Easter 2012

For Easter I was going to put a picture of an Easter Basket out on facebook; the kind the Easter Bunny left when I was a kid. There was a problem with that...there was nothing close in all the pictures I found on Google. We didn't get movies or toys, we got eggs and candy. Generally we each got a large coconut creme egg that mom bought from school or a hollow chocolate bunny. There were the eggs we colored the night before that usually became egg salad within a day or two. And of course there were jelly beans. I'm not talking about the designer jelly beans that became so popular during the Reagan administration; I'm talking the cheapest jellybeans a mom on a budget could buy. There were some small chocolate or coconut eggs along with some speckled malted milk ball eggs that were thrown in to round things out. These were all lovingly placed in baskets made with straw or colored plastic strips that were padded on the bottom with crumpled newspaper that was then covered with pink, green or yellow cellophane straw. As kids we were thrilled to get these baskets but most kids today would find them lacking.  


And this I posted on facebook yesterday. I'm including it here for those of you who don't do the whole social media thing.
When I was a kid Easter was the one holiday we could count on my father being home for the day. I guess from about the time I was 7 or 8 we would go to church and then we would take a series of buses and trolleys and to go visit my Great-aunt Katie. She was a nun and was stationed at in parish in No. Philadelphia. The convent she lived in was a series of 3 or 4 connected rowhouses that had a connected and enclosed front porch. My mother would dress us all in our new clothes and the nuns stationed with Aunt Katie all made a fuss. We would go to the music room and hit the piano keys or take one of the rockers on that front porch and rock it till it moved from one end of that highly waxed floor to the other. When we left the convent we went out to dinner and then rushed home to get to our Easter baskets.
I hope all of you have happy memories to look back on this weekend.


One other thing and I'm gone...   Today is April 7th. It would have been my parent's 65th wedding anniversary. My dad has been gone since 1976 and my mom passed away in 1993. They gave me a some wonderful gifts. The best gifts being Eileen, Skipper and Karen. I love my parents and think of them every day. Every year for Easter and Mother's Day my father bought my mother an orchid corsage. If things work as I hope they do you'll see a picture of one with this post.  

HAPPY EASTER ALL!!!!!!!!!!!

Hammerstein

Earlier today I was listening to some music from Broadway shows and I was struck by the fact that Oscar Hammerstein II was responsible for so may of the songs we consider standards or are so ingrained in our culture we forget that someone had to actually sit down to write them.

Oscar was the man who introduced us to the "possible" love song. In "Show Boat" he gave us "Make Believe" and in "Oklahoma" he  gave us "People Will Say We're In Love" and we can't forget "If I Loved You" from "Carousel". The man could take the yearning for love in a human heart and put words to it. How gifted he was.  

The last song he wrote was for "Sound of Music" and it was "Edelweiss". Most people actually believe it was an old Austrian folk song when in reality those words came from the fertile imagination of Mr. Hammerstein.

The next time you listen to any music think about the work of the people who sat down and figured out how to get the words and the notes you're hearing melded to make a song. And it makes no difference the type of music. Opera or Rap someone has to come up with an idea and then get it down on paper or the modern equivalent thereof.

Oh, and if you have any doubts about the the man's talent just read the words. The music is beautiful but the lyrics stand on their own. Here is some of "If I Loved You". The man knew the human heart.

                                                                  If I loved you,

Time and again I would try to say

All I'd want you to know.

If I loved you,

Words wouldn't come in an easy way

Round in circles I'd go!

Longin' to tell you,

But afraid and shy,

I'd let my golden chances pass me by!

Soon you'd leave me,

Off you would go in the mist of day,

Never, never to know how I loved you

If I loved you.

Rain Boots & Umbrellas

So earlier today we got one of those catalogs in the mail. You all know the kind, purporting to be 'gifts' and full of those 'as seen on TV' products. One of the things in the book really took me back. Rain boots for women, we called them 'raindeers'. We wore them over our shoes and they were almost clear, sort of frosty, and they had a little loop on the side to close them over. Remember the days when a well dressed woman would never dream of going out in the rain and allowing her dress shoes to get wet? Men too had slip on covers for their shoes and they were commonly called rubbers.  I know I went through more than a pair or two of raindeers when I was in grade school. Back in those days the nuns would check to be sure your feet were dry on rainy days so you better have your rain boots.

And thinking of rain boots made me think of umbrellas. I used to love to walk through the ground floor of Gimbel's Department Store on Market St. and stop at the umbrella display. There were solid colors as well as beautiful prints with wooden and heavy plastic handles in all manner of colors and designs. In a rack of 20 or 30 umbrellas no two were alike. A good umbrella was upwards of $20. and in the late 60's and early 70's that was a lot of money. I remember when the first clear umbrellas came on the market and they were great cause you could keep your head totally covered and still see your bus coming down the street.  

I don't know what happened to those boots and umbrellas that used to protect us from the rain. Can you imagine a teenager today who would prefer to use an umbrella instead of getting wet or imagine anyone under the age of 40 who would wear a pair of boots to keep their shoes dry. Folks would rather carry a good pair of shoes and wear an old pair out in the rain or snow and change shoes.

Ah well it was just another of my YOU KNOW YOU'RE GETTING OLD moments and I thought I would share.  

Buying Shoes....ARRRGHHH!

My sister has been having a hard time lately finding shoes that will help her get through the day with as little discomfort as possible. She suffers from fibromyalgia and does childcare so she spends most of the day on the go and in pain.

You would think that with all the different shoe companies around that make walking or shoes for all kind of specialized activities it would be easier. It's not. The main problem lies with size.

Now you need to understand that the women in my family have big feet. I wear a women's size twelve and my sisters a ten and a half and a ten respectively. The manufacturers of women's shoes stop half sizing at size ten. Did you know that? Did you know that women who wear larger than a size ten pay more for their shoes than our sisters with smaller feet?

Forget really high fashion styles. I'm talking your normal athletic footwear. We used to call them sneakers but they're so much more than that these days. If you can find sizes over 10 you might pay $5 to $10 more for them. Hush Puppies is a very popular brand and finding anything over an eleven for a woman is difficult. Very difficult if on top of having big feet lengthwise you also have wide feet. It becomes impossible. I was just checking out Rockports and their women's shoes go to 11's but men go to size 16. For the longest time I bought men's shoes from them. You can't tell me that they have machinery that can make a man's but not a woman's shoe.

We women are crazy that we allow shoe companies to walk all over us (pun intended). If your feet are narrow you pay more. If you wear a very popular size you pay more. If you wear a large size you pay more. If you want a well made dress shoe you not only pay more you are talked into wearing shoes that can cause injury to your back or ankles just because they might be stylish. Would any man worth his salt be talked into wearing shoes that elevate his height 5 inches so his legs and butt would look better?  

Ah well that is my rant for today. I hope you all have a good night and a good day tomorrow and that you think about this blog the next time you buy a pair of shoes..

Rudeness at a Funeral

Every once in a while you meet someone who has so little regard for you or your feelings that you can simply turn your back on them and walk away without getting angry or upset because you know that they are not worth the energy those feelings would create. Recently I was with some people like that and I just have to get it off my chest.

Last week my siblings and I went to Williamsburg to lay to rest my mother's youngest brother. He was a great guy who loved his family and he had lived a long and (except for the last six months or so) a wonderful life.

My Uncle took accelerated courses in high school so he would be able to serve in the Navy during WWII. The war ended while he was in boot camp so he spent four years stateside as a medical corpsman. When his enlistment was over he found a job in sales and loved it and was a salesman for his entire professional life.

My Uncle married and had 3 children; a son and two daughters. He considered being a father his best and greatest accomplishment. His first marriage failed for a number of reasons and he remarried and was very happy. His wife had two daughters that he adopted when they were adults.

This was a man who worked longer than necessary to provide for him and his wife an idyllic retirement. They lived in a lovely and exclusive community in Williamsburg and by anyone's definition lived the "good life".

In the last six months his health failed and the health of his wife is also not what it should be. (Let me interject here that my Uncle and his wife were both 83 years old.) Her daughters seemingly began making all the big decisions regarding his health care and finances. My uncle, when he was lucid, was not very happy with how things were going but because of his failing health was unable to do anything to make the situation better. My cousins, his son and 2 daughters, did everything they were able to do to make things better for their father but they live 350 miles and 6 hours away and were stymied at every turn.

Now when "steps" are involved it has always been my practice to take things with a 'grain of salt' figuring that not everything is as black and white as they seem. These women and their blatant rudeness have certainly opened my eyes where they are concerned.

When I went into the wake the other night and I was ignored I gave 'S' the benefit of the doubt when I said hello and she ignored me. I explained who I was and she told me that she knew who I was and then continued to ignore me as did her younger sister. This was no great loss to me. They are not a part of my life and I don't need them to validate my existence.

The thing that has my blood boiling was that they ignored my other Uncle. The 85 year old who was burying his little brother. These two women ignored him and did not say one word of condolence to the man even though they rode to and from the cemetery in the same car. They whispered in the back seat of the limo and ignored his presence when they could. When my Uncle wanted to give a eulogy at the graveside they did that eye roll thing that we all know too well. My Uncle may not have seen that but one of my siblings did. My Uncle was able to make his farewell remarks despite them.

My mother and her brothers were orphaned at very young ages. They had only themselves. After their mother passed away they were sent off to boarding school. At the time my mother was 13 and her brothers were 7 and 5. They lost their father 7 years later. Because of the gap in their ages my mother was not able to spend as much time as she would have liked with her brothers. They were on their own for their years in school with only each other to count on.

When my Dad died 35 years ago my uncles both stepped up and played greater roles in the lives of me and my siblings. When my Mom passed away 19 years ago they were both devastated by her loss. To loose my Uncle was difficult for me but what it must have meant to his surviving brother is almost incomprehensible.

My cousins have lost their Father and I know how that feels but loosing a parent is something that you expect in the course of life. What you don't expect is the rudeness of the people who say they are sharing that grief with you,

Someday in the not too distant future these two women will be mourning their mother. I hope when that happens the people around them have more concern for their feelings than they have shown to others this past week.

Watching TV

I was born in 1948 and don't remember a time when there was not a TV in my home. It has been a constant in my life. The TV was tuned to the Today Show when I was getting ready for school in the mornings and we watched soap operas when we came home for lunch. I learned how to do homework while watching TV. When I turned 13 I was allowed to stay up to watch the shows that came on at 10:00 pm. (The trick with that was I had to be able to get up on time the next morning or I couldn't stay up for a few nights.)

Now you should understand that my parents were night owls. My father was a bartender who didn't get home from work until after 2:00 am. My mother had been a nurse before she got married and was very used to staying up and getting by on not a lot of sleep. And with no husband around at night the TV and telephone were my mother's friends.

I can remember before starting grade school that if I woke up before my mother went to bed she would let me come downstairs with her and we would bake muffins (from a box mix) and watch the late movie on our local station. Ed McMahon (pre Johnny Carson) was the local announcer who would introduce the movie and do commercials. Once the movie was over so was the broadcast day and the station would play the national anthem and go to a test pattern.

I remember a lot of trivia about TV. I remember "Winky Dink" where you had a film that went over your screen so you could crayon on it as part of the program. I remember Miss Frances and "Ding Dong School". I remember 15 minute soap operas at lunchtime and I remember it being a big deal when they went to 30 minutes and then 60 minutes. I remember the reason I wanted to stay up late was to watch Vince Edwards as "Ben Casey". I loved Richard Chamberlin as "Dr. Kildare". I remember a series called "Circus Boy" with Mickey Dolenz (who later became famous as a Monkee). I remember a news report about a fire at Lady of the Angels school in Chicago (and the fire drills we had in school after it happened). I remember Arthur Godfrey, Dennis Day and Queen for a Day. I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis and Peyton Place and a presidents assassination.    

The thing is I remember a lot of TV's past but a lot of what I see now barely leaves a ripple in my consciousness. Back then we had 3 channels and it seemed like there was always something worth watching. Now we have more than a hundred channels to choose from and most of the time there isn't a lot to choose from. A cousin of mine wrote today the he had spent an enjoyable hour watching reruns of "The Rifleman". It was a boyhood favorite of his and he really had a good time watching it. So with cable he was paying to watch a show that was more than 50 years old that cost him nothing to watch when it was new.

My problem is not with cable. My problem with TV today is the lack of imagination in programming. We are inundated with cheap reality TV. Really..."The Bachelor"? They couldn't come up with something better? I remember "The Defenders" and "East Side West Side" and "Naked City". Surely there are talented writers out there who can come up with a plot line and script. That would put actors and grips and studios back to work on something that the public will watch.    

We are the public. If we don't watch what the networks put on they will be forced to come up with something new. Let the programmers know that ""We're mad as hell and we're not going to take it any more".       

If all else fails turn on some music and read a book. Your imagination can cast anyone you want in the lead role and you can go to a library and borrow a book about anything that interests you for nothing.

Don't watch what you don't enjoy just to fill up time.

Bye for now!  

 

What can you live without?

Last night, for some reason, I was thinking about a survey group I participated in a number of years ago. It was one of those instances where you walk into a mall and someone comes up and asks if you have a few minutes to answer some questions. Well it turned out to be a bit more involved and I wound up returning to that mall for 2 or 3 weeks to answer questions and watch videos. The question we eventually focused on was if we could give up music for 30 days. A few of the participants initially said yes but then we were asked if we could do it over the Christmas Holidays. Not one out of the dozen or so of us taking part would agree to that; even when they offered to pay us.

So thinking of that made me think...is there anything in my life I could do without for 30 days? There is a lot more to choose from now than there was back then. Could I leave my cell phone behind? No, there might be an emergency where it is needed. Computer? TV? CD's? iPod? Microwave? Kindle? Nook?

I guess that if I absolutely had to do without I could handle a month without everything mentioned above. I wouldn't want to but I could. I could live with out a computer because they still do print newspapers. There would still be radios for music and movies and plays for entertainment. I could use my regular old land line phone to keep in touch with my friends & family. The stove and oven still work so I wouldn't starve. As for books...they are still printed and available in brick and mortar stores and libraries.

The thing is that all those things that we could live without do make our lives pleasant. My grandmother lived without all those things (well she did have a TV for the last 40 years of her life) and she would think that all these things were absolutely frivolous.  But I can only think that popping a meal in a microwave to heat it up would have been easier on her than having to heat up leftovers on the stove or in the oven. My mother would have adored cell phones and computers. I love being in touch with people via facebook. I touch base with people from my past and I meet new people who bring light and laughter into my life.

So think about what you would give up for 30 days. What would the impact on your life be? And here is something else to consider...most of the things I've mentioned living without have only come into our lives in the last 25 years or less. Can you imagine what might be on that list 25 years from now?