My parents were married in February of 1938. They were married in Grandma's house in Portage la Prairie , Manitoba. They had a best man, brides maid and preacher as well as grandma and Grandpa. What a grand wedding! They talked about it often. Mom was 24 and Dad was 26.
Up to that point my Mom had always lived at home. As so many young women did at that time she worked as a hired girl. Most households hired a girl as there were no luxuries or appliances. All the work was done by hand. Mom talked fondly of a family that she worked for for many years. She corresponded with these people for years. They were excellent people to work for and they treated her like family. I think she was paid $10.00 to $15.00 per month.
As many young men of the depression did, Dad traveled and picked up odd jobs and lived with friends. Dad was 18 when he left his family. Dad worked in a sawmill for his uncle all winter and when the job was finished and Dad wanted to move on, Uncle had no money to pay him. Uncle pointed to a pile of lumber and said that was Dad's pay. What could an 18 year old kid do with a pile of lumber that no one wanted. Dad walked away and traveled further on.
Dad moved on to the Okanagan valley in British Columbia. He had two sisters and some cousins living in the area. Dad picked fruit, worked in the bush, worked on a dairy farm and many other odd jobs. Much of the time he was idle and lived with other young people or his sisters. It was a frustrating time for young people who were not able to make a living for themselves.
In 1935 Dad came back to the prairies and with one of his sisters bought a small farm. The farm had a small meager house. It was about 14' by 24' . It was very poorly built so was very cold. Dad farmed and picked up the odd job. In the winter he went to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba and worked for a man who put up ice to be delivered in the summer for coolers. Again the money was poor but he didn't have anything to do on his farm in the winter.
So this is where Mom and Dad met.
A few days after their wedding they got on the train and went out to Dad's farm. Now I can imagine my mother's feelings as she was leaving home for the first time and moving out to a shack far away from her parents! The shack had not been heated all winter so it must have taken some time to heat up. Fortunately, one of Dad's friends kept them until the old house was heated. They had brought their clothes and a few household items that they had been given for wedding presents or things that Mom had bought.
So this was the start of their married life.
Neither of them complained about the hardships of the great depression. They often talked of the fun they had on no money. Many young people at that time married later in life as they couldn't afford to live independently.
I always admire how they managed to survive such hardships.
In my last post I admitted that I had no idea that the Micro Manager had such a collection of hankies. I got some ribbing because I didn't know that the handkerchiefs were in the house. That's okay as I'm not at all materially oriented.
However , some of the comments got me thinking about other areas of my life and what I may be missing.
Now I was a middle school teacher for 37 years. (You haven't heard that line for a long while.) I know that there were many things that went on in the classroom that I didn't ever get to know about.
However, I'm friends on an adult basis with many former students and sometimes we share some tremendous laughs about things that went on. There were many near misses of getting caught.
One story I'll never forget is from Bob who I never taught. Bob was my daughter's neighbor so many times I sat out on the deck with Bob.
Bob was a great story teller. There was usually a lesson or moral to his story.
One day in Middle School Bob decided he didn't want to go to school in the afternoon. He planned his afternoon off very carefully. He would go back to school after the noon lunch break. He would make sure that he was seen but would leave before attendance was taken. When the bell rang to go to home room Bob headed for the exit. To has shock and horror the principal was standing at the far end of the hallway. Just the two of them in that long hallway.
Well Bob thought , "He's seen me so I'm caught ." Bob kept on going without a shout from the Principal. Then Bob thought, "He'll phone my Mom and when I get home for supper I'll be in trouble." So Bob took his afternoon off but with some worries. Suppertime came and his Mom said nothing.
Well, Bob thought maybe I didn't get caught skipping class. Then Bob began to worry that when he got to school the next morning that his name would be called to go to the office. Next morning? Bob was not called to the office. Bob was beginning to think that he got a way with skipping class.
For some reason the Principal was in Bob's home room taking attendance. When the Principal got to Bob's name and saw an absent for the afternoon before, he asked Bob , "Where were you yesterday afternoon?" Bob said, I blurted out, "I skipped.!" Bob said he doesn't know why he said he skipped to this day. It just came out of his mouth.
The Principal calmly said, "Drop into my office before you go home."
Now Bob's buddies razzed him for admitting that he skipped when he could have got away with it.
Bob was allowed to worry all afternoon.
He visited the Principal after school and was given a few afternoon detentions.
Bob was still worried about his Mom finding out. His Mom was not phoned.
Bob likes to think about how miserable an afternoon off school could be.
Bob joined the Air Force and was paymaster for most of the time.
The Micro Manager is of an age when women who traveled sent little gifts to their friends. A popular gift was a fancy handkerchief! Anybody remember these?
These handkerchiefs were of a fancy design and may have had decorative stitching in places. Many times they had the name of the place the person was visiting along with a picture in the cloth. The were sold singly or in packages of four or whatever. The handkerchiefs were folded so that the four fit in a package making four triangles. The package could also be fancy with lettering and photos or maybe a painting that had been reproduced.
Well, there happens to have been 50 -60 of these fancy handkerchiefs in my house. I had no idea these things existed let alone were in my house.
Now the Micro Manager and I have been attempting to downsize for ten or fifteen years so the handkerchiefs came on the block for disposal.
Surprise! Surprise! These things are worth some money if you haven't wiped your nose with them. Check out eBay. One business bought about ten of them and paid money for them. That left 40- 50 in the house. The micro Manger found out that certain groups would take the handkerchiefs and give you a charitable receipt. All you had to do was present a price that was being paid on eBay. Go to eBay and have a look and you will find many of these handkerchiefs offered for sale. They are worth more if in the original package. If the original package is in good condition...more money. If the package hasn't been opened ...more money. As it happened the local college took the handkerchiefs for their Drama and Fine Arts program.
Now I don't remember seeing these fancy handkerchiefs in the house. How the Micro Manager got these in the house , I'll never know.
As of today, all the fancy handkerchiefs are gone from this house.
In recent days a cartoon with a pendulum showing females suffering the results and the swing now showing males being caught.
The pendulum is a good metaphor to show how the present situation has changed and that men are paying a price for their behavior. The pendulum tries to bring up the idea of a balance.
I'm not sure that there is any way to think of a balance in this situation. Both males and females lose a tremendous amount in this situation. Females lose physically, emotionally and it carries on throughout life. Males lose their position and power. They are very different types of losses and I don't see a comparison or equality in the situation.
People have been talking about a balance? I'm not sure what that balance would be. When the behavior is taken out of the courts and reported on line any control the justice system had is gone.
The other point is that inappropriate behavior still goes on. With recent reporting of assaults people think that might put a stop to it. It won't. There will be many males who still behave in a very inappropriate manner.
One of the comments in my last post mentioned that we have to look at each other as people rather than male/female. We should look at ourselves as people with characteristics describing character and ability. I like this idea although it is so huge that it will never happen.
I hope that we do move to a situation where there is less sexual assault and that there is a more definite understanding by all as to what various behaviors are.
The reporting of numerous high profile sexual charges has taken us by surprise. It was always known that there were sexual assaults and more that occurred and were never reported. The rate of reporting is extremely low. The rate of conviction for offenders is again extremely low.
There would be numerous reasons why the very few assault charges were laid.
Our justice system is woefully inadequate to process sexual assaults. Women are unwilling to report and lay charges as the system doesn't work with respect to sexual charges. It's difficult for a complainant to give evidence regarding an assault. It's a personal and hurtful experience. Then a cross examination can add another layer of stress. The offender then gives his side of the story. So you have two stories. Which one does the justice system accept. Historically it's been very difficult to get a conviction on a sexual assault.
So the justice system has limped along making a very poor job of cases.
Too many males and very few females have been involved in setting up a legal system that works better than what we have now. The justice system until recently was mainly male and they set up and ran a very ineffective system. One judge in Alberta asked a rape victim why she didn't keep her legs together during the assault..
Now since some women have skirted the justice system and reported assault many more women feel confident enough to report what has happened to them. That is good.
So now we have men who are publicly accused of sexual misconduct . Many men have lost their positions without going through due process. So again the justice system fails us.
The patriarchal system we have leads to male behavior of dominance. I wonder if matriarchal systems have been looked at as far as their issues with sexual assault is concerned.
We are a highly competitive society. People who desire leadership rolls compete vigorously for the position. No holds barred. Many politicians are now accused of misconduct. Politicians are able to negate half of their rivals with inappropriate sexual conduct.
The justice system is only one piece of the puzzle. Education? Social behavior?
We have a long way to go on this one before an acceptable level of justice and equality are achieved.
I have written on this topic before but, today I was listening to a phone in radio show and the topic was friendly letters. It got me thinking about friendly letters again.
Now I'm old enough to know what a friendly letter is. I'm also old enough to have written many friendly letters. I grew up during the 40's and 50's. I had excellent mentors as far as friendly letter writing was concerned. My mother and Grandmother corresponded weekly. As little kids we would gather around Mom to hear Grandma's letter.
So when I left home I tried to write my mother a weekly letter. I kept it up for about 5 years and then it gradually dwindled to nothing.
Up until my mother-in-law's death we got friendly letters. Now about once every two or three years I get a friendly letter from a sister-in-law. It is an excellent letter and I like to see it come.
So that covers that. Friendly letter writing has dwindled to nothing.
Back to the phone in show. There are people who still write friendly letters but it seems that they are special projects. For example, one husband went through his wife's address book and asked people to write his wife a friendly letter for her birthday. She got fifty letters and is still excited today. The conclusion on the show was that friendly letter writing is dead.
The Internet became part of the topic...emails, face book , twitter. The feeling was that these devices were part of the problem for killing the friendly letter. However, writing in these formats did not give a good letter. Another enemy of friendly letters is the phone. There are very economical long distance rates compared to 50 or 60 years ago. It is literally cheaper to phone than write.
Now with blogging there is more room for detailed information. The goal of some blogs is to keep friends and family informed. Some blogs consist of posts that describe daily life. They tell the story well enough to make it interesting enough to read.
So are you involved in any way with friendly letter writing? Has blogging taken over friendly letter writing to some extent?
A stamp dealer was telling me that stamp collecting has almost disappeared. Young people are not interested in it. They don't write and have little to do with stamps.
One of the American bloggers I follow , occasionally mumbles about the metric system and the lack of it's use in the States. She wonders why the US is not adopting the metric system.
The post got me thinking about Canada's change to the metric system. The change began in 1970 and it's still going on. The change was ugly but we can say that we have adopted the metric system of measurement.
Our change happened in an awkward fashion. The plan was to phase different parts of the economy into the use of the metric system. A special ministry was set up by the government to oversee the process.
It's difficult to make an overall change as some sections of the economy just can't change that easily.
Our land survey system is difficult so it took a while and is still in progress. Miles are part of the legal land system. Most of the agricultural system now uses hectares.
As a country we automatically use Celsius and kilometers. We buy gas by the liter.
I was a teacher during the seventies so the education system was charged with teaching the metric system. We did a poor job. We taught conversion of the English system to the metric system. Poor plan. Don't teach conversion from the old system to the new. Teach the kids about the size of the basic units in the metric system and then how the system is based on tens.
So now almost everything is metric. We by groceries by grams and liters or some form of them. One problem is that some groceries are also sold in pounds and priced in both pounds and grams. This gets to be a problem.
We had some major sieges. One old guy wouldn't change his gas pumps to liters. He fought a long fight but in the end he lost.
Lumber is still a problem because historically the English system was used so all old buildings were in that system. Most lumber is in English, but some dimensions have changed. Plywood thickness is in millimeters but length and width are in feet.
Somehow, we muddle along. The biggest advantage is that we fit in with the rest of the world. The worst of the change for me was listening to people complain about it.
