MODERN CONVENIENCES AND SOME EPITHETS

MODERN CONVENIENCES AND A FEW EPITHETS We all love our modcons and I am remembering a few from my history. The winter of 1947 was brutally cold. Dad was working in Gooding. They lived in a small house heated with a wood stove. Mom told me that one of my first ever bath was in a container of warm water sitting on top of the wood stove. Yum, steamed baby. I became acquainted with freeze dry clothes the winter we lived in the Bishop house, also heated by a wood stove. My job was to bring in the laundry, usually diapers. I would bring them in and stack them near the stove where they thawed perfectly. I then folded the diapers for use. The first ever washing machine I ever saw was at Grandma Horn's. There were three containers, the first was a tub with an agitator, the next was a tub for rinse water, a wringer and a tub where the wrung out clothing fell. The water had to be heated elsewhere. Grandpa Horn would go light the water heater which was located in the storm cellar. Then hot water was available through the taps in the house. I was fascinated by the wringer. All drying was confined to a line where it was hung to dry. Mom's most efficient line was where several lines were strung around a line that held at least fifty pieces of clothing. This was located at their Boise Cascade home near Mill Road in Emmett. Another device that is very oldfashioned was a good grinder. It was metal with several sized blades to use for which ever size of grind was wanted. The most common use was for grinding whole cranberries and one whole orange for the long time family favorite; cranberry, orange, black cherry jelly, celery, walnut. This makes a terrific turkey sandwich for left overs. The other use was for meat. I came home from school one day and a large gray thing was on a plate. I asked what it was and Mom told me it was tongue. Ugh. She boiled it, peeles it, ground it up with onions, dill pickles and mixed with Mayo. It made a very tasty sandwich spread. I am getting kind of hungry. The other kids at it up as.” they had never seen the original. Mom would save up chicken parts, back, wings etc for chicken noodle soup. She would make noodle by putting a pile of flour on a board and mixing in some eggs. This was then kneaded, rolled flat and cut into noodles. The noodles were then dried on newspaper in one of the bedrooms. For years, I thought that was where noodles came from. They were delicious! Epithets: My great grandfather was named Issac Newton Horn. When ever Mom visited Missouri as a youngster she would read the newspaper to him as he was illiterate. One time at dinner, he exclaimed, “Give me some of that there lickum dabby.” Another Missouri relative was displeased with the state of her daughter's underwear. “Julia, I do believe you have a buzzsaw in your ass!” Lastly, there was a local dance being held. It was well attended. One of the dancers was a large, tall, redheaded woman who was a vigorous dancer. She slipped and fell on the dance floor. One local wit shouted. “ There is a big red down in the herd!”

2022 Christmas Letter

2022 Christmas Letter: Seasons Greetings Beloved Family and Precious Friends. I have reviewed my book for this year. I had lots of odd dreams all about various aspects of self. I have chatted a few times with Aunt Wanda. She recently had Covid and only had symptoms of a sinus headache. Thank goodness for vaccines. I asked her if she knew the entire story about when Dad ran away from home. Yes, she did. He ran away when ge was 13, rod his bike to Ontario, sold it for enough money to buy a ticket to Minnesotta. When he got there, Grandpa Rose called Charlie Berglund to let him know that Ralph had gotten there. Charlie asked him send him home on the train. Dad stayed for the harvest. Grandpa Rose took him to the train. Dad changed the ticket to New Orleans. He stayed there for a few days. He got picket up for vagrancy. The judge decided to keep him for a few days. He took Dad to the station and bought him a ticket to Idaho. As soon as he left, Dad cashed in the ticket and stowed on board a freighter. The ship went through the Panama Canal. I am sure he was putl to work. I am not sure where he deboarded the ship, I think San Diego. At any rate he got home okay and had quite an adventure to tell. Numbers: I did not learn mu numbers at home. So I had to cheat in first grade. I remember asking a class mate how to make an eight. Yeah, it wentn downhill from there. Brother Phillip got interested in Ancestry.com. He looked into Nellie Rose Berglund. She had people from Canada. How about that? When the Berglunds lived in Boise, Aunt Wanda told me that Dad sold newspapers downtown and told people he was an orphan and really needed the money. Jeez! In May, I did a stupid. I packed at Davita, locked the car and started to walk. The car started rolling backward because it was not in park. Instead of waiting for it to stop rolling, I decided that I must chase the car. I got the door unlocked but slipped and fell, banging my forehead on the pavement and breaking my glasses. A lady asked me if I needed help, yes, I can't get up. They called the EMT folk who decided I needed an MRI. As a result, they found a subdural bleed and I was transferred to OHSU. Whee! Met some cool people. Tim rescued me the next day. I no longer chase cars. I was hoping that the subdural bleed had knocked out the petit mal. But no, I managed to lose my gray sweat pants, underwear, cami and sweater. They were in the laundry basket. I simply forgot that I put them there. Sigh... A week or so after that I got my very first ticket. City Cop pulled me over, I was going 36 mph in a school zone. The ticket was for $165. Had to write a paper check. Traffic school was not available. Won't be slacking off like that again. Merry, merry everyone, I love you! Royce

SHAVING

“ SSHAVING Two years ago, this past September, my sister, Gale and her MIL, Joanne came to visit. They brought the Golden pup who was a big hit in the neighborhood.! One day we were having lunch at Shark Bites nd the halibut fish and chips with malt vinegar was delicious. At one point, Joanne asked why I did not have more facial wrinkles. I looked at her and said, “I shave faithfully every day.” Gale nodded in agreement. It all started when I was 35, it was at my Grandmother Horn's funeral. She ws 93 and had died of ascending cholangitis after having her gallbladder removed. Side note, I worked at St. Al's in medical records. Her autopsy report came across my desk. This was way before HIPPA and confidentiality did not preclude reading family records. At any rate the autopsy showed her great vessels as clean as a whistle. I hope that I inheirit her constutition. Back to the funeral, my sister Ellen pointed at me and said, “Ok, look, Roucie is growing a mustache.” That was the end of the mustache. I did ask my doc for a test to rule out hirsutism by tumor on the pituitary. Yay, negative. So, I now have smooth facial features, but all other loose wrinkly, hair skin is other wise out of view.

ON THE ROAD

ON THE ROAD We were a traveling family until I reached fourth grade. Dad owned several trailers, the largest of which was a Great Lakes 12 wide by 50 feet, if I remember correctly. We lived in a lot of trailer parks. We lived in Baker City for a brief period, it was summer, we were not enrolled in school. That summer Richard and I uh, borrowed the neighbor kids bikes and rode them like we stole them. The earliest trailer I remember living in was in Vale, Oregon. One night there was a tremendous thunder storm, very loud. The next morning, Mom slept in. Richard decided he wanted toast. So he put a slice of bread in the toaster which got toasty to the point that it caught on fire. Mom woke up then. Fireworks ensued. We lived in American Falls for a time. I went to school there, second grade, I think. I remember that one of the neighbor ladies tried to light her stove, the gas accumulated, overflash. Her face was burned. She came to Mom and mom put butter on her face. Richard participated in a boxing match. He had fun. I remember taking a test on time and had to write down the correct time using the clock faces. I got the times exactly wrong. The day Dad came to get me out of class to move, I was outside reading and a girl came to tell me to come in, I did not believe her, so the teacher came to get me. I was all in favor of moving. One summer, we lived in Jerome in a small trailer. There was an ice box. So every other day or so the ice man would bring ice. We would beg for slivers of ice and he would oblique. We lived at Thousand Springs but in one of the cabins. My tricycle disappeared and showed up as a birthday present painted green. They had a sturgeon in a pond. When I was in the third grade and Richard was in the second, we lived on Capitol Boulevard in a Green something named place. We walked across six lanes of traffic to walk to the Boise Junion College campus where we attended school. That was the year that we got bikes for Christmas. I rode so much, my behind was sore. The next place was Evergreen Mobile Home Park in Emmett. We walked to school. In the fourth grade I attended the old three story brick school, which was later sold to the Catholic church and then half the lot sold to a bank and the public library. The Great Lakes trailer got moved around a bit, Dad had it towed to Brownlee where there was a great deal of dirt. I learned how to make button holes from a neighbor. She may have given Mom the recipe for raisen sheet cake with white frosting. There after if Mom made that cake, that meant we were going out somewhere. Usually to a dance in Ola, which I remember fondly. Later on the trailer was moved to Hell's Canyon. That summer we spent in the dammed up creek, swimming. We begged dad for a Yuke inner tube but those trucks did not actually have inner tubes. When there was lightning storms, we would see the lightning bounce back and forth off the canyon wallsl. One time we went to Halfway, Oregon with dad. We stayed at a school that had a play ground while dad worked. I played on monkey bars until I had blisters, then the blisters popped and I still played. One time Mom had to take something to Dad on a very steep hillside. She had to turn about and we all got out and watched her. When we got back in, she swore she almost had a fecal hemorrhage. We spent the summer in Hailey, Idaho. Dad was working on a Fish and game project. I was asked to sketch a picture of the construction. There were wonder hot spring pools there and the folks rented a private bathhouse. Take about fifteen minutes to turn a bunch of noisy kids into limp noodls. Also that summer, we were sleeping in a tent under a large tree, the folks were in a small camper. A huge thunder storm came up and we all bailed out of the tent into the camper. Crowded. The last time I lived in the Great Lakes, I was a senior in Highschool We parked where a store now sits. I came home one day and Mom had the sewing machine out. I looked at the pattern for a maternity top. I asked who this was for and she snarled, “Me!” Good thing I didn't ask if Dad knew. One thing I know was that Mom was excellent at stowing loose stuff in the trailers including putting pillows inside the cupboards and taping the doors shut. Never failed. All dad had to do we level the trailer and ground the sink so we would not get shocked.

THE SUMMER I STAYED WITH JESSE

THE SUMMER I STAYED WITH JESSE KERSEY The Kersey's and Berglund' have been acquainted for several decades. I think Dad and the senior Kersey were childhood friends. We would often visit them when they lived above Ola. One time we were sitting at the dinner table and Phillip was sitting next to Neal. Neal noticed that Phillip did not have anything on his plate, so he reached over the forked over a nice large pork chop. Marge was widowed early on, her husband was killed in a logging accident. Eventually she moved to Letha and married Fred Smith. She had at least one child by him, little boy named John Smith. John John didn't talk until well after age two. All he had to do was point and grunt and multiple siblings would fetch and carry for him. One summer, Jesse had rented a small house in Letha. I went to live with her for the summer. She had a small sewing machine, I purchased a pattern for a shirt with French cuffs. I sewed it and Mom did not scream and tear it apart. I wish I still had that shirt. I love French cuffs. Jesse and I picked fruit in a local orcharge, prunes probably. She hired a classmate of mine to babysit the kids. Her name was Marilyn and she lived next to Uncle Tom's Cabin. First day we came home Marilyn was exhausted. I do not think she had ever babysat a rowdy bunch of younsters. I became acqainted with Joe Dewey, a boy a year ahead of me in highschool. He is Mormon and assured me that the Book of Mormon had some good adventure stories in it. We bonded over sci-fi. He wrote it and I read it. Joe also was missing a forelimb. Nice young man. One day Jesse came home and told me that she had met a wonderful man and they were going to get married. She was a bit disappointed that I was not more excited for her. I was not very interested in men, romance etc. At any rate they married and lived happily until he died years later. Jesse had a step daughter named Connie. I see her on Facebook ever once in a while. That was a great summer, I enjoyed it very much.

FATHER'S DAY

FATHER'S DAY Our Dad was wonderful. We had a happy childhood. I always liked to purchase a Louis La'Mour book for him for any occasion but Father's Day was good. Louis La'Mour wrote about 147 books. He also wrote children's books and I will look into that sometime soon. My personal favorite was one where the hero was a military man stuck in Siberia. He had to survive the hike out to America. It was a terrific book. His last book had elements of sci-fi, very surprising. He died in 1980 and I was stuck, no more books! Dang! I discovered Tony Hillerman years later, his first book was writen in 1970. I could have been buying them for Dad. Shoot! The only book of Tony Hillerman that I did not enjoy was FINDING MOON. It was not set on the rez, so I was disappointed. His daughter, Anne Hillerman has written twelve books, I have only read two of them and they are excellent. I will check out the rest of them sometime soon. Apparently none of Louis La'Mours four children did not write or at least not in his genre. Sigh.... One other favorite author of mine, Anne McCaffrey, wrote many books some set on the planet Pern of the sentient flying dragons and their bonded partners. Her son, Todd McCaffrey wrote a sequel that addressed he life of the wyverns, a lesser dragon that acted as night watch and worked in mines because it could not see well in day light. That was very good. However the sequel went in the weyrs and had the main character a woman who rode a queen. She fell into a coma. However when it came to the mating flight, the man made love to the comatose woman. Strange and distasteful. The story got a bit more weird when it looked like the girl, when she woke up, had a liking for girls. Anne had handled this nicelyl in previous books. Her daughter, GiGi has written some fine sequels that far surpass those of her brother. I wonder if there other authors out there who progeny have written in their genre. Oh, well. Happy Father's all you great Dad's out there!! I love you!!

FLYING LESSONS

FLYING LESSONS: Let me start with a little background. When we werep kids, our Uncle Carl, would sometimes fly up from Petaluma, California. One time he took us up, Richard, Phillip and myself. We landed in Boise, Dad met us and we rode home with him. Later on, I would fly home from SFO to Boise on United. The best salad I ever had was Langostine, yummy! In summer of 1965, I moved to Petaluma, CA to live my cousin Carl and his wife, Robin for a few months. As soon as I turned 18, I got a job at Fairchild Semiconductor. My first roommate was Ella Sue. Uncle Carl offered free flying lessons and we only had to pay for the gas. Swell! One time Mom and Dad were visiting and were there at Petalma Sky Ranch when I landed. They have Brownie film of me getting out of the plane and bumping my head. Sue and I had so much fun. I learned how to come out of a stall, bank, turn, take off and land. Most important walk around the plane inspecting anything loose etc. I soloed and have about 40 hours in the log Uncle Carl gave to me. One time Sue and I took off for lessons. By the time we got home, the pot of eggs which I had left to boil, had exploded and turned to kitchen black with smoke. The smell was nearly as disgusting and the rendering plant that used to be located just south of Petaluma. We opened the doors and windows and started scrubbing. We were very careful to make sure nothing was being cooked after that. One time, we met a young pilot about the time we were finished. He asked us if we would like a ride in his plane. OK! I got to ride in the front seat coming back. The panel in front had way more than the altimeter and fuel gage on the 1947 Aeronca. I was looking everything over exclaiming with delight! There were lots of toggle switches and so many dials. I finally pointed out something that looked vaguely familiar and asked, “What is this?” He looked at me a little funny and finally replied, “Um, it's a clock.”