Norms Bait and Tackle

so_P_bubble · July 12, 2021, 08:26:25 AM

I still lament 3 or 4 books left "home" behind - unread- when I had to leave forever. Of course I could never find them again to buy
My beloved books are the only thing I miss from my former life.

MaryPage · July 12, 2021, 09:24:35 AM

I sure can relate to that, Bubble. I sure can relate to that!!!

Shirley · July 12, 2021, 09:39:07 AM

When I was growing up we had a "Carnegie Library"... all I knew was funds came from Andrew Carnegie and I read every book in the children's section & so many more when doing college papers. My good friend here (10 days younger than I am) grew up in SE Kansas, we were talking about our reading habits & favorite book. Couldn't believe by ears when she said, "Freckles & His Friends", that was also MY fav. I ran across it at a book sale a few years ago & as a surprise I bought & gave it to her.

Kind of wish I'd kept it for my great grands to read, doubt if it is in print anymore & since I read it some 75+ years ago, doubt if many copies still around. Will ask her if she still has it, she doesn't have any gr-grands. I do have some very old books from my father's home, one was written "a decade after the Civil War", another came from France (in French) from the mid 1850s. I gave one son the old geography school books from my father (Dad was born in 1898 & only 8 years of school in the little town along the river). He could still help my husband with calculus in college & wasn't anything he didn't know about from all his reading.

I've been passing along special books, even donated some McGuffey Readers to the Historical Society where he grew up. They were thrilled. As I give the books to family I remind them that "if any time they don't have room or want the books, do NOT sell, offer them to any blood kin to save & pass down".

Bubble, I did find that old French book listed when I Googled... it has a value but this one not for sale. It has my step gr-grandfather's name inside. Have you checked on the ones you left behind?

I'm waiting on the mowers, they were supposed to be here at 8:00 because I have a Dr. appointment across town early afternoon & have to lock all gates before I can leave. They can run late but need to call so I can go back & take care of gates! Can't do that at the last minute. Besides, I could have slept a couple more hours if they weren't going to be here at that time! It is cool enough I opened a couple of the sliding doors to let the fresh air in, first summer I remember not being able to to this.

MaryPage · July 12, 2021, 10:11:48 AM

Shirley, like you, I devoured every book I was able to get my hands on. I read every one of the OZ series: weren't there something like 32 or so of those? After Frank Baum died, his daughter took over. Ruth? I'll have to Google it. The really old books were fascinatingly quaint. I went to visit a great aunt once, and in a glassed in bookcase I found a complete set of Elsie Dinsmore. I read every one. I wonder if any exist anymore.

Tomereader1 · July 12, 2021, 11:45:45 AM

MaryPage, a couple of weeks ago (maybe longer) PBS ran a program about L. Frank Baum. He was certainly an interesting person, a dreamer of the first order. Never staying with one job, occupation for very long. He certainly had a lot of "life experiences".

Marilyne · July 12, 2021, 11:53:05 AM

Woke up this morning, to the welcome sight of FOG . . . or as the meteorologists call it . . . the Marine Layer! Whatever it's called, it feels wonderful, after a number of days of 100-plus degree weather. I just hope it hangs around most of the morning, but will likely burn off before 10:00.

I also was fortunate to have an Aunt and Uncle, who gave me an Oz book for my birthday every year. Like you said Mary Page, the original hard cover, with those strange but wonderful Illustrations by ??. Can't remember his name at the moment? I loved the books, and gazing at the beautiful color plates/pages, of which there were only a few in each book. My favorites, after the original "Wizard of Oz", were "Ozma of Oz", and, "The Emerald City of Oz". Some were a little ridiculous, like "The Scalliewagons of Oz", but I read them all many times.

Another children's book that I loved, was "Heidi". How I did dream about living in the Alps, with a grandfather called, The Alm Uncle! I wonder if today's children still read those old classics? I also had, "Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates", "Lassie Come Home", "Black Beauty", "Tom Sawyer" and many others that I read over and over again.

patricia19 · July 12, 2021, 12:30:32 PM

Good morning from a now sunny Interior. Marilyne, you mistook my meaning in my last post. I was trying to say that you were like me in not always knowing how or where to start and that it was okay to try different approaches or leave it entirely if that was your choice. I moved in the winter of 2013 and didn't start clearing until January 2016. I'm still working on my bad procrastination habit.

MarsGal, if they require a year-long maintenance program, I wonder if they'll be posted elsewhere afterward or get a new crew? I do have some small stuffed animals on my bedroom bookshelves. I have three miniature chairs of different types that I've set them in. Shan is like Farrah in that. She will bounce up with paws raised at the side of the computer desk, but woe if you attempt to pick her up.

MaryPage, I was born into a family of collectors. And my father made us a wooden dollhouse with all the wooden furniture, and my mother sewed little curtains, pieces of bedding, and cushions. I had lincoln logs and a collection of the Betsy paper dolls from McCall's magazine. Then in 1967, Fairbanks went through a terrible flood, swamping the town and all of that went away.

After that, the city developed a series of dams and water release areas, and it has never happened since. I remember so many odd things ending up in our yard afterward. I also remember riding in a riverboat to a school. Two army medics stood on either side of a door, and as each person passed through, they were inoculated on either side by a device that gave several shots at once. I was fifteen and remember being afraid of the shots and not wanting to show I was afraid to the cute army guys giving those shots. I still, to this day, don't like shots!

Shirley, I was born in a family of readers and remember long evenings where everyone except my older sister spent reading. We had a small lending library at the time, and I powered through it so much that the librarian called my mom to see if that was okay with her or did she want to lay down some guard rules? I will be forever grateful that she told them to let me be. After statehood in 1959, they built a large library, and now we have more than one. I have two six-shelf bookshelves and over a thousand on my Kindle. Not that I'm addicted...

Marilyne, you and I had the same childhood library! I loved and read those you mentioned. As a child, I lived in a small town of 22,000 in a US territory, and there was a lot that we didn't have until statehood. Books and the library were escapes into another world that disappeared in that 1967 flood.

so_P_bubble · July 12, 2021, 12:45:18 PM

Shirley, there was a set of 3 books and I had read only the first and a few pages of the 2nd. Titles were: Caro & Cie, Mon ami Pipo, and... maybe Graines d'homme. They were printed in Switzerland, but I never looked at author's names I never could find any reference to them

Heidi was also a big favorite and with another friend we used to play at being Heidi, Peter, and making our own adventure.

Marilyne · July 12, 2021, 02:36:01 PM

I did look on Google for the illustrator of the early Oz books, and recognized his name . . . John R, or J R Neill. He was the artist who illustrated the books I had in the 1940's. However, the first printing of The Wonderful Wizard of oz, was illustrated by WW Denslow. That sounds familiar to me too, but I'm sure the art in my books was by Neill.

Bubble - After reading "Heidi", and dreaming about the Alps . . . a couple of years later I read "Tom Sawyer". Then I wanted to be Becky Thatcher, so I could be kissed by Tom! (I guess I was getting a little older at that point in time!)

Patricia - I also liked all other horse stories, besides "Black Beauty". Some of my favorites were, "My Friend Flicka", "Thunderhead, Son of Flicka", and "National Velvet". I longed for a horse of my own, but of course I never had one.

patricia19 · July 12, 2021, 03:13:32 PM

I have never heard of "Son of Flicka"

My older sister was horse crazy and later in life owned an Arabian and one that was part Tennessee Walker. However, owning one was out of the question as a child, so she had to content herself with hanging out and helping in a friend's stable.

When she had her horses, I remember her spending hours with a long lead rope and a whip, training them in a large circle. The whip was never used on the horse but more for sound effects? I liked reading about horses but didn't like them in reality. When I was six, I was put on a pony that was promptly stung by a bee.

It reared and took off away from the grownups for quite some time, trying to buck me off or rub me off on a tree. I didn't get on another horse until I was sixteen, and that one couldn't be turned in the barn's direction without it heading that way.

A friend has four horses, and they're okay, but her llamas are more intriguing for me.

MaryPage · July 12, 2021, 04:22:59 PM

I read several books by Joanna Spyri, but Heidi and Dora were the best. I liked Dora even more than Heidi, but Heidi was the favorite of the whole world.

I think The Road To Oz was my favorite at the time. Nowadays, when I think of Oz, I think of the Purple country to the North and a whole book I read that took place entirely up there. I do not know why that has stuck in my head so firmly. Let's see: was it Blue Country in the East and Yellow in the West (oh my, monkeys!) and red to the South. Was Glenda the Queen of the South? A good queen?

But I loved Hans Brinker and the Silver Skates above all of those. What a wonderful book! I rarely ever took the time to read a book twice; you know, too many books and too little time. But I read that at least twice. And last year I watched Shirley Temple do Heidi again. A sweet movie.

Denver · July 12, 2021, 09:05:28 PM

Monday passed much too quickly for me as it is already time for dinner.

We have a lot of smoke here on the front range due to all the fires in the west. Watching the National news tonight is frightening to see the size of some of the fires.

I enjoyed reading all the comments on books that you all have and enjoy.

I did not hear from the surgery scheduler today, so will call her again tomorrow as I want to get this painful shoulder replaced ASAP. 😩😩

I wish you all a good evening and a good night of rest.

Jenny

CallieOK · July 12, 2021, 09:15:52 PM

Oh, how I have enjoyed reading the favorite books from everyone's childhood.

My Dad read to me every night while we were sitting in his armchair and, I was able to read aloud with him before I started to school.
Family story is that soon after entering First Grade I began reading "Dick. And. Jane. had. a. dog." instead of "Dick and Jane had a dog". The reason I gave was that was the way everybody else read and I thought I was supposed to do so, too.

I've read almost all of the books mentioned and still have some of them - including the book from which my Dad read to me. Also have each of the "Winnie The Pooh" books, as well as the poetry books "When We Were Very Young" and "Now We Are Six" - and a set of the "Just So" stories by Rudyard Kipling.

Mother gave my entire set of Bobbsey Twin books to a younger friend and she still has them. I tease her about giving them back because Mother didn't ask me if I was ready to give them up but haven't gotten anywhere with that argument... and don't expect to.

I loved the "Mary Poppins" books and used to "play like" I was she and stroll around with an umbrella with my toes pointed out as the book illustrations showed her doing. Loved the musical but Julie Andrews was way too "sweet" for the M.P. I imagined in the books.

Also loved my matching set of "Little Women", "Little Men" and "Jo's Boys". I gave them to Ellen, who is the "reader" of my Grands, and she loves them.
Has anyone seen the newest movie of "Little Women"? It's told from Jo's viewpoint (a la "feminist") but I thought it was a good adaptation - other than Beth. No one could possibly play that character better than Margaret O'Brien and the new actress looks way too old to be playing with dolls.

I could go on and on and on and.....about books I loved growing up.
However, I need to mix up some cookie dough and get it in the fridge for baking tomorrow or Wednesday. Son is home from the hospital after back surgery and doing okay. Between his office, her office and friends, they are set for meals for at least two weeks. Doubt that anyone will include home-made cookies, though, so those will be my contribution(s).

Sleep well Everyfriend and have Pleasant Dreams.

Sasha · July 12, 2021, 09:20:40 PM

One of the few victories we had while cleaning out my mil's house (she was a hoarder for all her 97 years: we lasted 2 months before calling in a pro), one of our victories, as I was saying, was packing up a roomful of stuffed animals and mailing them to her sister in a nursing home. She was delighted, and they got spread all over the home!

Shirley · July 12, 2021, 10:04:28 PM

Okay, don't see Nancy Drew or the Zane Gray books mentioned.... I read everything, even encyclopedias. With 3 older brothers & older sister I had plenty to get into before I was allowed to go to the library by myself. The war had just ended when that happened, and I inherited the bike our parents bought from Dad's Mother's neighbor (when you couldn't buy anything with rubber tires). It had red tires & Dad fixed it up so it was well balanced to the point I rode it without using handlebars all the time. My sister would not even get on it from the start, it had RED tires. She was always thinking about how things "looked". I didn't care, it was fast & became my ticket to freedom. I swear it knew it's way to the library all by itself. Since my brothers had bikes & went everywhere I guess Mom figured I was okay. She had twin sisters that "set the scale" for me, tomboys & independent. Life was good, I always felt like I raised myself because the war was such an important part of our life I took care of me.

Like some of you, I really wanted a horse but smart parents realized I had no clue how much work it was to care for one (they grew up with horses), and also realized I'd be wanting to bring it inside during storms & that wasn't going to happen! I read every horse book mentioned.

I did love Heidi & thought "the Grandfather" was exactly like my mother's father. He was that hard working old man with leather looking skin. His mother was French but father German & his parents came to this country as children. The German family thought the line ended because the 2 children that set sail from Germany died, but more were born & all became acquainted with the birth of computers.

I also thought the cast with Margaret O'Brien & Liz Taylor was the best movie ever.... and guess was when everyone fell in love with Peter Lawford, but he wasn't my type!

Sasha, I think your idea of taking the stuffed animals to the nursing home is fantastic!

CallieOK · July 13, 2021, 12:45:37 AM

Shirley, I forgot to mention Nancy Drew. Think I read almost all of them and still have a couple on my shelf.

It's interesting to me that we are the same age but you have much more vivid memories of WW2 than I do. I don't remember any details except singing 'Three Little Sisters" (Andrews Sisters hit) with two friends at school assemblies. After a local sailor visited our elementary school we argued about who got to "love a sailor".

No experiences with horses - even though we had plenty of pasture space to ride around. I did learn to milk a cow but could never hit the cat's mouth.

I have a bag of stuffed animals stored in the garage - including "Tommy", my sock doll that I'm holding in a picture taken when I was about 3 or 4 and "Rags", my patchwork doll made about the same time - probably by my aunt.

Jenny, hope that shoulder can be taken care of ASAP!

Time for

Vanilla-Jackie · July 13, 2021, 04:21:14 AM

Well 9.am, my two foreign gardeners have just left after turning up on time 8.am...they done a good job ( worked hard and fast with powerful mowers ) with mowing back and front, and getting rid of the front and back patio paving weeds but never had time to prune the bushes nor trees at the back, told me would take another 1 & a half hours which i told him surely it will only take another hour, he said it was a large garden, i said it wasn't that large and their prices dont come cheap and this would cost me a bomb...anyway he said we have to go....Luckily my next door female neighbour knocked at my door yesterday telling me my next door but one neighbour is a gardener, has his own gardening company and she went to get him come to see me as he was out in the front, i had to tell him i have already paid and two were coming 8-9am but i will bare him in mind for future, i never asked him what he charges but i just know he wont fleece me, i asked him for his card with contact number...so just phoned him and told him i will be more than happy for him to take care of my garden, said just phone and let him know when i am ready and he will do it after work if need be, i told him i shall try to go another month...I am now learning the hard way how busy these gardening companies are this time of the year so feel so lucky to have a gardener as my next door neighbour and he does dress like a gardener, is British, young and fit looking and seems more than happy to fit me in, and first impressions comes across a very nice person...
**********************************************************
Changing the subject it is my friends cremation service tomorrow, i shan't be able to go, lack of transport, my MS disease and to be truthful would only bring back the sad memories of my Richards cremation service two years ago, although it was held139 miles apart, although his ashes are now back home a few ( 22 ) miles away, and i am back home too...we are both back where we belong, and not still stuck there in Dorset...Dorset would never be our home, home is where the good memories lie....

Friends hubby confirmed he had received the boxed " Lotus Art Studio " condolence card i had personalised on-line and had had them post to him...he thanked me for it...

MarsGal · July 13, 2021, 08:13:26 AM

Patricia, Alder's crew are staying in Duluth and will take up duties on the Spar when she arrives next year. Of interest, USCGC Spar is stationed at Kodiak, AK. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USCGC_Spar_(WLB-206)

My childhood reading consisted of mainly horses and westerns, including Black Beauty and The Black Stallion, Heidi. Even earlier there was Mother Goose, and Reginald Rabbit. In my teens I also remember reading, Little Women, The Scarlet Letter, Edgar Allen Poe's stories, Alcatraz by Max Brand, Owen Wister's The Virginian, Green Mansions by William Henry Hudson, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, a bunch of war stories and non-fiction starting in 9th grade with Red Badge of Courage, and gradually going through WWI and WWII, which included Run Silent, Run Deep, and Is Paris Burning, and of course, rummaging around in our set of encyclopedias which included a set of seven called Lands and Peoples. Oh, and we read Shakespeare's MacBeth and Julius Caesar in high school English class. I mention them because I remember the teacher expressing her puzzlement over why most of the students did poorly in related quizes/tests, except for me. After all the whole class voted on which plays we would like to read. Well, those are the ones that stand out at the moment. My nose was usually in a book back then too.

patricia19 · July 13, 2021, 09:22:47 AM

Jenny, I hope you can get in touch with someone and get that shoulder fixed soon! I absolutely hate waiting for someone to call on a medical issue.

Thanks for the Spars Kodiak connection, MarsGal; I think I may have seen her one time when I was visiting friends in the Southeast. Until I started watching cams, I never really paid attention. This is rivers and riverboat country so not many calls for seafaring boats locally.

We're also having very smokey skies the last couple of days as the winds have shifted back and the warmer weather and dry conditions have returned. I posted one of the Forestry photos of smoke coming up over the ridges in photos.

Callie, I learned to read at three by my mother's side similar to you and your father. Mom would read the words and follow along with her finger tracing each written word as she read them. We all learned reading early with this method.

In the small lending library, we had when I was growing up in the territory, was a sizeable collection of bibolgraphies of Americans from the revolutionary war and beyond to Theodore Roosevelt. I realize now that they were perhaps a little biased and you'd never know there was any women involved other than footnotes, but at the time they were engrossing and may have fixed an interest in history for life.

I read and loved all the books mentioned except for "Jo's Boys" and one other mentioned earlier. I also read The Hardy Boys who were written to be Nancy Drew's contemporaries. I've never read "Is Paris Burning?" About Shakespeare, we read his works along with Hemingway and Poe in high school. Poe was one of my favorites.

When I was at the AV Department in college, I have to tell you about one of my tasks. I was one of several running the 16mm projectors in the theaters. Whoever filmed those for college students was a lot bloodier than the books!

You had to pay attention because you were running two projectors, for the first and then second part. You paid attention so one wouldn't run out to an empty screen. You would start the second projector moments before the first one ended. That way, they ran concurrently for the last of the first part with no interruptions.

patricia19 · July 13, 2021, 09:31:16 AM

I have to tell you of a Dick and Jane book that has stayed with me for some odd reason. Dick, Jane, and Sally, along with their dog, visit a construction site. Sally loses her teddy bear over the fence and down into the pit. The story of its return must have been involved to have stayed with me all these years!

Another thing I did that I wonder if any of you had. When I would receive that new literature book each new year, I would take it home and, by that first week, would have read the entire book. So, my attention definitely wandered during class read-out-loud periods!

phyllis · July 13, 2021, 09:41:49 AM

I don't think anyone mentioned the dog books by Albert Payson Terhune (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Payson_Terhune). I read, and cried, over every one.

I loved our small town library but I had a problem with it. We were only allowed to check out 2 books at a time. I would check out my two in the morning, hurry home and read them, go back to the library in the afternoon and return them and try to check out 2 more. The librarian explained to me that I had to keep them at least overnight. I was so disappointed.

I also read every Oz book written. After all, I was a young girl born and raised in Kansas so I, of course, had to read them. A few years ago I found a 1903 edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz at an antique shop. It sits on my mantel now. The illustrator was W.W. Denslow.

I think it comes as no surprise that my college major was English Literature. I was going to write the great American novel. That is, until I found out I had no writing talent. Only reading talent.

MarsGal · July 13, 2021, 10:46:05 AM

Newest bulk carrier on the Lakes. I caught her going by Marine City this morning.
https://www.vesselfinder.com/news/20559-Algoma-Central-Corporation-Takes-Delivery-of-the-Captain-Henry-Jackman

Vanilla-Jackie · July 13, 2021, 11:07:22 AM

Phyllis...and i bet you was first in line as those library doors opened the very next morning...

patricia19 · July 13, 2021, 11:10:34 AM

MarsGal, how interesting! Thanks for that link.

Phyllis, I have two history degrees due to those early reads. I think reading is one of the most important things you can teach someone!

Tomereader1 · July 13, 2021, 11:56:29 AM

My mom taught me to read at a very young age, she would also point to the words so I could follow along. I never saw her read a book, newspaper of course. But, my love for reading was learned by "watching my father". He was gone mostly during WWII, but when he returned home, I rarely ever saw him without reading material. He would read till all hours of the morning. I knew there must be something exciting in those pages, and whetted my appetite for someday getting my own books. I have to say, sadly, that other than school reading, I never got a library card until I was an adult. Not to say I didn't buy books or borrow from friends, LOL.
There was a small doorway at the rear of our apartment, kind of like a foyer for the back door. I would take a flashlight and pillow, and set up camp there, and read till someone called me for supper. My favorite readings were dog stories, especially illustrated ones where I could wish for the kind of dog I might one day have. I guess my favorite book and movie was National Velvet...gosh how I wanted a horse then!
Now I have bookshelves & bookshelves, stacks on the floor, 1,000's on two different Kindles and my library card is still kept up to date. (Awfullest year being 2020 when the libraries closed). Just now opening up on limited basis, but by golly, I'm there to pick up my on-line requests!!
Enough of my blathering and I love the direction this discussion has taken about the books of our youth. (Oh, I did have a one-volume encyclopedia, can't think of what they called it, but I read that cover to cover, by which my greedy little brain filled with useless trivia, very little of which remains today)!!

Marilyne · July 13, 2021, 12:13:14 PM

Jenny - We are also saddened here in California, that the "Fire Season" has arrived, and has already started ravaging our beautiful forests and small communities in the outlying areas of the state. There seems to be nothing that can prevent this for occurring every single year, when the weather turns hot and the wind blows. Sorry to see that you have to have the shoulder surgery, but the sooner the better! I hope you get scheduled today, and can get the surgery next week. Keep us posted on that, and also on how your three grandchildren are coping with the loss of their Mom.

Jackie - Here's hoping your next door neighbor, the gardener, can help you keep your yard the way you want it, for a reasonable fee. The yard workers here where I live, are referred to as, "Mow, Blow, and Go" workers. They are not gardeners, and know nothing about planting and pruning and fertilizing, etc. They are very fast at what little they do, and charge a high price! You either accept it as that, or you have to do it yourself . . . which fortunately, AJ is still able to do.

Phyllis - I remember the dog stories by Albert Payson Terhune! We had a large thick book called - "The Terhune Omnibus", that I loved. It was a collection of dog stories, that were mostly very sad, but usually with am uplifting ending. (Not always!) In spite of that, I read them all, and remember that tight feeling in my chest and throat, and my eyes filling with tears, as I continued to read. There were so many dog stories, and horse stories that were absolutely tragic. Another one called "Beautiful Joe", comes to mind. I don't remember if that was by Terhune, or not?

Callie and Shirley - I will return later to talk about the Nancy Drew books, which I loved! Also Cherry Ames! I still have lots of both series packed away in my cluttered basement!

Patricia - As I mentioned to Jenny, the fires are blazing once again here, as I know they are in AK as well. So far the wind is blowing N/E - so is sending the smoke to Nevada and Utah. Oregon, is also a mess of fires, that are far from being controlled. So many disaster areas around the country.

Sasha - Good to see your post! I really hope that you return, and bring us up to date on, "A Place in the Sun", and all of your beloved felines.

patricia19 · July 13, 2021, 12:31:01 PM

Idaho is burning as well as Spain, Greece and some other European countries as well as parts of Russia, they also burned last year.

MaryPage · July 13, 2021, 01:02:58 PM

When I was a child, those Bobbsey Twin books cost twenty-five cents each!

I loved them, but loved the The Five Little Peppers even more!

And my all time favorite; still my favorite: Anne of Green Gables! There were 8 books in all. I read every book of any kind that L.M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery ever wrote.

I loved Nancy Drew, but a couple of years ago or so I decided to watch a movie made of her on one of her adventures. Well, I gagged and turned it off, eventually. Nancy is still only in High School, but she is Sleeping with her boyfriend. I guess that is the norm these days; I don't know; but in my time, neither I nor Nancy Drew did that!

I saved all of my Bobbsey Twins and gave them to a granddaughter. She did not enjoy them, and quit reading them. My daughter Anne, her mother, pointed out that I should read one and see how different it was/is. So I skimmed through a couple and was shocked. Casual comments about people of other races and beliefs WERE ubiquitous, and we are just not remembering or believing that truth. Now I understand why the entire series has been rewritten for our present times.

It was coming from an entirely different direction, but it reminded me both sadly and strongly that it is impossible for an author of today to write a historical novel of, say the forties, if they did not live it. They cannot know or understand our minds of that time. They do know know the slang or sayings we had, and the many they insert had not become usage yet. No, they can get the cars, clothing, dates and events right; but they do not and cannot know who we were.

When I tell young people that World War II was the best four years of American life, they look quite worried about me. But I mean it. It was. Yes, it was a terrible time. Literally everyone went to war or went to working at it in one way or six. But we were a cohesive nation. We were all pulling in the same direction, and we smiled at everyone we passed. We gave assistance to complete strangers, and "Did our bit for the War Effort" every day of those four long years. I was only 12 on Pearl Harbor Day and 15 on V-E Day and 16 on V-J Day, but you would be amazed, if you did not live it, at the number of jobs I worked at to do my part. We all did.

Vanilla-Jackie · July 13, 2021, 02:06:54 PM

Marilyne...a new one on me " Mow, Blow and Go " i will bare that in mind for the future...

Shirley · July 13, 2021, 02:08:36 PM

MaryPage, I was 6 just a few weeks after Pearl Harbor & 10 when it was over. I agree that it was a time when WE were one, even if we didn't understand about race issues. And I really didn't. We had enemies, they were why we were in a war, and I don't remember much being said about party politics those years. Because my 2 oldest brothers did go into the service it was personal to my family. Do you remember carefully pulling the aluminum foil from cigarette packages? We took dimes to school to buy the book of stamps that turned into bonds. Mother would call the Red Cross and have them send out 2 or 3 "boys" that were hanging out at the place, for Sunday dinner. She hoped that if she fed someone else's boys, maybe someone would feed hers. I don't know if they ever said they were offered a home cooked meal when "state side". But we loved and helped everyone during those years, and shared anything we had. I don't even think we need to re-write books because it is history, the way it was. We have changed, some things for the bettery and I agree, I still have a problem with the "open sex" of today. But we each will be judged in the end on how good we were in our own beliefs, don't you think?

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