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Remember When

  • Remember When: Telephones have evolved, and I haven’t

    My first recollections of a telephone were as a child.  The instrument was black and stood like an old outside water spigot, with a large round head that you spoke into. To listen, there was a round cylinder hooked to a black cord attached to a hook, which you jiggled to make contact with the operator, also known as “central.”

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  • Remember When: Depression was ending, and I plotted to get a bike

    I wasn’t the dumbest kid on my block, because I had been taught to read the newspapers at an early age. Maybe I didn’t grasp everything in print, but I could tell that America was getting back on her feet at the end of the Great Depression.

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  • Jaw drops open: Available funds are not available

    On my 83rd birthday, I was knee deep in banking problems. At my age, I should be running (make that hopping along) after pretty girls and checking out new  sports cars. But not this day.
    Some years ago, my bank convinced me to move into the computer age. You’ll no longer be bogged down with reams of bank statements and canceled checks, they told me. With just a few strokes on the keyboard and remembering the proper passwords, I had all my banking stuff at my fingertips.

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  • Icy weather was more complicated in old days

    Recently I described my Chesterfield Avenue neighborhood as two-story wooden framed homes with wide, breezy porches. Well, that’s not the whole picture.
    The television variety of weather folks didn’t exist back in the days of my youth. In fact, television didn’t exist. We got our weather predications from the Esso Weatherman on WBT radio out of Charlotte.

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  • Black window shades, tin-can drives, meals for passing soldiers

    Do you recall school auditoriums where speakers came and told us all kinds of stuff?
    At Chesterfield Avenue Grammar School, we had touring magic shows, the dental show where we all got a new toothbrush and a  tube of Ipana Toothpaste. We had morning chapel, sang “Onward, Christian Soldiers” and closed our eyes for a fast prayer to help get us off the hook for the evil we had done, were doing or maybe were about to do. Seems like the third grade always had a class play filled with silly songs and tap dancing.

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  • My big fib in defense of Lancaster

    Now my mama wouldn’t approve of me sharing this chapter of my life with folks. The reason being that it was a great big fib to begin with.
    She might not mind, though, if she saw all the news stories a few years ago about how down and out Lancaster had become, with Springs gone, high unemployment and such. It was spread all over television and in the papers.

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  • Remember When: Whole town reined in every child

    Usually, my great-grandson, Steven, spends the weekend with us. To be more specific, he spends his weekend on our computer.
    I have no secrets in cyberworld. Steven has unlocked my passwords, and in doing so, he has unleashed a stalking tiger. As his granny says, “Well, you let him do it, so don’t complain.”
    This boy is only 8 years old, and we do our best to protect him from unsavory individuals and web sites.

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  • Mothers make the best snow buddies

    Oh boy, what a surprise! I knew it was cold that day as soon as I popped my bare feet on the cold bedroom floor. The windows were glazed over with beads of moisture. That always happened when it was colder outside than in our house.

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  • Store rambling can make your mind ramble, too

    Well, I didn’t get that flu shot as early as I planned. It’s no wonder the sniffling, snorting and lousy feelings have just about gotten the best of me and my bride.
    Out of Klennex, push came to shove and I made the trek to the Walmarts.  

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  • Mama’s spring bell is ringing

    There is one thing for sure, spring cleaning comes every year whether you live on a dirt road or a paved road. If doesn’t play favorites, either.
    Seems like mamas and aunts have some kind of little bell built inside of ’em and when the trees bud and the wild onions sprout, that bell starts clanging and there is work to be done.
    Old Man Winter’s cobwebs, dust and mildew are gonna get wiped away.

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