Houses didn't have "family rooms" when I was a child. At least I had never heard of such a thing. In my world you had a living room or a parlor, or sometimes you had both. In most of our rental houses we just had a living room, and that was the place where everyone gathered in the evenings or on weekends to relax and be a family. In the houses where we had two such rooms, we invariably chose the smaller and cozier of the two for the daily gathering place. Now that I have used that word "gathering", I realize that I have often seen that used in country decorating books to describe just the sort of room I am talking about today- the "gathering room."
You see that there was no television set in our living room. We didn't have a television set until I was in high school. My dad finally HAD to go buy one during the high school basket tourney time, so he could watch the games happening in Indianapolis. You do see a radio. And that was what the family gathered around when we wanted some entertainment other than conversation or games. I LOVED listening to the radio shows in the evening. David and I would fix snacks. We used to make "Hermit" cookies, or Mother's "Never-Fail" fudge, or popcorn. Then we would lie on the floor and listen to "Jack Armstrong", or "The Shadow" and eat our snacks. And the whole family listened to "Fibber McGee and Molly", "Gildersleeve,"
or "One Man's Family." I think that "One Man's Family" was our favorite, and it was aired on a weekend evening.
I can tell you exactly what the house and street looked like where Gildersleeve lived. I can describe Molly's living room, and the jammed closet that would "explode" every time Fibber opened the door. Strange, though, that the house and closet looked a lot like ours. And Gildersleeve's street looked a lot like our street. That was the beauty of radio. It required that the listener really listen and use his mind to conjure up the sights. It was a much more creative process than mind-numbing television. Perhaps we were fortunate to grow up in such a time. Our granddaughters attended a Waldorf Elementary School. In Waldorf Schools the teachers use no audio-visual equipment whatsoever. Everything is done through story-telling and visualization. Both girls have grown up to be very creative writers and artists.
On the game table you see a Monopoly game. We did play games like Monopoly. We also played card games: mostly Hearts or Canasta. Mother and Daddy played Bridge. Alas, I don't seem to have any card-playing sense. I have never learned to play bridge. Don likes to play euchre. I play for awhile, then my mind begins to wander, or I start an annoying conversation (annoying to the card players), and all is lost.
Also, I am a terrible loser. I HATE to lose. While Don, on the other hand, is very competitive, but takes losing right in stride. So, these days, television is pretty much our entertainment of choice.
The throw on the back of the couch would have been crocheted by Grandma Lininger. Grandma never sat down that she didn't have her crocheting with her. She made an afghan for every child and grandchild. I still have mine. It has been mended and repaired, but I still treasure it. Often, during the evening, Mother would wrap up in the throw and take a nap on the couch. Or sometimes I would come home from school in the afternoons and find her under the throw and listening to her radio shows (Soaps.)
When we lived on Meridian Street and I was between the ages of 8 - 11, one of my favorite tricks was to search for coins under the chair cushions, and down in the chair crevasses. You know that fathers and brothers do not sit up straight when they are relaxing in an easy chair at home. They slump and lounge, and pocket change has a way of escaping from their pockets. Glory! Glory! If I could find enough change, I would run across the street to the drugstore and buy a magazine. I loved movie, fashion, or home magazines. I loved magazines that had pretty, colorful pictures. Then I would read them and cut out all the pretty, colorful pictures.
When Jack came home from the army, he brought with him a German ammunition box. It was wooden with rope handles and an attached lid. Mother painted it and put my name and a Pennsylvania Dutch design on the lid. This was my treasure box. For years I collected all my favorite magazine pictures and kept them in this treasure box. I also kept my paper dolls in this box. I liked paper dolls, and I liked making my own clothes for them out of scrap paper. And sometimes I cut out the ladies from the Sears catalog, and cut out extra clothes for my Sears paper dolls.
The Hermit cookies I mentioned were from Mother's recipe books. As I remember them they were soft and chewy, and had raisins and spices in them. Sometimes they were better than at other times. If we couldn't find one of the ingredients, we just made them without that ingredient! The fudge was one Mother had made all her life. I have seen many Never-Fail fudge recipes, but not like Mother's.The newer recipes call for Marshmallow Fluff and chocolate pieces. I remember Mother's recipe called for cocoa powder, butter, water, milk, vanilla. You had to stir and stir. At eight years old, I could check to see if fudge had reached the "soft ball" stage. That is, if when you dropped a bit into cold water, did it form a soft ball? If so, you could take it from the fire, stir, and pour it into a cake pan to set. I have one of my mother's teen-age diaries, and she talks about going to "fudge parties." At Christmas she mentions that one of her gifts was a "fudge apron." Our mother knew her fudge!
Ah, such simple pleasures. But I do remember it as a mostly happy childhood. Today's children might find it hard to survive without electronics. But I recall all that "living" with great fondness.
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