.

Most of us will remember buying white tennies for gym class and fabric for a sewing project in home economics at Potters’ Dime Store. Wimpy’s cafe was next to the barber shop; across the street were the sweet rolls featured at the Chimes Cafe and the darkened atmosphers at Rodgers Cafe .  There was a grocery store on the southwest corner where Mrs. Sandeen clerked.  Was that grocery store the Red Owl?  Next door to that grocery was a small beer joint where little kids sat on the curb outside waiting for their parents at the bar.  So many stories, but I don’t know if Mrs. Avery, the social columnist ofThe Pope County Tribune back in the fifties and sixties, would have published several of my Main Street memories.  Dona Longaker wrote that my columns remind her of Mrs. Avery’s “Local Briefs”.

Carol Dick told us that when she was a seventh grader, her father bought a business downtown, a beer parlor with swivling stools plus the back room pool hall.  Being a teenager, she remembered how embarassing it was for her that Dad owned Dick’s Recreation.  Dona Longaker’s remembered that her dad often walked from the movie theater, which he owned, up the alley to the back door of the pool hall to play pool and smoke his Old Gold or Chesterfields cigarettes.  Hioajjjvio.l/ng no sons, he asked Dona if she wanted to come with him to the pool/ .lohoall and he would teach her to play pool.  But Dona knew that some of helr classmates might be there, maybe Ray Handorff, Dick Ziminske and others.   She felt she might embarrass herself by ripping the green felt cloth of the pool table with the pool cue.  She turned him down.

Wendy Schaub and I were too young to feel embarassed about riding our bikes in the back alley to the pool hall and going in the back door of the darkened pool hall to say hi to the guys I knew from their days at the jail.  Patiently, they taught  two  pigtailed girls to play a game of pool.  

Everyone was drawn to Main Street on Saturday night!  It was the “Happenning Place” in town.  From the cash drawing to the turkey giveaway at holidays, no one wanted to miss the week’s excitement of a Saturday night in small town America.

from where i sit A Toast To Mothers

Mother's Day has become to moms what Christmas is to kids.   As much as dads and kids look forward to mom’s holiday, they also fear Mom’s expectations.   Mother’s Day has developed into a commercialized holiday overwrought with expectations.  

I wouldn’t give up this special holiday for anything.  Best of all are the photos and cards that my little kids made in school for Mother’s Day.  Their handmade cards on colored paper pasted with sticky flower petals and a love message written with dirty hands clutching assorted crayon colors are proof that they really love me!!!  Their cards are priceless.

Hallmark makes a bundle...around 162 million greeting cards are sent, making Mother’s Day the third largest card-sending holiday in the world.  Kids and dads honor mom by treating her in various ways.  Some children may be inspired to serve breakfast in bed to mom.  As they serve microwave pancakes, burnt toast and juice, crumbs are sprinkled on the sheets and drops of spilled coffee stain her pillows.  Can you imagine what a mess the kitchen will be?  Dad may decide to treat mom to a fancy brunch, but on the holiday, restaurants are crowded with crying babies and runaway toddlers picking through the food, sampling a bite of this and a fistfull of that.  It’s usually a chaotic holiday at any restaurant.  Most women don't want brunch with a crowd of strangers.   Trust me, they want their work as a mother, their joy as a mother, their pain as a mother, to be recognized, acknowledged and honored in a genuine and consistent way. 

Few holidays succeed in disappointing mothers and striking terror into the hearts of fathers on an annual basis more than Mother's Day.  The holiday—which once served as a simple way to honor mothers—now conjures up images of disaster topped with an extra large, Hallmark card, covered with hearts, kisses and flowers, to demonstrate how much Mom is loved.  

It wasn't always this way.  Anna Jarvis spearheaded the first Mother's Day events in 1908 to honor her own mother, a Sunday School teacher and caregiver for wounded soldiers during the Civil War.  Anna campaigned zealously for the holiday to become official, and in 1914, Congress recognized it as a national holiday. Quickly the floral and greeting-card industries discovered the commercial possibilities of the holiday.  By 1920, disgusted by the prevalence of pricy cards and boxes of candy, Jarvis began urging people to stop buying flowers and cards for their mothers.  In a press release, she wrote that florists and greeting card manufacturers were "charlatans, bandits, pirates, racketeers, kidnappers and termites that would undermine with their greed one of the finest, noblest and truest movements and celebrations."   Going door-to-door, she  collected petitions to rescind Mother's Day and spent the rest of her life trying to abolish the holiday she founded.

According to Esquire's 50 Best Gifts To Buy for Mother's Day,  folks are spending around $150 per mother on anything from cards, a meal at a restaurant and flowers to extremes like an $180 Donna Karan robe or a pricey $289 designer purse

According to Salary.com, the average stay at home mom works 94 hours a week.  Mom’s daily jobs include laundry, food shopping, cooking, cleaning, making sure homework is done, driving kids to classes and getting them on the bus.  Considering all her duties, she would earn around $113,568 per year.  In addition to their daily job at home, many moms today work a 40 plus hour a week job outside the home.  A mother’s work is never done.

What about all those valuable lessons Mother teaches kids?Things My Mother Taught Me (from Splitcoaststampers)

My Mother taught me LOGIC..."If you fall off that swing and break your neck, you can't go to the store with me."

My Mother taught me MEDICINE..."If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they're going to freeze that way."

My Mother taught me ESP..."Put your sweater on; don't you think that I know when you're cold?"

My Mother taught me HUMOR..."When that lawn mower cuts off your toes, don't come running to me."

My Mother taught me how to BECOME AN ADULT..."If you don't eat your vegetables, you'll never grow up.

My mother taught me about GENETICS..."You are just like your father!"

My mother taught me about my ROOTS..."Do you think you were born in a barn?"

My mother taught me about the WISDOM of AGE..."When you get to be my age, you will understand."

My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION..."Just wait until your father gets home."

And, an all-time favorite - JUSTICE..."One day you'll have kids, and I hope they turn out just like YOU -- then you'll see what it's like."63

God could not be everywhere and therefore he made mothers.