Living Room: Cleaning and Mom

Cleaning was kind of a perpetual event especially in the living room. It wasn’t that we just had to pick up on a daily basis but in addition there was the frequent dusting and making sure that the house was in order, the house really meant the living room because the living room was the first impression that people had when they entered the house. Mother always believed that if you spent good money, you got what you paid for and so with appliances she always wanted to buy the very best that we could afford. Then, as cognitive dissonance would have it, she would defend that purchase to the bitter end, even if the appliance was a lemon. For example, when she got a new vacuum cleaner she insisted on an Electrolux because it was the best vacuum cleaner made, not the cheapest but the best. This decision caused quite a row on the home front because it was, to our family, a huge expense, but mother insisted and when she insisted, Daddy found a way to figure it out and get her what she wanted because, if he didn’t he would pay in other ways. So we got the Electrolux and we used it and as was usually true, it was a work horse that never let us down. That machine must have lasted at least thirty years because it was the same vacuum that they had until Daddy retired and it was one that took a lot of abuse, especially from the kids in the family.
One of the things that I liked best about it was that my favorite cat, a long haired black beauty named Sam loved to have his tummy vacuumed. Whenever he would hear me pull out the appliance, he’d come running into the living room and throw himself on the floor so that I could give him a good vacuuming. I always thought it was strange that he didn’t mind the noise and he loved the results. He always looked beautifully groomed and that’s not easy for a long-haired feline. I never saw this with any other cat until our old boy Bandit lost his hearing when he was around 17 years old and then he didn’t run and hide from the vacuum any more, he’s let me give him a good old suctioning. That, of course, was because he couldn’t hear a blessed thing and so the noise didn’t scare him.
The windows in this room were Mom's nemesis. The house did not have a foundation and Longview WAS in Washington State, not exactly the driest climate in the nation. These windows had small panes and were wooden framed, so they sweat a lot. All of us hated cleaning the windows, the bottom pane was large and not so difficult to clean but the top of the window was separated into six small panes and the work was always painstaking and monotonous. There was a constant mildew problem in the house and Mother fought it with a vengeance. But, these windows were a constant reminder that she was defeated.

Bev, Mom & Me

1948

The One thing that you could depend on when I was growing up is that when we were expecting company Mother would spend at least two days tearing the house apart making sure that every tiny place in the house was spotless. This tendency grew exponentially worse after the boys left home and joined the service. First they were off to boot camp for what seemed like forever and then they would start coming home on leave. As soon as they that they would be coming home for a visit Mom started to go nuts preparing their special foods, cleaning house and making sure that everything was absolutely shipshape (or at least shipshape for Arlen since he was in the Navy, it was probably spit and polished for Larry and Bob who were in the Marines!) If, per chance, they were sent overseas then the cleaning frenzy got worse because they were gone for a longer time and the expectations for their home coming was enlarged. As the cliche' goes, it's always darkest before the dawn, and this was certainly the truth when in came to the cleaning frenzies; the house always looked much worse mid-cleaning than it did at any other time pre OR post cleaning. The vacuum temporarily took up permanent location in the middle of the living room, cleaning rags laid helter-skelter throughout the house, the sink was constantly full of hot soapy water. Mother would race from room to room in a nasty old house dress with a bandana around her head fussing and shouting orders to whoever might be within hearing distance (probaly including anyone within 100 feet of the property line).
When Bobby left home permanently he joined the Marines and one of his longest times away from Longview was when he was stationed in Hawaii. We all thought it sounded really romantic to be in the Islands and we were sure he was having an incredible time. There was great concern when he was hurt (I think it was a broken clavicle) while playing football for the Marines. He was not one to write home frequently like Arlen or Larry. I think Arlen wrote every week and Larry though less often, at regular intervals, but Bobby would never pick up a pen if he could avoid it. I can remember that Mother would get exasperated with him and then contact his commanding officer and then it would hit the fan! Bobby would be beyond angry with her, but it was the perfect plan because she would start getting letters fast and furious. The first time he came home from Hawaii (I must have been about 11 or 12 years old) he wrote and said that he thought he’d be home sometime around a particular date, I have no memory of what the date might have been but I do know that it was during the late Spring or early Summer. Mother took this to mean that it was exactly that date and so a day or so beforehand she started her race for the cure, cleaning and moping and waxing and fussing. Everyone of us was pulled into duty, we rubbed and scrubbed and made every place shine like the top of the Chrysler Building. I remember thinking to myself that she didn’t seem to like him too much when he was home, why all the fuss now that he’s gone? So the last day prior to his arrival I heard Mom and Dad talking about not really knowing which day he was arriving, and it gave me an idea. Now was the time when I could fix Mom for good. So as she was mopping the kitchen floor for the third time I stood up, looked out the opened front door and yelled in a delighted voice, “Bobby! Bobby! We’ve been waiting for you!!” At this point Mother let out a terrific cry of despair. She knew that she and the house were a disaster area and that she couldn’t do a thing about it. Of course Bobby was nowhere in sight, I was just pulling her leg. But, when I rolled on the floor in laughing fits, she didn’t think it was anywhere near as funny as I did. To say the least, she was none too happy with me. I’m not sure that we ever had the same sense of humor, but I still look back at it with a twinkle in my eye, because I got her good that time.


Bobby 1966