My Home Town-Millinocket-My Mother

MY_Home_Town-Millinocket-MOM.docx Anyone on this site My Mother My mother, the dear soul, didn't frequent the out of doors much as she was possessed by her house and the cleaning that she thought needed to take place.  God forbid that a speck of dust, or a finger print show up she would have had a conniption.  She was persnickety about  what she perceived as her job.  On Saturday mornings she would solicit my  two older sisters for their early morning chores.  I was not included as I was to young to be of  help, therefore, I was banished to the downstairs so as not to be in the way.  Well, I was not in the way of my mother and my sisters, however, I was in the way of my brother who was transfixed to the old Sylvania with the halo light around it. (For those of you who are too young to know what I'm talking about, that would be the T.V.) I can't remember the names of the cartoons we watched except Mighty Mouse (which I loved as he always rescued the damsel in distress  just in the nick of time)  Later in the morning my brother would watch Sky King and I didn't really like that show but I didn't say anything  as I knew he wouldn't let me help him on our Saturday ritual.  Let me preface this by telling you that my mother's black cast iron cook stove was so clean that it would shine.  She took pride in putting some kind of smelly stuff on it occasionally, rubbed it for what seemed like hours and boy it did look nice.  Well, our ritual was to take some potatoes out of the bag, slice them paper thin and place them on the top burner. They would cook up nice and crisp, almost like home made potato chips.  Well, when you removed them from the burner they would leave a white tell tale starch mark of being there.  That is about the time Sky King would come on and we'd retire to the same spots in from of the Sylvania and continue with our lazy Saturday morning.  Now, let me tell you mister when my Mother would come down over those stairs and see her stove she would me madder than a hornet.  We'd listen for the next several minutes of how hard she worked on that stove to make it look nice only to find someone who didn't have enough respect to appreciate how hard she works.  My brother would say he was sorry and my sisters would be fighting over the left over chips they had missed out on.  Later on I pursued that memory a little closer and now know that she wasn't as mad as she let on she was.  She knew it needed to be said for our benefit but there was always a little twinkle in her eye and I think my brother knew that. As I indicated my Mom was always working on cleaning something and thus didn't have time to play with me like I thought she should.  So, she came up with a game of Mrs. Hotdog and Mrs. Bologna.  I was skinny and she was menopausal porky so that is how the names came into  play.  She would go about her business of doing her chores and would tell me I had to do mine and when she was finished she would invite me over to her house to have coffee, tea and some goodies.  Needless to say whatever she did, I did. If she cooked a cake I cooked a little cake, if she baked a pie, I baked a little pie.  (Probably where my love for miniature anything comes into play) I had all the same cooking utensils she had, rolling pin, bowls, egg beater, cupcake tins. etc.  If she ironed than I got out my iron and I ironed also.  She let me do the washcloths.  Then when it was time for lunch she would come to where I was in the house and knock on the door and as if I'd like to join her for lunch.  Of course I'd play right along with her and we would pretend to be neighbors just visiting. You see, I was much younger than my siblings and so at times it was almost like being an only child.  They would all be somewhere playing, but either didn't want a younger sibling hanging around that they'd have to watch or I couldn't go where they were going because I wasn't old enough.  Didn't matter to me at the time, but later it did. That will have to wait for one of my next blogs!!! 'Til then, have a great one!