Saturday, September 5, 2009

How Many Bars of Soap

Soap is more than a cleansing agent. It is history with a smell and a great deal of pleasure to it.

My younger years I can remember having my mother tell me to wash behind my ears and then she handed me a bar of soap. We were living on Dunrobin Avenue in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, and we didn't have any running water.

I fetched most of the water and filled up barrels. We got a lot from rain barrels that were hooked up to catch the water off the roof which ran into gutters and down spouts when it rained. The winter was harder as water had to be brought from a well several blocks away that a number of people had a key to access. So, water was used but not wasted.

I recall washing my hands in a basin filled with water but not warmed up, mind you. It was cold to the touch and one scrubbed his or her face and then when the hands had been rubbed together in that washing fashion, one took the remainder of the water and splashed it on his face several times, washing the soap away.

Often I would make that sound that everybody did where after splashing it on your face, you shook your head just like a dog does after you get done patting him or her. "Phaaaaughshuywop" and "blap," you gurgled out. You were done so combed your hair that had gotten all wet from the washing. A quick look in the mirror and you were ready to go to school or what have you.

As I got older and was still hauling water, there was the Saturday night bath. Boy, I hated that. My mother heated up the water on the wood stove and filled up two tubs. The old metal ones that you could barely sit in. That was fine but I had to use the same bath water that my sisters used and there always something floating on the top of the water that looked scummy. I would brush it aside and never dip my face in the water. It gave me good reason to hurry and get the washing done. It was also my job to empty the tubs and set them out on the back porch for the next bath.

I can only remember three types of soap in those days. Ivory soap, Fells Naptha, and Lava. Lava was rough and guys used it after doing a sweaty hard day's work. You could scrub up nice and clean from the Lava but it always felt like you were taking a little sand to your skin.

Ivory soap was great. It floated in the water and had a nice clean smell to it. It came in good size bars that us kids used to squeeze until it slipped out of our hands.

We used to have a great joke. You want to hear a new song? Yeh ! Ok, let me hum a few bars for you. "Soap, soap soap, soap."

Oh well, we finally moved and had running water. One could take a bath without heating up the water on the stove and no second hand water, just plain pure stuff out of the tap that was hot to start.

The first few times I scrubbed with Ivory, buried my face in tub water, blowing bubbles and singing a song I still remember. "Ivory soap is good for you, wash your face until it is new. Scrub your toes and wash your hair, and take a bath in your underwear."

Well, thru the years they came out with new toilet soaps. Why they called them that I don't know but the new bars gave the ladies a sense of smell and downright pleasure. If Ivory soap was 99.9 percent pure then the new soaps with all their perfume etc., were never as good in my opinion.

But then guys like things that don't smell too much and Ivory soap was right up there with "Brylcreem, a little dab will do ya. Brylcreem, you'll look so debonair. Brylcreem,the gals will all pursue ya. Simply rub a little in your hair." That was the jingle on the radio and once you heard it hundred times you remembered.

I can recall all sizes of soap but not packaged that way. I think my mother found an outlet for bits and pieces of soap and bought a lot of rejects for a time. Soap was soap. At least in the 1940's and 1950's.

I finally came back to my roots in my twenties and went homesteading in British Columbia, Canada. Back to no running water and rain barrels and ponds and creeks and a good bar of Ivory soap. There was a wash basin, usually next to the back door, with soap dish and a bucket of water. Man, that was refreshing. Scrubbing up was almost a ritual. One could throw the water around and splash and gurgle and make those "holy cow that water is cold" sounds.

Yet there was something about cold water early in the morning and all that washing going on and smelling the morning breakfast floating in from the kitichen stove. I have eaten a lot of things from store bought to homemade but when they're cooked on a wood stove by experienced hands there is a flavor that fills up your senses and you eat like there is no tomorrow. Coming in clean to the breakfast table was expected and the clean smell of soap added to the atmosphere. We took soap to a lot of locations in the wilderness where privacy could be had along with some interesting washing places.

Bathing in a creek is intense. You have to find a spot where you won't get jabbed in and out of the water. There are parts of a body that just don't take well to getting poked or pinched. Once in the water, especially in the early spring, the bathing process can be hurrried to within seconds of turning blue. The other times are more tolerable, especially when the sun is out. Mid summer almost makes it enjoyable and in winter one just gets by with sponge baths and heated water in the wash basin. Clothes are washed with a scrub board or at a laundramat, depending on how flush you are with money.

Well, the cares of the day are ahead in the morning when you're performing your ablution. It is invigorating, gets the blood pumping, and you feel alive with all that is around you.

One exception -- my buddy Barry sounding the breakfast call even as you are getting your last leg into your pants or buttoning up your shirt. He had an uncanny way of knowing when we were off schedule. What I liked about it was his good natured way of looking at things. "Come and get it or I am throwing it out." I never knew that man to be mean or unkind but he had his way and with some thinking about it you got to see his point of view. Sure there was grumbling and good natured shut up attitude but we liked him. His friendship for us was never in question.

Soap is a clean look at the world. More soap was when your mother caught you swearing and stuck a bar in your mouth. That cleaned things up considerably. Soap is in your saddle bag and suitcase and hand carry when you're poor. When things get a lot better financially, you can afford a regular motel where soap is provided. Most of my young adult life if I stayed anywhere it was in a cabin and no soap was found there. Every once in a while I would have a soap dish rather than the counter or bathroom sink or a board to lay it on. I would look at the soap dish with satisfaction and somehow feel it was a step up. I would grin at myself for how funny that would seem but nevertheless a soap dish is a thing of beauty. Someday I am going to convince Tanya McGraw to paint a picture of it for me in a western setting. In the meantime, put soap on your list and put a line under it to remind yourself of one of the simpler pleasures of life.


In my later years I always took the little soap bars from the motels. They must have expected it and I never let them down.

Making soap is a good idea, I think, even though I was never involved in it. I knew homesteaders who made soap and usually it was pretty good. I would bet if they had their wives use it, it would sit in the soap dish a good long time. Now, if the wives made it, you can bet it would be a lot better product.

Fats boiled with ashes or animal and vegetable oils with akaline salts is not high on my list of saving money. Buy the soap, I say!

Well , there are lots of uses for soap and some you know. There is saddle soap, rope soap, soap for getting things slippery, soap for washing, and one time soap for things like running into a skunk or falling into an outhouse or anything else you can name.

I would bet there is soap in heaven and for the gals it would be heavenly and for the guys soap that wouldn't slip out of your hands unless you wanted it to. As for me and soap, we have a long relationship and I would just as soon keep it that way.

I once stepped on a bar of soap in my half sleepy condition toward dusk. I let out a yahoo sound and headed for the wood pile that was near by. As luck would have it, all that got hurt was my pride. The point is, if you want to go for a ride, don't step on a bar of wet slippery soap.

I have used bar soap to scrub down some blue jeans when it was all I had. It was real hard to wring the soap out with cold water but it was clean and the result ok for a working guy.


One last thing when it comes to soap -- the white soap, especially Ivory, still has a high mark on my list. Do you think Ivory soap still floats?

Digby

Friday, September 4, 2009

A Penny For Your Thoughts

Your thoughts today are not worth what they were in the 1950's. A 1950's penny is worth considerably more today as the copper content then was a lot higher. Today a penny has about 90% zinc with a copper clad face.

In Canada, the penny of 1950 was plentiful but not as easily obtainable for us kids as the penny is now. We often would get a penny and put it on the railroad tracks before a train went by. Usually the penny came back to us in an oval shape and it became sort of a keepsake. If you tried that with a penny now I am not sure how it would look but I am sure it would not flatten out like the mostly copper penny did.

The saying "A penny saved is a penny earned" doesn't have the same meaning it had when we were kids. Imagine a steam engine weighing up to 175 tons rolling over that penny.

When I worked for the railroad, steam engines were on the way out and were being replaced by diesel engines. It took two or three diesels hooked up in tandem to replace those large steam engines. They were phased in slowly but in the late 1950's there were more and more diesels coming on line. I imagine those big diesels could flatten a penny in the same way but the steam engines had a magic to them all their own.

Travel by train was great. It started at their beautiful train stations. The one in Winnipeg was a thing to behold. The ceilings were higher than a little guy could throw a rock and the patterns and the little shops and ticket counters were like looking at a dream place. We waited around there to catch a train but we were just kids and we were not going anywhere. We imagined what it would be like to catch the 10:15 or 12:30 flyer.

Youser!! One just got excited to see the trains coming and going. The platforms were filled with people and the baggage carts were loaded. The passenger trains were a half mile long with skydome cars, sleepers, dining room cars, and us kids peeking from around pillars, seeing a world far away from the one in which we lived.

We caught a look at a state room one time as we snuck aboard a parked train that was open for cleaning. We poked our way down long corridor of cars that were out of sight when it came to luxury and accomodations.

We got chased away many times but we would head down again to the Winnipeg's main railroad station during our lunch hour, eating our lunches and taking a bus to and from the station to the school area with tickets we saved by sometimes catching a ride to school with folks we knew on their way to work.

Hanging around that railroad station was such fun. We used to watch a train leaving the station. The wheels of the engine would spin and there was a clatter and a chatter that made that steam engine slip and slide on its wheels for a moment. The steam would pour out above the engine along with the smoke from its belching smoke funnel. Slowly at first, it would move and then we would see the train conductor standing on the platform between cars waving at us kids. The engine roared and the sound was music to one's ears as the whole procession got underway.


We would head back to the station and look over the huge waiting room where announcements of arrivals and departures could be heard over the loudspeakers. Folks were everywhere and the sounds were like a live beehive in action. People were busy checking times and destinations and on their kids.

You heard all the sounds of living. Coughing, clearing of throats, singing, laughter, sometimes adults crying and babies crying. There were feet sticking out from the benches and the smell of food was everywhere. The most pleasant sound of all was of the train bells, steam engines puffing and railroad people calling out to all within hearing distance that it was fifteen minutes to boarding.

There were murals on the station walls and our imaginations were in full play as we imagined we were one of the passengers heading to a far off place. So much happens in a train station that it makes for a story a day. However, this story lasted a lifetime.

Four of us went to the train station on a Friday at noon. It was the usual combing the station and skirting around workers and staying away from anyone looking official. We were laughing and acting up and being mischievious when we were stopped in our tracks. There was a group of black people singing and playing musical instruments that sounded like it was coming from a far away place but it was right there before us. There must have been a good forty to fifty of them and they were waiting for a train. I never knew where they were going but their songs were especially spiritual in nature, coming from the depths of their souls. Folks in the station were gathered around and those singing were good natured people who sang like they were heading home after being away so long.

I never knew the songs but years later recognized them when I went to a special session of spiritual singing at Assiniboine park. Songs like "I feel like a motherless child," " Just a closer walk with thee," "Swing low sweet chariot."

The singers at the station sang many of the songs acappella in a bluesy sort of way. There were shouts at times along with dancing, handclapping and foot tapping. Us kids wanted to join in and the folks singing invited all who were watching to clap and dance if they felt like it. There was some moaning that was blissful mixed with humming and it was all so grand. We hung around until the last song was sung and the feeling we had was exhillarating. We left with the wonder of it all and felt in those songs there was more pain and more joy than we kids could understand.
Oh yeah, but we knew how it made us feel and so we left tapping our feet and dancing as we went back to school. What we didn't realize is that we had stayed an hour longer and we would be in for it when we went back to school. We talked it over and decided to say it straight to our teacher and principal as we knew we would be in his office before you could say jack rabbit. Sure enough, it was coming down on us but we had Jimmy speak for us because he had a way with words. He described it to a T and ended up saying, "We were caught up in the moment and we just couldn't tear ourselves away as it was like it had a hold on us." I remember the principal was smiling but Jimmy had done such a good job of saying it, and truthfully, that the principal gave us a lecture on obeying rules and how they affect everybody and went on about keeping order and the like. Finally he said for us to go back to our class and to remember in the future to think about not being late or next time there would be serious consequences.
We couldn't get out of there fast enough. Sometime later we heard back that the principal and teacher were so taken with all that had happened that they just couldn't bring themselves to punish us.
I knew from that day that our thoughts were worth much more than a penny. Every once in a while I close my eyes and I can hear those singers. The sounds fill me up and my heart seems much the better for it.
It was a place in time and the four of us kids never could shake it off. I guess we were lucky. Those kinds of experiences are not just classic, they are character building and us kids were characters that needed building to keep us going when the winters came and the home life pulled us down.
Digby

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

All Things Considered!

It was 1945 and World War II was over. I was nine years old and the excitement was tremendous. People were outside their homes celebrating. It was a day to remember. What day was it? I don't remember and even if I did it wouldn't make much difference. My uncles had gone to war and it was over. My mother and all my relatives, it seemed, got together which was rare for our family.

I was a Canadian and the war had started for our country in 1939. We were a member of the British Commonwealth and as such were bound to take England's part and do our duty. The British Commonwealth consisted of the United Kingdom, England, Scotland, the Irish free state and others. In a nutshell, they were former colonies who united with Britian in a mutual agreement for all countires that belonged to the commonwealth. That agreement took us to war.

Most of my uncles that I knew went off to war. Including my favorite uncle. He would talk to me like I was the only person in his life. I was just little and in my childlike way looked forward to his visits and loved him dearly. He came to say goodbye one day and I didn't understand except for the fact that he would be going somewhere and wouldn't be back for a time. I remember fighting back the tears because I was told to be a be a big boy. I wanted my dad to be like him but that dream was never a reality and far from anything my dad could possibly produce.

I digress: He went to war and when I was a little older I was told he wouldn't be coming back. I went off by myself and the tears came and there was nothing I could do to stop them. I shuddered, finally lay still and thought about him as only kids can do. The twinkle in his eyes, that laughter he could so easily bring forth and his kind way sat on my chest like a heavy playmate. I stared off somewhere and remember how the sadness engulfed me. There were no answers to my questions that I found any comfort in.

Why won't he be coming back? "He was killed in the war," I was told.

Why? Who would want to hurt uncle Tommy?

Sure, all kids at my age knew about death but we never welcomed it in and made sure it kept it's distance. It was hard to explain war and even harder to tell a little kid that war brings its own pain and there is nothing we can do about those who don't come home. I was told years later that he was part of a tank crew. The tank was hit and he managed to get halfway out of the hatch opening only to die there in a foreign country. The circumstances were never explained to me. I never asked a lot of questions in those days but for my uncle the questions came and it made no difference. He was dead, it was done, and we had to think about other things.

I told myself I would never forget him but time went by and he became a pleasant memory. I wished I had done something special for him. I'm not sure what that would be but I have since learned that those thoughtful things were not part of some families. That would come later in my life.

Well, as I said at the beginning, the War was over. It was on the radio and it was everywhere. Horns were honking like it was New Years Eve. People were coming outside of their homes and hugging each other. The air was electrified with voices and it seemed as if nothing could contain the happiness everyone was feeling. Neighbors talked about their sons coming home and how they could hardly wait to hear from them. One lady jumped for joy and said: "At last my son is safe."

I have been part of celebrations throughout my life and yet never was there a feeling like that day. Tears, of course, but the tears were happy tears for most. Many just sat down and bawled and even as a kid I knew what that meant.

Neighbors were out in the street in force laughing, crying and clasping their hands as if in prayer. Those with the heaviest of tears just seemed to be releasing all the pain because of someone they had lost and I can remember going over to a lady and putting my arm around her neck and saying, "Don't cry, lady, the war is over." She hugged me so tight that I could hardly breathe and said, "Yes, it is finally over and the world will be better off." I have since understood that remark so much better but the war was not over for mankind. Peace never sat down very long without being interrupted by destructive forces of evil.

My uncle was a bright spot in my life and he was taken from me. I don't know what would have happened if he had come back. Would it have been the same? I like to think so. I believe he would have made a difference in my life as we were kindred spirits. Yet, I knew what the effect of wars had upon my other uncles and they were the same personalities but there were changes that showed the effects of war. My aunts would sometimes talk of it. I never got the full sense of it then but I can imagine they were wrestling with things that took more than they could explain. The reasons of war were lost to a kid but the effects for some of us were not ever forgotten nor should they be.

After the war there were happier days when the sounds of living bounced us back into thinking better thoughts. I have taken many a road since them with an uncle's memory cheering me on at times. Who knows when the final book is closed on my earthly life what a story my uncle will tell me of his other journey in the heavens. All things considered, I think it's better to end this way. This one is for you Uncle Tommy.

Digby