I remember Mama- and Papa- and....

This morning was my weekly day for a massage. My moment of heaven: when Lisa digs her fingers and her elbow into this ancient body making it feel like a youngster again.

For some reason, today, especially, it evoked memories of long ago. Memories that amazed Lisa. She said 'I should have brought a tape recorder'.

Well, this is the next best thing. See if you remember any of these events. If you do, you must be pretty old.

I remember when bread was ten cents a loaf. It came with a little charm on a string that your mother would sew to the top of your beanie. I don't remember ever wearing a beanie, but I suppose I did. What ever happened to Wonder Bread? What ever happened to beanies?

I remember when mother and I would walk up the hill to Mr.Pooley's grocery store. Mother would tell him what she wanted. He would then go and get it off the shelf and assemble it on the counter. I remember if we were buying a water-melon, he would take a sharp knife and cut a little triangle out of the melon for mother to taste to see if it was ripe enough. Then we would walk home and he would deliver the whole order to our house in his car. This was not a gourmet grocery shop and we were not wealthy people. We lived in a very middle-class neighborhood; but this was how you shopped for groceries in the nineteen-thirties.

I remember when the milkman came to the front of the house in a horse-drawn wagon to deliver the milk to our door. The milk came in a tall glass bottle and the cream would have risen to the top of the bottle. Mother would skim this off to be used in coffee.

I remember, during the War, when friends who had a farm would bring us cream, which was practically like dealing with the 'Black Market'. It was so thick you had to spoon it out of the bottle. Mother would beat it with a hand mixer until it became butter. Otherwise you got white Oleo that had a little red capsule in it that you squeezed until it broke, making the Oleo look like butter. I used to ask my mother, 'Why can't we have white butter like the folks next door?' They were even poorer than we were.

I remember when an iceman would come to our backdoor with a large block of ice on his shoulder, held with large tongs. He wore a leather pad on his shoulder to keep from getting frost bite, I guess. He would would then put this block of ice in our Ice Box (not a refrigerator) which was in the back shed. For cold drinks, mother would chip off pieces of ice to put in the glass for iced tea or whatever.

I also remember when Hobos, wandering poor men, would come to our back door and Mother would give them food. Maybe they did a little work; I don't remember.

I remember when I walked to school throughout elementary and junior high school. No buses. When I went to high school, I took a city bus.

I remember always having scabs on my knees from falling down on my roller skates, skating on the sidewalk on Meachem Avenue where we lived. No shoe skates, but the kind you fastened to the bottom of your shoes with a key to tighten the clamps. 

I remember one Christmas when there was a large item behind the Christmas tree with a long handle sticking out from under the blanket that hid it. I thought that my father had bought a new vacuum cleaner for my mother. Imagine my surprise when it turned out to be a bicycle for me. With balloon tires! We must have been coming up in the world.

By now you have figured out that I was a Depression Baby.

I remember when my father and I would walk over to Capital Avenue to meet my mother coming home from working at Kellogg's. My mother's job was to sit beside a moving belt with a long paddle and push off any burned corn flakes. My father, obviously, had no job at that time. We would walk the several blocks to Capital Avenue and meet mother getting off the Street-car.  Yes, a street-car.

I remember sitting with my mother in a large chair. She was reading to me. Suddenly a number of ladies came through the front door with happy cries of joy and all sorts of wrapped presents. Some of them were for me. I thought that this was a great idea. It turned out that my mother was expecting what turned out to be my brother.

I remember coming downstairs one morning when my grandmother, who lived with us, took me into her room, sat me on her bed, and told me in serious tones that my mother was not at home but would be bringing me a baby brother. I don't think I was thrilled with the news.

I remember visiting my mother in Leila Hospital. I don't remember seeing my brother, although I am sure he must have been there, but I fell in love with a tiny baby carriage filled with lilies of the valley that someone had sent. I wanted that so badly.....

I remember my first piano lesson when Miss Fairchild came to the house in her funny little coupe, with the back seat filled with piano music for her students. I guess she charged a dollar an hour. I was nine. This was the first time we had an extra dollar for piano lessons.

At the first lesson, she was showing me where all the C's were on the keyboard. Mother had recently had the floors refinished and varnished. As Miss Fairchild reached for the highest C  on the piano, her chair slipped from under her and she fell on the newly varnished floor on her butt. She laughed hysterically. She never let me forget that first lesson.

I guess that is how I became a musician.