TubaOrNotTuba

If the need should arise I am ready to provide a full inventory of every place we ever lived and every school we ever attended. This is for my siblings more than anyone else but maybe my children have the need to know. I was lucky enough to be provided with a good memory for physical locations. I can point you where the houses were and where the schools were and if you’re intrigued by the word were it’s because most of those structures are now gone. It happens. We weren’t given to building much at of bricks. Except for that one school that we attended back in the day. I do wonder what my sister remembers given that she also was a student there. As a child you tend to miss the big picture for the details. I did go looking for old photographs but they were rare. Probably because no one else actually cared. The school that I attended for my grade four and five and six and something else was built probably half a century before I got there and it stayed in place for a long time. Gone now. It might have gone when they took out the railway. As for my other schools they’re all gone. As for hospitals they’re all gone as well. When you are young you tend to believe that things will last forever. Not so. And please do not ask me to talk about the colours inside. I seem to have missed that whole side of descriptive elements. Given the time. White was probably the only colour used. As for the outside of houses believe me children do not notice. Only if you were able to say that you lived in the white house or the brown house you had already done better than most of your peers. It’s a wonder we ever found our way back home. I did mention that most of these structures are gone and that part saddens me. These were all good buildings in their time. I have to look back and say I was lucky to have been there even if I will not be returning to any of them. Even my high school which took up five full years of my life was torn down about a decade ago. I’ve seen pictures of that one at least both: before and during. There is no sense. They replaced the building with something newer and better and I know that one will also disappear probably without my ever having been inside.

Did you do your laundry recently? Was it difficult? I actually do not care about your answers I’m just making a point. Our way of doing laundry has changed dramatically. I’ve been doing the throw it in the washer and wait till it’s done method for half a century but I came along at a time when people still had a ringer washer. I was warned over and over and over again not to put my fingers in the ringer. I was also taught how to yell for help if I did so and so I never did either. But you have to wonder for the people of this age what they would do if faced with the need to wring out their clothes. We spin until we’re happy. We know that machines can do a much better job then we can of removing all the water we put in to get the wash done. We can also rinse our clothes thoroughly. That may sound like a lot of work but it is so necessary. If you have ever had to wear clothes that were still soapy you know what I mean. And we have been doing laundry in the home for centuries. Seriously I do not think that anybody that I know ever had to go out to a stream and beat their clothes against a rock. You might see that in a movie but it does not reflect our realities of life. Also we have hot water now. Do not laugh yes that is a big deal. Combined with powerful soaps and a bit of time we can wear clean clothes every day of the week unless you really get your schedule out of whack. As I said for me it has been half a century so that even in university when I had no time for anything I still could manage to get a couple of loads of laundry done in the basement of a building. Never had to wash anything in the washroom or take it home to mom. Too far to travel. We can make jokes but we live in a very clean society.

My children grew up with modern heating. In fact they probably never even thought about it because all they needed to do to get more or less temperature in a room was to touch a small control. How much things have changed from the time of my parents. My father and my mother did not grow up together. Just nearby. And during their childhood houses were heated with wood generally it was a year long process to make sure that there was enough firewood to get you through the cold spells. I helped a little bit when I was older. Went out with men to cut trees just like in the movies. In the burn where I lived we had piles of slabs which were the leftovers from the local sawmill. All meant to be burned in a stove. Since the house was rarely warm enough in winter you also learned to rely on good blankets. Local E we have never dug for coal. That came from just across the water period. But the train stations because they had access to transport brought in piles of black stones to be burned judiciously. Yes I did live in a house with a cold furnace at one point and it was also a lot more work than my children have ever had to think about in terms of heat. I suppose that if we had had the modern knowledge we would have gone for something like I don’t know solar or passive but we didn’t we burn stuff. Blame them for the current weather if you wish. They will not be here to be held accountable. Nor will I. For me that’s just history. And yes I still have some blankets around in case it ever gets really cold.

Since my request to take a time machine back to the time of my grandparents has been summarily refused I must carry on by trying to learn from other sources. One of my sets of grandparents lived on a small family farm just up the road from here and I visited them when I was young. I was quite aware that they had animals but I had never given thought to which animals and why. There were not very many. The usual mixed bag of cows and pigs and horses with an occasional chicken wandering around outside. I did with time learn that each animal gave something else to the table but I never thought about how it all comes together in a very interesting marriage throughout the year. Not every animal is to be killed at the same time. You must plan your menus ahead. For example today I learned that you needed a calf in order to make cheese and I had really not considered that possibility. It has something to do with a magical chemical called rennet which is found in the calf’s stomach. Also pigs do not like drafts of cold air. Something else I had never considered I just figured they lived in a little pen and waiting for their turn to come up. Cows of course I understood but I had not thought about the various ways that milk can be used in the diet and I had forgotten that a cow has to have a calf before there will be milk. It is all about the timing. Turns out back in the days of the family farm they had figured out all those variables they knew what to do when and nothing ever went to waste. You’ve heard of sausage? They had you’ve learned about hooves being made into glue. I do not know that my grandparents ever made glue but I will not speak for their ancestors. And the eventual hide would be made into leather. Perhaps not in the back barn but somebody knew the tricks. There are so many other little tidbits out there. I have learned a few but now I will take the time to study and try to put it all together into one big picture. Life on the family farm. After all they had no supermarkets in their day and if you did not have it at home you just did not have it. I wonder did they grow apples? All this from watching a simple video which is how most of my days get started. Take an idea and run with it.

From my kitchen window I can see a small lake. Technically not a lake. Rather a lagoon open to the sea. And that’s what makes it special because from what I can learn that lagoon is full of eels. So much so that our local museum has a whole section related to the artifacts of when people went out on the ice with spears. We no longer have that ice. I have never seen anyone standing on the shoreline trying to spear a wiggly. But I did watch a video dating back to five or six centuries ago when the eel was a valuable commodity on the average table. People ate eels. People caught eels. In small traps mainly. And now I wonder, am I missing out on something? Should I be down on the stairs near the shoreline trying to catch my supper? Not likely. I have never developed a taste for the beast although I’ve watched relatives who fried them up with glee almost and I’ve learned a little bit about the complicated lifespan. Better to let the eel keep its place in nature without my interference. I will watch the lawn just in case one of them decides to walk about. I learned that from my language exercises about fish that walk on the lawn. Anything is possible you know. What I would like is that same body of water to be filled with trout. I like trout although I haven’t gone fishing for those in the better part of a lifetime either. We have a number of very small rivers around here and when I was younger I would go after supper with a line and catch a couple. At a different time in my life I guess. But getting back to that body of water. Too small for large boats. A lower kayak would fit perfectly.

Back in the day I would have had to make a choice. Do I call a bus or not. Outside we had what may have been fog or haze. I can no longer tell the difference between the two but generally fog is wet. What I did notice was that the big boat that goes by down below, had to let the world know that there was fog or something with its horn. Every 90 seconds a big blast of a horn. I imagine that for someone paddling a small boat, this would be a real wake up call. In my case I was simply laying out on the deck glad the sun was not too warm. I do notice things like the foghorn or fog siren because it is not a common thing around here. We can go months with no idea that a boat has even passed except for the rumbling and vibration in the floor. I live less than a kilometre from open water and sound carries well. I would love to be on that ship, because that’s what captains call their boats, but that will have to wait for another day. Once again, when I was younger I could have found myself in the fog for days at a time. I lived on a much smaller island for a year and when the fog was too thick we stayed inside. We also had a fog alarm. I think they match them to the light houses when they can. Unlike a lighthouse the foghorn does not have its own character. Just a loud noise at regular intervals letting the world know that outside there is weather. I mean, fog does qualify as weather in this part of the world. When you have enough wind the fog just moves right on by. Although I have seen times when the wind blew hard and the fog stayed there for days. A lot more fog than here. That same ship goes by here pretty much every day and about the same time. The transit takes place in a matter of seconds and you can almost set your clock to it. Very punctual these marine types. I was thinking back to the number of different ships that I have seen on that same route over half a century. I guess that every time a boat or ship gets to be too small for the job, the government buys a new one. Sort of explains our national debt. And knowing how the government thinks they probably do that with airplanes and buses and other transportation vehicles. Even trains. Some ads on TV recently were talking about the new train cars that they purchased.

If ever I decide to write a book for children, I have the stairs of my story. I open my front door and three young foxes ran to take places just below the step, where they could watch for me and see what would happen next. Even a bit of barking to remind that they are alive and well and there for whatever comes along probably dog biscuits because that’s all I have to offer. I never had anything like this my lived in town. The best we ever managed was a lonely porcupine who wandered around like a lost soul but here, I have friends. No I have not given them names. I’m saving that for the book and they do look a lot alike probably from the same litter. Our young foxes never seem to come with their parents by the time they make it to my front door. They are already halfway to adulthood and I wonder, did their mother tell them not to bark at strangers. I should take more pictures but they look the same from year to year. I do have one preferred photo when I had a group of them doing gymnastics on top of a huge hay bale. I mean I know they were looking for mice but it seemed so natural. Yes I really should write a book and confer characters to the faces. It worked for other famous people like Disney. I’m sure I could give you a tale that will remind you that their tails are not available. We are more civilized now and they do bark almost like a dog does. Am I trying to tame them? No to be fair, small dog biscuits are not the right tool for the job. I just offer enough reward for them to keep running over to see if I am still their closest friend and neighbour and yes, they’re mainly red. A wonderful colour of red and they are just small enough for me to make them into imaginary characters for that book that I still have to write.

I want to leave behind stories for those that come after me. It is important that if someone asks a question about where they come from that there’d be a response. And not just a point on a map. I am fortunate in that the homes of my two sets of grandparents are still standing period. I can take you to the front door and point although neither home is still in the family as they say. But these homes were both similar in size and building materials and proximity to important jobs. The railway if you will when it still was here. Both homes had an upstairs in the downstairs and the number of bedrooms and in certain of these places people were born and died. A lifetime under a roof if you will. The views from the windows were similar although one set of grandparents had a river in their backyard. Teeming with trout as I remember we don’t do that sort of thing anymore. Unlike now the car was less important. People tended to keep horses and carts and they never went more than a few miles to get to anything unless they need to take the train. I was fortunate enough to live in the home of one of my grandparents when I was a fully grown working adult so my memories are quite sharp. In the other case, I remember details. Stairs. Because I tended to climb those on my hands and knees given my age. One family drank coffee and the other drank tea. I can remember the mystery of the coffee percolator. Both families eventually had small television sets but that was not an important part of the home rather having neighbours dropped by for a chat and some tea that was what made a house into a home. I know that both homes had cats because when you live in the country that’s your first defence against the invaders. I would love to have the chance to show these houses to my descendants: my sons and my nieces and nephews and in one case to a couple of my sisters because they came along after the fact. In both houses the kitchen was the most important room that was mainly where you made fresh cookies. You see, details do get affected by your age. And there were telephones. Eventually you can find the book that talks about getting the phone and the lights but those came afterwards. The houses came first in both cases around the time of the First World War or little before. It puts a date on things.

Today I’m going to try to recreate something I have not visited in many decades. We all have places that we would like to see again and in my case it would be the local Telegraph office at the Elmira Station. It was run by my father. He was a trained professional and he could handle many things at the same time including full control of a ticket office all the coming and going in the train station and the click clack of the Telegraph what I remember most of course was a chair that would rotate through a full 360° nothing like that in my home you could get on top and turn around and around and around the seats even had cushions but I digress of course. I never understood what was being sent or received on that Telegraph I learned to read code in a different era with a different system and I never had to master the idea of clicks that lasted longer than others much more difficult than you think. There was also a microphone so that my father could talk to the dispatcher. He never invited me to say hello to anyone but I knew what was going on and then all the different sizes and colours of paper after all a railway never does things simply there was a form for everything and carbon copies so that you could really get your fingers dirty. About the time that I started to be interested in this sort of thing as a profession, my father moved on to other fields and other places, and now I have to rely upon old movies and YouTube videos to try and fill in the blank spaces in my memory. Those memories go beyond the clicks. They (the government) came and took away the trains. Not that I understood why. Trains run on time hopefully and there was a big clock hanging on the wall that was accurate long before I knew the meaning of the word. I knew that the clock was the boss of everything else that happened in that office. If the clock stopped so did the trains.

This is the time of year when we play a game we opened the real estate listings and try to figure out what we would take if it was offered. As I said this is a game which requires a great deal of imagination. I took a few minutes to look at what is available locally and my eye was caught by two offerings. One of them; a small church, pretty building with a great view and one caveat, you don’t get to keep the building there you must move it away on the back of a truck I assume, to who knows where. Someone has other plans for that great view out over the water. In another listing a house down in town. What I found curious about this listing found over the internet, was the description a concrete foundation with a clay floor. I can imagine it but I cannot imagine why would you go to all the work of pulling in a foundation without actually putting in a seller or a basement as we like to call them. Why would you fill it full of dirt I’m going to have to find someone with more experience than I to explain the reasoning. We also have a lot of land for sale around here and the prices in every case make no sense. This is the time of year when tourists drive by and decide that this is where they would like to live or retire if they had unlimited funds. Most of those lots will still be for sale in six months time. As I said this is the time of year when people dream; not when they actually build things. You would want to know what winter looks like first.