”Childhood is measured out by sounds and smells and sights, before the dark hour of reason grows.”
The sun is coming but just not today. The temperature will rise out of the 50’s but just not today. I will get ambitious but just not today.
When I was growing up, we had a phone with a party line. It was less expensive than having your own line. We counted the rings as to whether the call was for us or for Mrs. McGaffigan who lived at the foot of the hill in a big house on the corner. We’d sometimes try to listen, but she usually caught us and would tell us to hang up. I think we breathed too loudly.
I miss the wonderful sounds from my childhood. I loved the sound of the rotary phone when I dialed a number. I’d turn the dial until my finger hit the stop and then I’d pull my finger from the dial. It would go back to the start, counterclockwise, with a clickity-click sound. Typewriters made a similar sound every time I’d hit a key. My typewriter was a high school graduation gift. My house, when I was a kid, had radiators. I loved the sound of the steam from the radiator on the wall at the foot of my bed.
In the coffee percolator, in the little glass on the top, the coffee sort of popped up and down as it brewed. It was one of my favorite sounds. I loved the clicking sound of the needle on my 45’s. It was sort of a cackle. I even liked the sound when the needle skipped.
My father would never wear corduroy. He said he hated the swishing sound. When he was a kid, he wore knickers. They were corduroy. They swished. I bought him some corduroys one Christmas. They didn’t swish. He loved them and wore them so often the wale disappeared.
Cash registers had bells. The fire alarm rang and the rings told us where the fire was. They also rang for no school. Hand bells were rung in school for every change, for the start and end of school and recess and for classes.
My parents gave me an Instamatic to take with me to Ghana. They also gave me a few flash cubes. They were four-sided. The cube made a clicking sound when it turned.
I still have my typewriter and an old rotary phone. My furnace makes noise. I can hear the hot air blowing. My coffee maker does give a beep when the coffee has finished brewing. Those about the only sounds left like those from my childhood.
keepthecoffeecoming.blog 
May 20, 2024 at 10:42 pm
Hi Kat,
I’m in Savannah Georgia for a couple of days. Unfortunately, I don’t have any time to sight see the town. I’m staying near the airport which looks and contains all of the standard hotels and restaurants that you find anywhere in the country.
I used to tell a story to the new instructors which involved a phone booth. I used to have to explain what was a phone booth to the younger students. Now, I don’t even tell it anymore because no one believes that there was a time when cell phones didn’t exist. The younger ones have never even seen a rotary telephone or a typewriter. I read an article that said that the last two pay phone booths were removed from Manhattan a couple of years ago. There’s a job that no longer exists, pay phone coin collectors, or telephone operators.
One of my favorite episodes of the TV series, “Seinfeld”, is the called The Chinese Restaurant. George is trying to get on the pay phone in the restaurant to call his date. George finally gets the phone and leaves her a message on her answering machine and including the number of the restaurant. The wonderful Chinese actor, James Hong, plays the proprietor of the restaurant. George asks him if he received a call for Castanza? James Hong says yes, “I call out Cartwright, no one answer, she say curse word and hang up”. It could only happen to George.
May 20, 2024 at 11:21 pm
Hi Bob,
I’m sorry you won’t have time to wander. I’m you’re in an amazing city. It is so true about airports and hotels being generic.
I used to stop at pay phones hoping to find change in the coin return. I was actually lucky in finding change. I wonder if the younger students have seen Superman. He does need a phone booth to change except in the cartoon where he sometimes runs into alleys. I read somewhere on line that kids should be locked into a room with a dial phone and a note in cursive about how to get out. They’d be stuck for hours.
I remember that episode. Just reading about it makes me laugh. You’re right about poor George.
May 20, 2024 at 11:40 pm
I forgot about Superman. I guess when they do another movie, he will have to run into alleys to change. Or maybe he would run into men’s stores to change in dressing rooms. I always wondered why no one ever found Clark Kent’s suit and tie.
May 20, 2024 at 11:57 pm
I wondered the same thing about his clothes. He left so many I figured he had to have had the hugest wardrobe. At least Superman on TV when he was at the Daily Planet used to change in the storage closet then fly out the window. I figured he flew back in the window to change back.