The Olden Days

So much for depending on our weatherperson's predictions because the rain was supposed to stop sometime around the hour of eleven last night, but while driving to work this morning, it was still drizzling out.

Thinking it was going to be a slow day after yesterday's chaos, it continued to burn on with phone calls and drop-ins, along with my having to get some information gathered and emailed out to various parties regarding a closing that's coming up.

My dear friend stopped by the office for a nice chat, and as always, we end up on subjects most refrain from talking about because of how 'careful' our general public has become over being as 'vanilla' as possible, just so a feeling or two won't get hurt, and believe me, in these times, if you happen to say something to one of the 'uppities' in our City, they'll be grinding an axe for you on into perpetuity.

She mentioned something that's supposed to be talked about in a scheduled City Hall meeting in regards to a planned apartment complex that's on the drawing board which would be built on that chunk of land the city owns which is catty-cornered north of Fareway grocery store. Knowing that piece of land quite well, it'll likely be another ticky-tacky apartment house similar to what's on the south 'bend' of Hwy 65, so if it gets approved, we'll have one on the north 'bend' of Hwy 65, and one on the south. I couldn't help admitting our dear city 'planners' are trying to get out community to have the 'texture' of Fort Dodge. It's been years since I've driven thru that similar-sized city to ours, but the stories I've been hearing about it, aren't anything like what I remember. Truth be told, I wasn't there since the time Gates Department Store was closing its doors and selling everything at bargain basement prices which was a very many years ago.

We also talked about how little those in our general public have studied World and American History, which is a shame because those who're ignorant of past events, unknowingly allow the same mistakes to happen once more, and believe me, we're definitely on a path where there's gonna be some history repeating itself because the ingredients are now coming together.

With it having been well over a year since I'd posted any photos out of that thick photo album which was gifted to me a number of years ago, I decided to go back thru it and start cherry-picking some worth sharing, and tonight's is one of them.

It's been said that black and white photos tend to show more 'soul' of whatever's being photographed of which I'm in agreement, so when you study tonight's close enough, you'll get even more of a 'feel' of what life was like back in the 1940's. Be sure to get a good look at the refrigerator's compressor which is mounted on top. Oh, and don't forget, those refrigerators had real metal shelves which were pull-outs. There's no doubt those appliances were built to last, and believe me, I know for a fact we still have them purring away in homes right here in River City. The upside of them, is how quiet they run, but the downside is they have to be defrosted on a regular basis. I've found that the ones that are in near perfect shape, sell for pretty pennies, just like the many other vintage items from those times. You may also notice that back in those years, they didn't have pre-cooked and packaged food products, which meant more people had wholesome home-cooked evening meals.

For whatever reason, we also ended up talking about making lye soap which my mother would make on occasion, and only because of how much better it worked on keeping her whites sparkling and smelling nice because she'd always add a little sassafras oil when making it, just so her wash would smell all the nicer. Way back in the times of our Settlers, they'd make their own lye soap from the ash of hardwoods and rendered fat. Yes, there've been many self-reliant recipes from the olden days which have been long-forgotten.

Tonight's One-liner is: Our lives began with waking up and loving our mother's face.

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