When an* Old Timer *like myself recalls “The Good Old Days”, the big, the bad and the ugly are often forgotten. I don’t want my grandchildren to accuse me of showing them my childhood through rose-colored glasses, so here is a chapter of “The Rest of the Story.”
It’s true that I actually enjoyed living in rural Alabama in a somewhat impoverished condition, and it’s true that I did not mind the hard labor of working in the cotton fields, or chopping firewood, of feeding pigs and chickens, of helping plant, weed, and harvest in the garden. Perhaps, of all the things that I had to do, the least enjoyment came from milking the cow (after I got over the thrill of learning how!) I loved the outdoors, and most of my work tended to be outside. Perhaps that is why my priorities, today, are noticeably not in keeping an immaculate house. In that time and that place, everyone pretty much experienced the same way of life. Our family was not at the bottom of the economic ladder, but it certainly was not near the top. Because our parents worked in education and in church ministry, we enjoyed a great deal of respect among most of our neighbors, and that made up for some of the financial instability.
Now, you will accuse me of painting the rosy picture in order to take the gray tinge out of the “not-so” rosy that I’m about to tell! The truth is, I don’t feel about the conditions and events that I’m preparing to relate as I expect most of you will feel as you read them. It was life…it was the reality of the times.
Much of what you have been reading in the last several articles took place in a community named Piney Chapel in the years between 1933 and 1937. Dad was the principal over a school that contained grades 1 through 12, and it was where I completed the first and second grades. My brother, J.H., was born just prior to our moving to the community, and a second brother, Will Ed, was born while we lived there.
The teachers’ home at Piney Chapel had walls made of beaded ceiling (rather narrow wooden boards with grooves running the entire length of the boards.)
The grooves made painting extremely difficult, but an infestation of little critters created the need for an even more difficult job than painting! It was not a shame to have a few bedbugs, but to allow them to multiply unchallenged was not considered appropriate management of one’s household. Besides, they had a habit of biting human beings as they slept!
Well, as “luck” would have it, the family or families before us had either done nothing or had no success in their battle with the bedbugs. The grooves in the walls were alive with those little critters, and Dad and Mother set about to get rid of them. I remember very little of that initial declaration of war, but I do remember that more than once our mattresses were hauled outside and inspected carefully. I think we applied kerosene to the crevices around the edges of each mattress and around the “button” tufts that kept the cotton stuffing inside the mattress from shifting around. I also recall fumigating the house by closing it up and burning sulfur inside. Mother was a very determined lady and such jobs were attacked with fervor!
Being closely involved in school affairs of all kinds, Mother was aware of every kind of communicable “disease” or condition that was making the rounds among the children. I’m sure there were times that we children were subjected to treatments for itch (scabies) when we had no more than dry skin or a harmless rash. Frequent bathing and applications of sulfur and grease were the common methods of treatment for scabies, and if you have never gone to school smelling of sulfur and grease, you can’t possibly know how humiliating life can get!
Next time: “The Thirty Minute Cure!”
This ninth article shows a “not so pretty” picture of the “good old days”. Life had its bad moments, and the problems with pests and diseases that were rampant then would be unwelcome guests in this modern world of my grandchildren. Bearing up under life’s struggles may produce great strength, but I’m thankful some trials are gone.
Reprinted with the permission of Redding Magazine.