“What is the world coming to when girls allow their hands to be kissed without gloves? That young people don’t use proper protection these days is exactly why there are always so many colds going around.”
Today is just one of those I have no ambition to do anything days. The house is already clean, the laundry done, the bird feeders filled and the dishes put away. I could make my bed, but I don’t want to and don’t care one way or the other. If I leave it unmade, it is prime for an afternoon nap. Reason enough I think.
When I was a kid, I seldom stayed home from school. The only times I did were for the big diseases like measles and mumps. I remember the room was kept dark when I had the measles so I wouldn’t go blind, one of the accepted notions in those days, and I was driven insane by lying in bed with nothing to do because I couldn’t read or watch TV. I don’t remember the mumps though we all got them from each other. I just remember my neck hurting. We must have gotten colds, but I think it would have taken pneumonia before we stayed home from school.
One of the smells I always associate with childhood and colds is Vicks Vapor Rub. My father for his whole life was a big fan. He even had a grey sweatshirt he wore every time he used Vapor Rub. It had a big greasy looking stain on the front. If we got sick, out came the Vapor Rub. We didn’t have a choice. It was the panacea for the common cold in our house. I remember how awful it smelled, but I also remember it really worked.
Nobody had pediatricians in those days. We did have a family doctor we seldom saw. His name was Dr. Devlin and his giant, beautiful house was right next to the entrance to the schoolyard. His office was on the first floor. I remember all the wood and the ornate staircase as you came in the front door. Dr. Devlin was a huge man who sat behind a huge desk. He wasn’t a fuzzy, warm doctor but he wasn’t mean either. I remember he wasn’t all that gentle. I saw him only twice during my childhood: once when I was ten and had fallen down the stairs and broken open my chin. I still have the scar. When I was twelve, the school detected a heart murmur, and my parents took me to the doctor then I went to the hospital for tests. I remember that test and being nervous because it was the hospital. Luckily, nothing ever came of it and the murmur disappeared when I got older.
I think we were seldom sick because a cold was just a cold. A cough meant cough syrup and there was always the miracle of Vapor Rub. The doctor was for big things.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: blindness, falling down the stairs, family doctor, heart murmur, hospital, Measles, no ambition, office visit, unmade bed, Vicks Vapor Rub
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October 21, 2013 at 11:52 am
As Sweden and Portugal are drawn together for the World Cup playoffs on November 15 and 19, best wishes to Christer and I hope that Sweden find a way to get it done.
This pairing means either no Ibra or no Ronnie in Brazil which is a shame
October 21, 2013 at 12:31 pm
My Dear Hedley,
I’m hoping the best for Christer and Sweden as well!
October 21, 2013 at 12:52 pm
I’ll keep my fingers crossed for Sweden 🙂
October 21, 2013 at 12:56 pm
Birgit, A nice little group of Germany, England and Sweden, and throw in some random like Honduras.
The Plastic Swede has to show up for a game, we shall see but I am definitely pulling for our friend Christer
October 21, 2013 at 12:45 pm
We used the same smelling chest rub, but the company is named Wick over here, because Vick sounds like Fick in German. For a translation of Fick into English just replace i with u.
October 21, 2013 at 1:00 pm
Birgit,
That’s funny! I know I’ve seen articles about words translating from English not so nicely into another language. Great example!
October 21, 2013 at 1:39 pm
Much the same here, if I could walk I could walk to school 🙂 We didn’t have Vicks, instead we always used something called Oleum Basileum. It was used inm much the same way but so strong the eyes started to flow. My mother concider that the remedy for anything 🙂 Head ache, use basileum, heart problems, use basileum 🙂
If we coughed we always had something called The Danish king’s chest pastiles. I’m not sure if it did any good but they tasted much like candy so I never objekted to have them 🙂
Windy, rainy and cold here today but it’ll turn towards warmer again already tomorrow they say, the rain will stay however. It’s fun, it hasn’t rained more tha two days and I’m already tired of it 🙂
Have a great day!
Christer.
October 21, 2013 at 2:11 pm
Christer,
That’s what happened with Vicks too-it was just so strong smelling. It was my father’s remedy for colds, only colds and stuffy noses.
I wouldn’t have objected either if they tasted like candy. I did like the cherry tasting cough drops-they tasted like candy too.
We could really use some rain. I just watered the plants on the deck. They are all still alive as we haven’t had a frost yet.
Have a wonderful evening!!
October 21, 2013 at 3:25 pm
I have that cherry tasting cough drops here at home 🙂 I can’t say it works especially good but I just love the tast 🙂
October 21, 2013 at 5:11 pm
Christer,
I don’t think it worked much for me either.
October 21, 2013 at 2:12 pm
Hi Kat,
Vicks Vapor Rub here, too. Sometimes it was even in a vaporizer.
I didn’t mind it much until I got to high school. My French teacher was a big fan of wide open windows in the dead of winter and benzoin resin.
Benzoin resin smells like Vicks Vapor Rub taken to critical mass. This teacher bathed in it. He also had a huge cone of benzoin resin in his bottom drawer. He showed us. The smell permeated the room. It had the same effect on me as the poppies had on Dorothy in Oz. This teacher’s lecture style was also soporifically boring. Even winter winds blowing through the huge old windows could not keep me awake. It was painful.
Now my treatment of choice for colds is Walgreens Muscle Rub and lots of hot lemon water. I even have a dedicated Muscle Rub T-shirt for those times.
I had a mouse in the kitchen last night. I saw it run under the microwave cart but couldn’t find it. I kept hearing things in the kitchen but when I went out, there was nothing. Finally I followed Rocky out and saw him staring at his food bag. I looked inside and there it was. The tiny deer mouse was huddled up with its head buried in the kibble as if it would be alright as long as it couldn’t see what was happening. I took the whole bag outside and tipped it over. Little mouse went off into the lawn. It’ll be back, I’m sure.
In the meantime, the kibble that Rocky will not eat when it is in his dish is suddenly the bestest food in the world now that it is spilled on the grass.
Sunny and warm up here. I raked leaves and did laundry and that’s all I’m doing.
Enjoy the day.
October 21, 2013 at 5:16 pm
Hi Caryn,
I think I remember my little sisters having a vaporizer, but I didn’t. I never used it in high school either-no way that smell was staying with me to school.
I can’t remember the last time I had a cold. I get bronchitis if anything because of my asthma.
One mouse and you caught it! My brother would tell you where there is one, there are many. Because I’m the queen of hospitality when it comes to mice, I’m going to put the trap out now in case any wander in to get put of the cold.
Dogs are funny creatures at times. Cats are all the time.
I didn’t do anything!
October 22, 2013 at 11:52 am
This is the second mouse I’ve bagged by hand. Again, I think this was a young one and not well-versed in the ways of the world. I assume he was nosing about some stuff on the chair and fell or jumped into the open dog food bag which was right next to it. It didn’t look like he was eating it but he wouldn’t have been able to get back out again on his own. I hope he made it through the night but he wasn’t heading in a good direction the last time I saw him.
I know there are more than just that one. As long as they stay in the cellar, I don’t care.
October 22, 2013 at 11:54 am
Caryn,
I hope they do for your sake!
I still can’t believe how many had set up housekeeping in my house last year!
October 21, 2013 at 5:20 pm
My mom was one of those people who kept you home from school only if you were near death. I used to miss maybe 2 days a year. This carried over to my professional life – – I had a streak of 6 consecutive years where I did not miss a day of work. It was only broken when i needed surgery. Of course, I got the sick pay back at the end of the year, so there was a bit of an incentive. When I did go back to work, I started another streak that went on for another 7 years!
My grandmother used Vicks…I hated it so I never touched it. I wash my hands frequently, keep my hands out of my eyes, avoid others with colds, and drink fluids so I don’t get sick…
Lovely day here…bet you can’t wait for Wednesday night! What’s the forecast for the first game?
Waving from Jersey….
Coleen
October 21, 2013 at 5:35 pm
Hi Coleen,
I didn’t ever want to stay home. I really liked school. In high school missing a day wasn’t worth missing all the work.
When I had major surgery, I missed 6 weeks of work and another surgery had me miss another six weeks. Other than that I went to school regardless. A couple of times the school nurse tried to send me home. When I said, I was fine, she sent my boss down to demand I go home. When I retired, I got paid for unused sick leave, and I couldn’t have survived without it as it took almost 3 months until my first retirement check.
Today was lovely and tomorrow should be the same, but Wednesday doesn’t look so great for a game: cold and possibly rainy. Wouldn’t you know it!
Waving back!!
October 21, 2013 at 7:00 pm
When I was a kid my mother always brought out the Vicks. It went on my chest, under my nose and into the vaporizer. The smell brings back memories of childhood illness. We did have a pediatrician named Dr. Radwin. My mother would take us to him until I was teenager which was very embarrassing. His waiting room, the basement of his house in Brooklyn, was always filled with screaming babies. My father always said that he would examine the babies while the mother’s held them so that he could cop a feel of the mother’s breasts. He resembled the preverbal dirty old man.
In those days he came to the house if we had any fever. My mother also believed that the only accurate temperature came from a rectal thermometer. I knew that when he showed up with his little black bag and wingtip shoes I was going to get a penicillin shot regardless of my symptoms. My mother also believed that if the doctor didn’t give me a shot then she was not getting her monies worth for the house call. Radwin did more for the advancement of antibiotic resistant bacteria than anyone else in his era. He always gave me the tongue depressor stick and would draw a little face on it with his fountain pen. I don’t think physicians even own little black bags any longer or write prescriptions with a fountain pen because they don’t make house calls.
October 21, 2013 at 7:37 pm
Bob,
That’s funny in an odd way about that doctor. Maybe he should have chosen a speciality other than pediatrics so he could legitimately check breasts.
Vicks must have been a universal when we were kids. I think my sister still uses it, but she is the only one I know.
Strangely enough, house calls are starting to make a come-back in some areas.
I hate going to the doctor’s office as the appointment time is arbitrary. If it is ten, I’m still there by 10:30 or later. Then I go into the exam room and wait some more. It drives me crazy.
I don’t remember ever getting a shot when I was a kid. Seldom were we sick enough to go to the doctor’s office. My sister had to go to the hospital when she broke her leg and later when she almost cut off her thumb, but those were emergencies-no doctor’s office involved.
Most don’t even write prescriptions any more. They just send them right to the pharmacy from their computers. I’m not thrilled as sometimes they get lost in cyberspace.
October 21, 2013 at 7:48 pm
The trick with doctor’s appointments is to get the first one of the day. Doctors can’t always measure how long they are going to be tied up with a patient so it’s easy for them to fall behind schedule. These days I rarely even see my doctor because my physical examination is done by a nurse practitioner and prescription refills are handled online by the nurse.
October 21, 2013 at 9:07 pm
Bob,
I do try and do that. My next one is in March at 8:30.
The last few times I have seen the nurse practitioner, and I agree.
October 22, 2013 at 12:39 am
I love reading everyone’s posts.. I know we had a vaporizer, for colds but i don’t remember much of anything else, except for a cherry like cough medicine, that ruined my taste for coke, and other soft drinks.
I’m about to close my eyes, but I wanted to wave and say hello.
Waving ( without gloves),
Lori and her crew
October 22, 2013 at 10:58 am
Lori,
I think I liked our cough medicine. I just remember it tasting very thick, and it coated the spoon.
I never liked regular Coke, too thick, but I like Diet Coke.
Hope you had sweet dreams.
Kat and the kids