A DIARY REVEALS A NORTHWEST NOVEMBER IN 1940

  

Note: I published this post a couple of years ago, but its message is worth repeating— BE GRATEFUL.

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 A couple of days ago, I picked up my father's diary from 1940 to peek into my parents' lives during the month of November that year. His words made me think about all I have to be thankful for and how little we really need to be happy. In Norman Rockwell's famous painting "Freedom From Want," the artist created a scene that has become our ideal image of Thanksgiving. We see a smiling, laughing family gathered around a table heaped with food while the grandparents present the turkey. Even though mine was a loving and happy family too, real life in the '40s wasn't quite so perfect as nostalgia would suggest. I was the sixth of seven children, a child of the '50s and '60s, so I wasn't there, but thanks to Dad's diary, I can picture that time.

Howard and Rosalie Willsie with the first three of their seven children.

 In November of 1940 my parents, like others in their small community, still struggled to recover from the effects of the Great Depression. My father already had a wife and three young children to support.  A national election that month meant President Franklin Delano Roosevelt would serve a third term, and Congress had passed the Selective Service Act in September, requiring all men between the ages of 18 and 35 to register for the draft. During that year, the news on the radio reported the latest, none of it good. Nazi Germany invaded and conquered one country after another. Japan controlled Indonesia and Italy controlled Greece, and most disturbing of all, over 400,000 Polish Jews had been forced into the Warsaw Ghetto.  

Reading the diary, I though about what must have been on my father's mind daily as he worked hard, spending long hours driving a freight truck, picking up meat from Carsten's packing house in Tacoma, roses from Beall Greenhouse on Vashon Island, moving furniture, hauling groceries, and more. He had livestock to care for, as well as other chores around their place, and he dedicated any spare time available toward his effort to get a new barn built before winter. In that month, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapsed, complicating freight delivery. With everything else that concerned him, he also followed the news as World War II grew ever more devastating, not realizing that within a year his own country would be involved.

As for my mother, her days revolved around the household their two-month-old infant daughter and young boys, one a toddler and the other three years old. The domestic duties she took in stride included not only caring for small children, but also washing laundry in a wringer washing machine. Since she had no electric clothes dryer, she dried everything on a  either a wooden clothes rack indoors or outside on the line on days with no rain, even in freezing weather. She sewed, baked, cleaned, canned, and worked as hard as my father, morning 'til night. Mom kept a diary through her teen years and at the beginning of their marriage, but by November of 1940 she had left it to my father to preserve the days of their busy, hardworking lives in the little leather-covered book I now hold in my hand, 73 years later. Repeated throughout is some form of the statement that they both went to bed exhausted.

In the small space allowed for each entry in the five-year diary, my father crammed together bits of home life, social life, and current world events.

Sun. Nov. 10 - "Finished my sawhorses and went over to the place and cut the sill and joists for the barn. It snowed most of the morning. Dad went duck hunting."

Mon. Nov. 11 - "No freight trip today. I got in a full day on the barn. I'm all ready to start laying flooring. The girls had the baby shower today. Neville Chamberlain is dead."

Wed. Nov. 13 -"Too busy again to day to work on the barn. The English scored quite a naval victory over the Italians. The big Narrows Bridge collapsed last Thursday."

Thursday. Nov. 14 - "Very foggy until noon in Tacoma this A.M. Had another busy day. Paid some more bills. The lodge is giving a card party but we are too tired to go."

The next day they asked a friend to watch the children so they could have a little date night. They "took in the show," meaning they went to a movie at the small local theater. He mentioned the death of a community member on the following Monday. On Tuesday, Dad rejoiced that he had a small load of freight. Even though it meant less income, he could spend over two hours working on the barn. A week earlier, my mother had taken her babies to a clinic set up at the local high school, for smallpox vaccinations, and on Tuesday a county nurse came to their home to check on the children. For dinner that night, she roasted a duck her father had shot when he went hunting.

Wednesday, Nov. 20

"Rained all day. Grandpa and I went up to the bank and he gave me the deed to our place as we have it all paid for at last. Tomorrow we eat turkey."

Yes, they did eat turkey the following day at the home of my grandparents, but before the meal, Dad spent the morning working on the barn. The next day the sun came out and my mother did a big wash. They picked up several boxes of apples from a friend and soon the kitchen would have been filled with the sweet smell of homemade applesauce and pie. I can close my eyes and remember that smell, still part of home life after I came along.

Next he wrote, on Saturday, November 23, "The Greeks are forcing the Italian Army back into Albania. It's warmer tonight and raining. Couldn't get over to the barn today at all. Eggs are forty cents a dozen."

A few days later he noted that my mother "... hung out a big wash yesterday and boy how it rained all night. She went out and wrung them out on the line."



Thanksgiving day passed and life went on. His noted that his gross income from hauling freight that month was $36.00 lower than in November of '39 and he had put 22,000 miles on his Diamond T truck. My mother sewed a snowsuit for their oldest son. Christmas would soon be upon them and year later, war. After the shock of Pearl Harbor, the news that came over the radio would no longer seem so remote. My father wanted to join the Navy but remained a truck driver, his trade considered vital to the nation. 

When you sit down to Thanksgiving dinner this year, be thankful. I am thankful for my parents and I miss them. The world is still a troubled place and always has been, but rich or poor, in times of war or peace, home is home and family dear. Put aside your little aggravations, petty issues, negative thoughts and feelings of never having enough. You have enough. Look around the table. Others will go hungry. Others are alone. Some are refugees or homeless in your own town. Think of those missing, those who should be in the empty chairs. In memory of them, their struggles, their happy times, and most of all their love and good example, be grateful.



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Shared Housing Services Makes "Home for the Holidays" More Than a Dream

     Lisa Conklin and I both love our work, but the tough decisions her job requires make me shiver as much as some of the people who need her help, many literally out in the cold. As a writer, I make decisions about things like which word to use in a certain place. As Program Assistant and Case Manager for the Transitional Family Housing branch of Shared Housing Services here in Tacoma, Conklin has to choose which families, from among the many worthy applicants, will end up with a temporary home and practical help in starting a more stable life. A word left out of a story feels no pain. A homeless child left without shelter does.
     "I currently have two, 'one-plus' bedroom units available," Conklin said. "However, I have about seven families that are looking for housing. The majority are living with friends, 'couch surfing.' One is staying in the car and motels when they can afford them."
     In addition to providing opportunities for home sharing through their Referral/Match service, SHS owns about a dozen housing units for their Transitional Family Housing program. It isn't a handout. The program offers a hand up, a chance for families to recuperate from whatever situation caused them to be homeless in the first place. The head of the family needs to at least be looking for a job and they do pay a modest amount for rent while receiving mentoring, counseling, and educational classes in life management skills and parenting.
      Have you ever tried to prepare for a job interview when you have no good clothes, no shower, no child care, and not even a good night's sleep because you spent it in a car? I can't think of anything more depressing, except not even having the car for shelter. Even people with homes, a wardrobe, and easy access to good hygiene can't find work these days, so imagine the courage it takes to even try when you have so many disadvantages. But by offering basic stability, SHS makes all the difference. They have permanently changed lives. You can read all about it in a feature article I wrote for a website called Neighborhood Life. The success stories told there will warm your heart, just as they do Conklin's.

SHS clients know the meaning of Thanksgiving

     That's all good, but in today's tough economy the need keeps growing. Each month Shared Housing Services meets 400 NEW individuals seeking alternative housing through their Referral/Match and Transitional Housing programs combined. That means 1,600 homeless people in this local community alone will desperately need the help of SHS between November 2010 and February 2011, the coldest months of the year.        
       "There is a tremendous need for affordable housing," Conklin said,"and with the holiday season fast approaching, a place to call 'home' is very important!" Your help could change the lives of people who are trying hard to get back on their feet. Please consider getting involved in this exercise in compassion. If you'd like to help, please click on this link.
         Many people in Tacoma have made a commitment to SHS. "A great big 'thank you' goes out to Auto Warehousing Company for supplying our TFH families and staff with Thanksgiving turkeys every year!" Conklin said. Her gratitude reflects that of all the familes she's met and helped.
     In the words of SHS Executive Director Byron Cregeur, "There is probably no other time of the year when a home is so much more than just a place to live. Home is where we invite friends and family to our house for a feast and they are greeted with the aroma of turkey and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving! Home is where your Christmas tree comes alive with ornaments of memories..."
         I've met some of these kids and I hate to think of their memories of Thanksgiving and Christmas involving hunger and cold. Don't you? They are our fellow Americans, right here at home, and many more live only one missing paycheck away from the same situation. Think about it, please.



Remember that many victims of homelessness are children.
















Photos are the property of Shared Housing Services and cannot be used without permission. Text of this post is copyrighted by Candace J. Brown 2010















The Elusive Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving

When today’s kids grow up, what will their Thanksgiving memories be of? I wonder. Probably turkey, hopefully a happy family gathered together, maybe dinner at Grandma’s house. Or maybe not. Maybe the kids will be ignored in favor of football or maybe they’ll play football and love it. I don’t know. Thanks to TV and Hallmark and the world of mass marketing we have an image of what it’s “supposed” to be: an ephemeral swirl of warm pumpkin pie, ruby cranberry sauce, turkey and mashed potatoes covered with gravy, a charming group of congenial relatives in a perfectly clean house decorated with candles, and vases of chrysanthemums. Ah yes… I've had some of those. But how often is it really like that?

I’m not saying the image of the classic Thanksgiving is a fantasy. It must have seemed very real in 1943, when Americans reacted so emotionally to the famous painting by illustrator Norman Rockwell, called “Freedom From Want”. It touched people deeply. Even if you’re young you’ve surely seen it: the view down the dining room table with happy relatives seated on each side, the older parents or grandparents at the head of the table. The hostess is lowering a gigantic platter with a huge turkey on it and her husband, in his Sunday best, looks on in his kindly way, carving tools close at hand. Sixty-five years ago, the Saturday Evening Post magazine published this painting and three others in Rockwell’s series called “The Four Freedoms." The artist was inspired by a speech President Franklin D. Roosevelt gave to congress on January 6, 1941, while the Nazi’s dominated western Europe. The government rejected the paintings, when first approached by Rockwell. It wasn’t until they were published in the magazine and became a national sensation, that Uncle Sam decided they were pretty good after all, and made them into war bond posters that became icons of American culture. Like the illustrations of the quintessential 1950’s Santa Claus, these images are burned into my consciousness and the mood of my holidays.

I must say, I’m very lucky. As a kid on Vashon Island, I did have the big happy family, the turkey, and all the trimmings. It wasn’t perfect. I know my mother was sometimes tired and stressed out when she miraculously pulled that dinner together. We lived in an ordinary house, and maybe the silver didn’t get polished in time, or the windows washed. But I do remember wonderful aromas, cutout sugar cookies in the shape of turkeys, massive amounts of food including beautiful pies and special things like real butter and olives. At least they were special back then. Now I have butter all the time and turkey often, and too frequently indulge in olives. I’m old enough to remember when it was a big deal to get oranges in the wintertime. Now foods that used to be a treat, something else to be thankful for, are available all year and have lost their “special” status. In this age of abundant food supplies, as long as you have some money, the exclusive is more elusive. We need to try harder to make a day stand out.

This year our Thanksgiving here in Tacoma will be a very small affair, just the two of us and one good friend. None of our kids can be with us. My Dad will be at my sister’s condo, another party of three. My mother-in-law lives in an adult family home. The other two parents, I'm sad to say, are no longer with us. I lost a dear aunt, just last week. My brothers and sisters are scattered.

I’ll roast a turkey and bake a pie, but won’t go overboard on side dishes and extra sweets. I might light some candles. There won’t be any kids running around, a crowd in the kitchen to get in the way, noisy talk and laughter, and a general commotion. I’ve experienced all that, and yes, I will miss it. But the reality is that over time circumstances change.

Yet I am deeply thankful. I have people in my life to love and be loved by. I’m healthy. I have a home, good food, friends, a great dog, and my writing and music. I’m living Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms and appreciate them and those who have sacrificed for them. Think of people who are spending Thanksgiving sad and alone, with loved ones fighting a war, or those sitting next to the bed of someone dying a hospital, or those are ill and in pain, or homeless. There are families who will drink too much and fight, violent and abusive in front of the kids or even hurting them, and police officers (who are missing dinner with their own families) will come to the door and arrest someone. Not a very pretty picture, is it? Sorry, but those are the realities of Thanksgiving for some people.

We can dream of the ideal version of Thanksgiving if we’ve actually had that, or grieve for what we missed if we haven’t. Or, we can alter our expectations and open ourselves to the possibility of finding new joys and creating new traditions. I see people choosing to spend the day volunteering at a food bank, or inviting someone who is lonely into their homes to share a meal. One friend of mine, whose Thanksgiving will be a quiet and uneventful day, is planning to go to church. She doesn’t expect to see many people there, but it is the way she has chosen to express and experience her own thankfulness. The important thing is to simply BE thankful, for truly, we have so much to be thankful for.

Whatever you are doing, and wherever you’ll be, spend the day with a grateful heart. If you’re grumpy, shape up. If you’re mad, get over it. Call somebody. Share. Remember those who are gone and what is important. Show your love. Laugh. Yours may not be a Norman Rockwell Thanksgiving but it could still be the best one yet.


I hope you all, dear readers, have a happy Thanksgiving in your own unique way.