Elfie attends the much longed for Ice Cream Social. She's been wondering if anyone in this valley "ever has any fun?" She hopes to spend time with the handsome preacher who is courting her, but instead...

Final edits now on this sequel to Hand-me-Down Bride,

a traditional historical romance.

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"...The young men carried the oars and the girls carried baskets, and they trooped down a gravel path toward the little lake, whose surface could be seen placidly shining in the distance. They arrived at a crowded dock with many rowboats, but laid claim to three of them straight away, someone having already given a tip to the old man who was in charge.

The oars were placed and there was some giggling and jesting while the ladies were helped in. Elfie was unsure about the rowboats. All of them had water in the bottom and each was supplied with a little gourd dipper.

“I don’t want to get my feet wet!” Addy protested, flipping her fine skirts away. Her sister agreed. “These boats are dreadful old wrecks.”

“They’re what we’ve got, so let’s make the best of it,” said Dina. She appeared devil-may-care and game for anything.

“That’s my bold Dina!” A voice sang out behind them. Cutting through others who were trying to negotiate an hour or two on the lake, with wicker basket in hand and his hat at a jaunty angle, came Ripley King.

“Oh, hello Rip! At last! Which one is ours? Is that one yours?” Dina, who rarely waited for an answer, held her hat against the breeze and pointed to a boat, tied at the very end of the dock. It had a fresh coat of paint and shiny brass oarlocks.

“That’s it!” said Ripley. “Got it ready special, just for today.”

“You did not.”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out. Oh, good-day, Miss Neiman.” He grinned, touched the brim of his hat and swept a comic bow. “How pleasant to see you here!”

Elfie caught the scent of spirits as he leaned close.

“Well,” said Dina, taking Ripley’s arm, “she, poor creature, was stuck with Reverend Schwann, his aunt and uncle, and all that stuffy bunch from the Grace Church choir. I have released her to freedom!”

Elfie blushed, as everyone was now staring, but she managed a smile for Dina. “Mrs. Schwann wanted to know if your Aunt and the Judge were here.”

“Well, they are, of course. What does she think of me?”

“Of course she wanted to know, the old busybody,” said Ripley. “If there’s a way for that bunch to keep us from having a bit of fun, they will certainly find it. Come my ladies—you’ve made your escape!” He presented his other elbow to Elfie. “Let’s go take a ride in my boat.”

But when they arrived,  it too could be seen to have a scud of dirty water in the bottom. “Oh drat!” said Ripley, “that old fool said he had it all patched up. At least the oarlocks look like they’ll work.”

“I think rowboats just naturally collect water,” said Dina. “Don’t worry about it.”

At the actual moment of climbing on board Elfie was apprehensive. “It’s—so—will it—ah—umkippen?”

“What’s that when it’s in English?” Ripley chuckled.

“Tip over.” Dina explained, while Elfie nodded and studied the boat anxiously. “No, it won’t. Just don’t stand up all of a sudden or anything dumb like that. Come on, Elfie! Now that you’ve escaped your captors—don’t be a ’fraidy cat...”

~~Juliet Waldron   

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Butterfly Bride~Hand-me-Down Bride's Little Sister

 
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“Waiting for someone, Miss?” A tall, good-looking American swept off his hat in an exaggerated gesture. He had short brown hair, a tanned face, blue eyes, and a neatly trimmed moustache. He wore a yellow waistcoat with a golden pocket watch chain.

“Yes sir.” Elfie hoped the conversation wouldn’t get too complicated. She was afraid her English wasn’t yet up to it. Aunt Ilga, who had brought her from Philadelphia, had just disappeared into the crowded little station house to see if there was any message for them and hadn’t yet returned.

“Well, I’m waiting for someone, too. Perhaps,” the smiling young man leaned closer, “it’s you.”

Elfie had seen him earlier, one of a group of three, who had all come piling out of a buggy with a double-hitch of chestnut geldings. The horses were lathered, so they’d obviously been going fast. They’d arrived in a cloud of dust, practically running down a newsboy who’d been crossing the yard, just as the train had pulled in. They’d looked around a bit, and she’d noticed them just as they’d noticed her. The best looking, the one who had come over, had lifted his hat, but Elfie had turned away, pretending to be distracted by some children who were racing along the platform. 

A moment later, when she turned back, here he was, boldly walking up. She hadn’t been in America long, just a few weeks, but in Philadelphia, she’d seen his like when she’d been out walking with her Aunt Ilga. “A swell,” her Aunt would call him.  Aunt Ilga had warned Elfie about young men like him.

Elfie looked him up and down, trying her best to appear severe, but it was not an easy thing for a willowy girl who was barely eighteen to do.  Besides, she knew she looked pretty, in a green dress and with a darling new hat which sported a curled feather atop her dark brown curls.

“I don’ tink zo.”

 

 

 

“Oh—hahahaha—tink what, you adorable creature?”

 

He leaned in even closer, and Elfie took a few prudent steps back, putting her steamer trunk between them.

 

 

“Come on—tell me your name, Darlin’ and where you want to go. We’ve got plenty of room in the buggy there. Me and my friends will be happy to drive you anywhere you want to go.”

 

***

 

 

 

From a work in progress, Butterfly Bride, the sequel to Hand-me-Down Bride. Elfie arrives in Pennsylvania, and proves to be quite different from her earnest, hard-working older sister Sophie. Instead, Elfie is an impulsive beauty who turns the heads of every young fellow in the Great Valley.

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***

 

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~~~A summer time piece from my post-Civil War romance, Hand-me-Down Bride

~~On the way to the hayfields, Karl and Sophie marvel at the beauty of a blooming field of Buckwheat.

Karl watched her.  She had walked into the field, delighting in the moment, in the sun, in the sea-froth-over-sage color of the buckwheat.  He'd caught a flash of her joy; joy in the splendor of this land!

After the long and terrible war, after his illness, it had been hard to find joy in his heart at anything.   Today, Karl felt free as a swallow, flashing over the rising corn.

Sophie was framed against the light, her plain apron lifted by a firm young bosom, her dark hair wound beneath the bonnet.  Above, great clouds sailed in shattering blue, and the buzz of those thousands of bees echoed some dream space he'd been to before, the white hum of eternity.

He tied the reins to a sapling and got down. He had wanted to put his arms around her, to mold her breasts against his chest, to catch the scent of her, to drink from those rosy, undoubtedly sweet lips.  Now, he waded into the field after her, wanting even more to share her moment of happiness. 

A simple gift. . .

"Das ist schon!" Face radiant, she turned.  "It is beautiful!”

 

 

 

 

~~Juliet Waldron

 

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~~~~

 

Sophie's traveled all the way from Germany to marry a wealthy older man. She's scared and alone, but her sisters and mother are depending upon her...

 

 

~~~~

 

 

 

 

 

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...To Sophie, Karl was polite, but little more.  He hardly spoke more than a sentence or two to her during the meals that she and Divine worked so hard to make.

Dull, grim Americans! Sophie watched them eat, the line of elbows rowed up on the table. Here they have plenty to eat and they do it like pigs swilling at a trough, not a word to say.

"Could you please pass them biscuits, Wida' Wildbach?" asked one of the hands, breaking in on her reverie.

Sophie passed the wicker basket.  Karl kept his eyes on his plate, although at least he did not use his knife like a trowel as the others did. 

Once upon a time, someone taught him manners... 

"Nothin' like Mrs. D's biscuits." Karl said.

"Mrs. D, nothin'." Divine had been waiting for just such an opening.  "Why, Miz Sophie made these, while I was cuttin' de slaw."

The shoveling ceased and a line of faces, all ruminating like cattle, solemnly regarded Sophie. 

"Well, they sure fooled me." Karl became a bit redder in the face than he already was.  Yesterday he'd been out all day, up to a place called Big Spring, to look at the wheat. 

"Yes, sir.  This year I may get early to preservin', now that I kin hand off them darned beaten biscuits to someone else."

Dishes of potatoes, green beans and bacon were annihilated.  More was called for and scooped out of seemingly bottomless pots on the stove...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 ~~~Juliet Waldron

 

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HAND-ME-DOWN BRIDE

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Sophie studied her toes.  She sat on the double bed in which she'd spent the night, knees drawn up beneath her white lawn nightgown. Lifting her dark head, she gazed through a nearby window at a May morning that shone upon a blooming--but sternly regimented--rose garden.  In spite of the warm breeze, she shivered.

Then, hoping it wasn't true, for the hundredth time, she looked at the other narrow bed, the one next to hers.  Upon it lay her new husband, the rich grandfatherly man who'd paid her way from Germany, a man she'd married only yesterday.

Theodore Wildbach was quite dead.  Proper, in death as in life, he was flat on his back, hands folded on his chest. He looked like the stone knights lying in the cathedral in her home town.  That was how Theodore habitually slept, and how he'd died. Pale lips gaped inside a ring of neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard.

She'd discovered him upon awakening. She’d come close, staring, unable to believe her eyes. It was a terrible surprise, nowhere among the thousand twists of fate she'd imagined as she'd journeyed across sea and land to German Mills, Pennsylvania...

 

~Juliet Waldron
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Set in Post-Civil-War Pennsylvania, this tale of an arranged marriage is as much about family as it is about finding true love. Sophie is a sensitive young woman struggling to make sense of her a difficult past and to understand the strange ways of her new homeland. Karl is not only a veteran of the Great War, but scarred by the secret violence of his childhood. How they both learn to trust--this often-tested immigrant girl and the veteran with a chip on his shoulder--is the subject of this tender, All-American story.

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Kick Your Ass Yoga Class

I dabbled in Yoga back in the 60’s. The first thing I learned was that I was “white-man-stiff”. A naturally bad back left me unable to touch my toes, even on my youngest, skinniest day. Even the simplest yoga posture was a tough proposition for me. As a kid, I’d always tried to “be strong” even when I wasn’t. I really pushed the poses. You can imagine what I felt like the day after.

I injured my lower back. I froze my neck. I couldn’t bend down to my toddler without collapsing in pain. Even my eyeballs throbbed. After that initial experience, you better believe I approached yoga practice with deep respect for my built in limitations. I even kept it up for a few years, slowly and carefully running through a few asanas every day. The most adventurous I got was a sunrise salutation or four. The emphasis in the book I followed was on stretching, focusing, centering, and, finally, relaxing, feeling the welcome tingle of blood flowing into stiff, starved places.

Imagine my surprise when I, now an elder who has been through a couple of large surgeries, thought I’d check into my gym’s yoga class. I found that Yoga has become, over it’s years in the West, a Type A sport. Misunderstanding of what it is now is my fault, for the class I attend is at a Gold’s Gym©. I’d joined one a few years back in order to mess with the machines so that the few moving parts I had left didn’t completely rust shut. At this kind of gym--what did I expect? The first yoga class I attended destroyed me in less than 30 minutes. I had to pick up my mat and hobble out the door in utter humiliation, while I could still be sure I could drive my car.

Limping around the house a day later, I came up with “Kick Your Ass Yoga.” Joke aside, I’m still going. I found the “second best” teacher in my gym, whose class is not so full, and who is closer to me in age. She’s not the least interested in her resident “cripple,” and in my baggy sweatpants and tee shirts I’m likely an embarrassment among all the flexible Lycra Ladies in proper yoga garb. Despite that, and with an increase in my daily ibuprofen intake, I go and follow her instruction as fully as the body Nature gave me is able to do.

It is a yogic saying that "you are only as old as your spine." I hate to think how old this makes me, but at least a little practice now is a holding action. Eventually, I think, I'll feel better for it.

THE MOON AND I

It’s hard to recreate a time when there were no words, only feelings.

Moon/Tree/Clouds. These are the first things I remember. Crib slats casting black shadows on a summer smooth sheet. White face through spreading branches. Next, a perfect silver disc lending its sheen to arching branches. The sugar maple that grew behind Grandparents house was enormous.

(Perhaps it had been brought west to Ohio by a homesick Yankee.)

Of course, I knew nothing about it. All I knew was that the maple was good to see, the harmony of black and white, the leafy patterns,somehow created a sound in my head like a clear note.

I was secure. Outside the broad leaves with their sharpened edges barely moved against a velvet sky. Moon face gazed down serene; a cloud edged in rainbow and silver slipped past.

In the next room, women’s voices. They cared for me, two young, one old, getting ready for bed in the spacious bathroom on the other side of the door. It was big enough to accommodate one at the dressing table mirror, a bather in the claw foot tub, one at the sink running water--or, perhaps, even "enthroned." Indoor plumbing was the first improvement Grandpa made after purchasing his house. He had jokingly called the place “a girl’s dorm” for years, and now here I came, the newest female--the one quietly wondering in the room full of moonlight. Sleep was impossible bathed in silver, but it wasn’t frustrating or lonely. Body comfortable, I didn’t need to cry and call them to me. After all, the women were nearby--and so was the Moon.

How I Met Santa Claus

I was born at the end of the baby bust, so when I was little, for a time, before the Dad’s coming home from the war boom began, I was aware of being "special." Kids were admired, and my cousin and I were no exceptions. We lived in a pleasant Ohio town which boasted a fine liberal arts college, but which had also been home to our families since long before the Depression. My cousin's parents had a nice cape cod house just 4 blocks from where Mom and Dad and I lived. We were down by the creek, on Cemetery Street. My cousin's parents had a Cadillac, even if it was a hand-me-down one from my Uncle’s Mom and Dad, who bought a new car every two years. I mention this because they had the wherewithal and liked to “do things up right.” At Christmas, this meant engaging a Santa Claus who would visit their son--and me.

I suspected he just might be the real deal. For one thing, I was quite small the first time I saw him, not yet five.

The night before Christmas I was getting the whole “you better watch out, you better not cry,” treatment from my parents. There were canned peas for dinner, and I remember forcing the rubbery pills down, focusing on the Christmas cards hung on butcher’s twine beneath the cabinets so I wouldn’t gag.

In those days, children went to bed before their parents—-long before. Right after dinner, there was a story, a wash-up, and straight to bed. Tonight, however, in the middle of the story, I heard sleigh bells outside. My parents wondered aloud who that could be. I wanted to see, but was told to sit still. Daddy would open the door.

When he did, in came the most perfect Miracle on 34th Street kind of Santa. He was chubby and had a real long white beard, a round face, a clean red suit and shiny black patent leather belt and boots. He was even carrying a sack. My father was grinning in a way that usually meant I was being snookered, so after I croaked out a hello, I asked after his reindeer.

“Oh, Santa said, “they’re up on the roof—and you don’t have a chimney, so I knocked on the door.” Well, this seemed plausible, and from somewhere outside, I could hear sleigh bells, just every once in a while, as if the deer were tossing their heads.

Suspicion somewhat allayed, I watched him take the seat my mother offered. Next Dad picked me up and put me down on Santa’s knee. Santa was authentically cold all over, his clothes, his face, his beard, and he had a good vibe, smelling pleasantly, as older men often did in those days--of whiskey. This was a polite, low-key Santa. His “ho-ho-ho” delivered as if he meant it.

He asked me what I wanted most for Christmas, so I told him, about the “drink-wet” baby doll and the teddy bear I coveted. Outside the door, sleigh bells rang softly. It was pretty amazing, there in the light of our Christmas tree, with bright packages piled up underneath.

Then he said “Merry Christmas, Judy Lee,” and said he’d be back later. As he left, there was a blast of cold and the sound of departing bells. Again I wanted to peep out the window, but my Dad had picked me up again.
“So, J.L. What did you think of that?”

“Was that really Santa?”

Over his shoulder, I could see him trying not to smile.

Still, I was left to wonder because “Seeing is believing.” My Santa had been nice, jolly and bearded--convincing in many ways--even if I hadn’t seen him fly away. Being the kind of person I am, I really wanted to see his reindeer very much. After a little more thought, a doubt entered. It had been pretty clear that I wasn’t supposed to see him go.

My cousin was even younger than I, so about the most I learned from him was that he too had had a visit from “Santa,” and he too had heard the bells. I decided this cheerful visitor might or might not be Santa, but it wouldn’t hurt to act as if he was.



http://www.Juliet Waldron.com

(I first thought of calling this “Let Me Tell You About My Grandchildren,” but figured everyone would simply turn and run like hell.)

I’ve just returned to cyberspace from a) a trip to the great sprawl of Atlanta where my kids and grandkids live and b) a major computer crash. Both experiences are somewhat out of the norm for this screen-and-home bound senior. I treasure my visits south, getting to see the changes that have occurred up close and personal. My oldest son is always engaged in his workshop/basement, tearing old computers apart, studying academic papers posted on arcane post doc websites and building new software. He’s the 45 year old version of the little boy I caught sticking a hair pin into an electrical socket, because “I knew there was electricity in there, and I HAD to get it out.” His one and only child is just finishing her second year in college, so there are no little feet pattering in this house. When our son was small, it was the days of “Mork from Ork” and we sometimes imagined our gifted boy was from another planet. (Would he start seeing through walls or something?) Neither of his parents are as intelligent as grounded or focused as he has grown to be.

In the home of my younger son, things are far less geek-monastic. There are two daughters, one eleven and one nine, and lots of colors, clothes, dolls and a Wii, and all the other trappings of modern childhood. The youngest girl in this house also lives on another planet, but her other-worldliness is a prison. She is autistic, and appears to be pretty firmly stuck there, although, when she was small, we were given the hope that she’d be one of the lucky ones and “come out of it” because sometimes girls on the spectrum do. So little is understood about this modern epidemic of disabled children. Like every autistic child, PJ is a unique world unto herself. It’s tough to have a grandchild who does not appear to know who you are, and who does not meet your eyes. In short, unless PJ needs you to perform a task for her–make supper or get milk from the locked fridge–you might as well be invisible. This apparent lack of empathy, of the warm social bond normal between people, makes life hard for both her parents and for her big sister.

If PJ appears to love anything, it’s the computer–her Daddy has set up one for her, with appropriate links, so she can obsess on whatever kid’s show she currently enjoys. While I was there, she was interested in running the television, because she’s deep in Ponyo, an entirely hand-drawn, fabulously beautiful piece of animation from the Japanese master, Miyazaki. PJ drives the remote like a champ, finding the scenes she likes best and repeating them without difficulty. She can replay for hours, so grandmother simply sat down and watched her watching. Ponyo is a mermaid story. The fish daughter of an undersea magician wants to become human because of her love for the little boy who rescued her. Sitting there, watching, I thought the appropriate age group for the film was probably rather young, as the protagonists are very young–perhaps about 5 or 6.

PJ’s favorite scene concerns Ponyo’s accidental release of her father’s potent magic, which sets off a chain reaction of wild creation. Enormous schools of fish leap from the sea, almost drowning ships; a tsunami roars in upon the land. Ponyo, riding the leaping fish, grows feet, hands, a belly button, hair and teeth. Hurled upon the land by a great wave, she becomes a “real girl.” This climactic scene, with triumphant Wagnerian music–she’s a connoisseur of music–was PJ’s favorite. Sitting on the couch in the dim room, I experienced the rush of transformation in the visuals and in the grand and celebratory music.

It wasn’t until later, back home, that it occurred to me that this latest “obsession” was an expression of hope, a prayer from a child so locked inside herself, so unable to reach out to others, to belong to family or make friends. For a few minutes, PJ saw herself as Ponyo, riding the giant fish, leaping upward toward the sun, surfing a wave onto the land, growing the feet and hands–and the all important ability to speak–of a “real girl.”

Groundhog Ruminations

The groundhog festival seems to get bigger every year here in PA. I remember when there were only a few members of the “inner circle” with top hats, Victorian black coats and silly, fake aboriginal names like “Thunder Maker” and “Cloud Rider” up on that stage. This thing has really taken off since the “Groundhog Day” movie in 1993. The ever-growing numbers in the “inner circle” and yearly attendees prove that.

The custom comes here from German settlers, who, in the old country, may have looked for bears to awaken as a sign of spring. In southeastern PA, you can still find a few “Grundsow” Lodges, where for that morning only Pennsylvania Dutch is spoken. The dawn festival involves speeches, skits and traditional foods. Traditionally, the attendees waited at the groundhog’s burrow to see if he’d emerge. If he was awake and came out, the weather had probably been warm, and an early spring—a signal to get ready for planting--could be predicted.

Phil is now, according to Punxsutawney legend, 120 years old, but anyone can see he’s been recently replaced. His newest incarnation is a slender young groundhog who first appeared on stage a few years back. (He had a runny nose yesterday, so I'm a bit worried about his health!)

He replaced an earlier, massively obese old fellow who probably came to the end of his decade-in-captivity life span. The older groundhog was far less human friendly, and did wonderfully entertaining things, like peeing on his handlers and sometimes chewing on their gloved hands. To me these acts of defiance were an important part of the show. After all, they’d dragged the poor critter out of his nice warm cage in town and brought him out in the middle of fireworks, flashing cameras, TV lights and a host of enthusiastic people (many of them, I’m sorry to report, drunk) screaming at the top of their lungs: “Phil-Phil-Phil!”

Heck, such treatment would unnerve anybody, not to mention a poor, overweight groundhog. Of course, not being eaten after being dragged out of your warm burrow is a definite improvement over the treatment many groundhogs received in the protein-starved winter past.

February 2 is also Candlemas on the Christian calendar, a/k/a the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin. Besides that, in medieval times it was one of the “cross-quarter” days on which bills were paid, workers hired and contracts drawn, important in every long ago market town. Both the religious observance and the business deals go back even further, into pagan times. Even the most casual observer can see that the days are growing longer now, and of course, the ancients, who were formidable astronomers, had noticed. February 2, known as Imbolc in the Celtic calendar, was sacred to the red-haired Mother Goddess Bridget, who tended a magical cauldron, and was patroness of poetry, music, dance and all the “arts of civilization.” Weather prediction was part of her festival, too, as the time of the spring planting was of vital importance.

One Cat Over the Line, Sweet Jesus!

Like the 70’s song, I fear, our house has reached capacity. In fact, as of Thanksgiving, we’ve got one too many cats.

This all began when our beloved resident ex-stray and tough guy, Bob, disappeared in wintry weather. Four days passed. It was very cold, and he did not return. I’d rather keep him in like the others, but there was no way Bob would submit to being a full time housecat, so my husband and I had made the best of his wandering. Now we mourned for him, thinking that even his superior street smarts hadn’t kept him safe. In fact, I was so worried I checked in at the township police station, even though I knew a wandering cat was “in violation of township regulation” and subject to a fine.

Into this emotional turmoil came my best buddy, Patti, who feeds a few of the local strays. Onto her porch, in the twilight, had come a starving orange kitten, attracted by the dish of Purina she put out every night. She could count every rib, every bump in her little kitty spine. The kitten looked up at her with golden eyes and chirruped sweetly. Patti knew she had to rescue her.

The next day, Patti came to me with this sad little creature in a carrier. She was, Patti said, to fill the hole in our house left by the death of Bob. My husband wasn’t thrilled, but Patti bravely offered to pay all the vet bills, and to get her tested for all the kitty plagues. The first thing was to flea treat her because she was polluted. I made a place for her in one room, with box, food, bedding and water. I sat down cross-legged, and the kitten promptly climbed onto my knee, purring. She proved to not only have fleas, but a host of dog ticks which had to be removed. Later I’d discover an infected wound on her left flank. When my other cats looked in at her, she hissed and growled, imitating, I think, the meanest cat she knew, the one who had bitten her. Integration of this fierce little mite into the existing peaceful feline kingdom inside our home was going to be difficult.

As people with a multi-cat household know, behavior problems erupt if there are changes of any kind, particularly at the introduction of a new cat. Hissing and fighting—even between cats that were friends—happens. It’s “the new baby” problem in spades, with jealous “siblings” and the added difficulty of interspecies communication. (I try, but sometimes I just can’t think like they do.) Now I had the new kitty—a semi-feral survivor with a septic wound and PTS who needed lots of special handling—as well as the other three who were undergoing an emotional adjustment to the new reality in the house.

Of course, you can guess what happened next. One day after the arrival of the kitten, I opened the front door and Bob walked in, with his customary loud “MA-WOW, MA-WOW.” He rubbed against my legs, and then headed toward the communal food dish. As I watched his striped backside recede, I spoke aloud. “You didn’t call. You didn’t write. WHERE the hell have you been?”

Of course, I’ll never get an answer, but I’m too darn glad to see him to be cross. I sat down beside him and patted him while he chowed noisily, dropping food all over the floor and purring like mad. I figure he lost some lives, and I sincerely hope he will be more careful of –whatever—in future!
So things continue here with one more cat than I can easily handle. The kitten has been very sick, and to the vet for surgery. She’s begun to grow nicely, but she’s still paranoid and hissing. My days are full. I’m a little old lady cat patter, vet tech, and feline psychiatrist. The patting I’ve got down pretty well. That’s a pleasure. The rest takes time. The refrain of the old song goes round and round in my head while I scrub water bowls and cat boxes. We’re “one cat over the line.”

Major Household Appliances

The big bucks ones! As a woman, who has been for long stretches of her life, a housewife, I don’t take appliances for granted. In fact, not too long ago, “housewife” was shorthand for drudge, and we pampered modern ladies forget this at our peril. Living in an area where I can still see Old Order Amish women slaving from morning till night—in between dropping babies and attending church—and as a writer of historical novels—I’m keenly aware of the comfortable life we modern women lead.

I’m not ashamed to love my appliances. I name them, too, because they are my “serving girls.” I feel lucky, rather like a Jane Austen heroine, to have married well enough to afford them. ;)

The washer came first, while we were still in college. As I had been lugging baby + clothes + diapers to the laundromat for over a year, this was a real luxury. I earned it, too, this trendy looking brown Sears appliance, while working as a waitress, picking up the quarter tips which were standard in the early 60’s diner, while my husband minded our son, Miles, and did his college homework. We’ve got pictures of me bringing in frozen diapers from the line during a harsh Massachusetts winter, though, and it was a good while before we managed to get the space and the dollars for a dryer.

I’ve just graduated to a front loader, a Bosch. Her name is “Ursula” because she has a bearish, blockish look. She is German by design, though the salesman carefully explained she was manufactured at a plant in Ohio. I love her dearly, because she is already saving us money on water and electricity. More than that, she does a ton of laundry at a time, and has a way with deep cleaning the ground in dirt that men are champions at producing in a way the top loader never did.

A dish washer only arrived at my home a few years ago, so the thrill of loading it up and then unloading clean dishes has not yet gone away. Her name, (christened by my husband) is “Heidi,” and she is also a Bosch, thrifty and extremely quiet. I was the dishwasher for years, and vividly remember many Thanksgivings and Christmases at which I spent literally hours at the kitchen sink, washing endless coffee cups, plates and silverware for our houseguests—my husband’s brothers and sisters. I dearly loved being the “Mom” and their lively company, but sometimes it got to be a bit much, and I’d have to go into the living room, turn down the rock’n’roll, and drum up some relief.

One beneficial side effect of not having a dishwasher for all those years was that both my sons were trained early to do dishes, dry them, and put them away. They were sent on to wives quite domesticated—at least, for boys!

You notice I haven’t said much about dryers. The fact is they aren’t very interesting. They are simple creatures and don’t develop personalities the way the other appliances do. However, I thank my stars to be a woman here in the 21st Century during winter or during weeks of rain like we had last summer, as I dump Ursula’s prodigious output into the gaping mouth of faithful, careful Molly the Maytag.

Bookcases I've Loved

My mother had a charismatic English friend named Rosemary, whose home we visited during several school holidays. She lived in an rambling old stone house in the evocatively named small and ancient village of Shipton-Under-Wychwood.

In memory, my image of Rosemary has merged with Julia Child’s. Mother’s friend was a tall, fair, big-boned Englishwoman, forever engaged in day long sessions with French recipe books, standing in an enormous dim kitchen filled with arcane culinary devices and dangling copper pans. Her children were much younger than I, so they weren’t very interesting to me, a solitary teen. She also kept 6 or 7 (they milled in a group, so it was tough to count how many there actually were) long-haired Dachshunds, a breed of dog I’d never met before. They were charming dogs who liked to lie in heaps on the couch, like a fluffy, smiling pile of black and tan pillows.

Rosemary had terrific bookcases, which I was turned loose upon while she and Mom sipped sherry in the kitchen. They were full of historical novels from the 30’s and 40’s—some earlier. Here were Norah Lofts and Elizabeth Goudge with their mystical and yet oh-so-grisly- vision of the romantic past. Between those covers I discovered a burning love for the genre, and learned what a mesmerizing time travel experience a good writer can deliver. The most exotic of all the books Rosemary owned were the ones by Joan Grant: “Winged Pharoah,” and “Lord of the Horizon.” Mrs. Grant always said her “novels” were, in fact, recalled past lives. So brilliantly realized are these books that they infected me. I had dreams about them for years. They also kindled a keen interest in topics which were considered totally wacko in the ‘50’s, but are now Cable TV staples: past lives, auras, astral projection, Egyptian gods and Pharoahs, Atlantis, and so on.

Rosemary was also an expert in all these new and fascinating topics, and seemed to like to talk to me. After a few hours, I found I could enter the kitchen and talk with her about these astonishing things I’d read. The ladies, having imbibed several glasses of sherry and had their grown-up chat, were quite welcoming, even Mom, who was proud of my geekiness. I remember sitting on a stool in that imperfectly lighted kitchen, watching Rosemary turn a perfectly delicious bird into a pate, which to my kid taste buds didn’t taste half as good as plain turkey. Meanwhile, ever more dishes piled into the big sink. Spoons and glittering knives of many sizes and shapes littered the counter. The dachshunds were everywhere underfoot, begging for thrown treats and getting them, their long ears dragging across a slate floor with an authentically medieval patina of grease.

Cicada Time

Bob was sitting on the picnic table the other morning, smiling and pleased with himself. He’d been out dancing in the moonlight, even though it was unusually chilly over night. I was sitting on the bench, patting him. He seemed entirely happy, kneading air with his paws and showing me his spotted belly, playing at being a Domesticated Animal.

The first cicadas are starting in our area, the genetic misfits who awaken on the far edge of their particular Bell Curve. They don’t sing much and flame out early. When one fell from a nearby maple, buzzing like a clockwork toy unwinding, Bob leapt from the table with a bound which would have done a cougar credit and made short work of it.

(It’s humbling, the way he can tune me out. Snap! Gone on cat business!)

I suppose he ate the poor confused thing, like he does everything else. Cicadas, with heads that are pure fat, are one of Mother Nature’s most sought-after crunchy snacks. Birds adore them. I’ve even seen squirrels eat them, these winged, green-armored Doritos of the insect world. I would think the wings and feet would make for an over-ridingly icky mouth feel, but not coming from an insect-eating culture, I’m not the one to judge.

I love cicadas. When I was small, some imaginative family member told me that their wings--see-through, gossamer, etched in green--were fairy wings. I guess what I really love is their deafening song, which can be as loud as 120 decibels up close. They are one of the few noisy things in which I take pleasure. It’s Nature, after all, like waves crashing on shore. The males on my trees start; the neighbor’s cicadas shout out an answer. With the trees arching green overhead, it’s my favorite sort of chorale.