To Canoodle or Not to Canoodle

In Post-War America, love was in the air.

Along with Valentines Day’s hearts and flowers, came big dates, big dances, and king sized expectations in high schools and colleges all around the country. But even the smoothest post war gal could use a tip or two to make the evening real dream-diary stuff.

So for all you valentines with a special date marked down on your calendars, some vintage advice from 1946 for do’s and –especially- don’t’s on hooking up.

Tonight’s the Night

Peggy was all hepped up for her big Valentines date with Hank a tall, dark, crew-cut kind of fellow. This blushing bobby-soxer was sure this would be the night he asked her to go steady. But, her pal Paula warned, going steady came with consequences.

Terror and titillation went hand in hand.

Sure, like most Junior girls in her High School, Peggy liked some hubba hubba from time to time. But every good girl knew the dangers of heavy petting!

Figuring out how to say “good night but not goodbye” and maintain her reputation, caused her headaches to beat the band.  Luckily for Peg  there was no shortage  of advise and cautionary tales  for the love struck female. Every mid-century women’s magazine were chock full of them to help set this jittery Junior straight. Consulting her favorite sub deb column in her mothers Ladies Home Journal proved  invaluable.

Caution: Romance Ahead

“It happens to every girl- that mellow moonlight and roses feeling when the man of the moment begins to look like the biggest thing in her life. If you’re a wide awake bright-eyed kind of gal who gets a kick out good books, good football games and good brisk walks in the rain, it’s inevitable,”  began a column directed to sub debs  in a 1946 issue of Ladies Home Journal.

“You’re going to get a kick out of good dates too!” Peggy read  on anxiously.

Boy, Oh Boy!

“You may have liked boys since you were an out sized character back in the pigtails-and-pinafore department and the little chaps around the neighborhood made good company for playing hide and seek.”

“Now boys are still fun, only now they are more fun, and instead of just liking them as you once did you feel a new appreciation for them.”

“And how!” thought Peggy to herself.

“Suddenly you want to date boys who are smooth dancers, know all the do’s and don’ts of about dating and are smart enough to push the button for a woody Herman disk when they slip a nickel in the juke box.”

“And then suddenly you’re content to know just one. Because it’s happened.”

“You’ve suddenly met the one boy who has almost everything you can ask for in any man! There may be a few things missing ( he isn’t as tall as you’d like nor does he drive a red convertible coupe) but with this dream stuff so close at hand- who are you to quibble.”

“You’ve found someone whom you can like and who likes  you. Someone you can really appreciate and that affection just can’t put itself into words.”

“So you’ve got to find some other way of expressing yourself- it will take-well one goodnight kiss at least!”

Eagerly, Peggy read on.

Can This be Love?

“Of course this is the old feeling you’ve heard so much about.”

“It isn’t just a hubba hubba business; it’s something much more important than that.”

“You can’t wait to get to math class each morning because he sits almost behind you; you can’t begin your homework at night till after 7:30 because that’s the time he calls and if he doesn’t call that evening you,  you can’t do your homework at all for wondering about him; and you carried a slip of paper round in your pocket for weeks worn and tattered because he scrawled “See you at 8:30”on it the first night you two had a date together.”

“It’s a wonderful feeling all right; it’s exciting. It’s stimulating, it keeps you awake at night! But just a minute, honey-chile- haven’t you felt this way before?”

“How about that super sharp fellow you knew back in the days when you were still a freshman? The one who asked you to wear his class ring one Saturday night (but the mood was off and the ring returned before the week was out)?”

“And the fellow with whom you went on a blind date when you were visiting your cousin in St. Louis, and the soda jerker down at the drugstore who went to your high school and who asked you to wait for him every night after work so he could walk you home?”

“You liked them didn’t you- and more than just a little?”

A Dime a Dozen

Vintage illustration Jon Whitcomb 1948

“And a kiss is an important thing.”

“You show your interest first just by talking to him, smiling when he looks your way; you can give him a hint that he’s the kind of boy who’s No.1 on your hit parade by saving your Friday nights for him; and then after a number of dates, lots of deep conversations and some real fun together- you may realize this isn’t just any boy.”

“This is someone special.”

“And since your kiss is based on honest affection it means something important to both of you. “

“But if you change man interests and dates every other evening, what happens to that sincerity? You may feel at the moment that tonight’s the night, but who was that boy we saw you with last night ( that was no ‘boy’ that was the fellow you thought you loved, remember?)”

A Girl Who Gets Around

“Or are you by any slim chance, one of those female characters who have been fooling themselves with the old tale that ‘a girl has to neck to get around?’ You may think that’s the true story, that the object of any fellows affection will automatically be the gal from whom he gets the most….affection.”

“But you just haven’t got as far as the punch line!”

“Many a gal gets around so much for a while that the whole whirl leaves her dizzy; she loses her sense of what’s what completely. She may think that all any boy wants is a gal with whom to hold hands, pat cheeks and rub noses at the doorstep. She goes through the same routine  with 6 out of 10 fellows, and she’s suddenly surprised when boys don’t call her anymore! “

Peggy blushed with recognition.

“That gal just forgot that anything too easy to get, is considered “cheap” and that’s just what happened to her. It doesn’t take long for fellows to catch on to a girls dating reputation- and a word to the guys is sufficient!”

Peggy’s pal Paula didn’t want to be the sort of “I told you so” kind of friend, but the look she gave Peggy said it all.

What’s Your Story

“Let’s forget what this moonlight madness does to your dating rating and your reputation and figure out what it does to you.”

“You may not spend too much time on self-analysis taking yourself apart to see what ticks. But if you did you would realize that you are made up of hundreds of complex “reactions” all of which add up to make your total personality.”

“One kiss won’t put you out of the pink-angel department with any boy, but you know that one kiss leads to another; you may have wanted to kiss a fellow goodnight because he’s considered a good date and you want to see more of him, or simply because he’s your guy and that’s just the way you feel- and before you know it, you’re necking!!!

“You can suddenly find yourself with a lot of emotions just too hot to handle! And don’t even try to fool yourself with the smug assumption, ‘I’m not that kind of girl!”

Caution: No Parking Ahead!

“So take time out occasionally to think about your date life. And take it slow and easy for a smart gal will know to keep those extra starts out of her eyes. This is one time you have to see what you’re doing!”

The lesson was clear- Valentines Day was no license to lose your reputation.

Peggy was firm: Keep the Brakes on!

Copyright (©) 2017 Sally Edelstein All Rights Reserved

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Little Donnie sees a parade

What a big day for Little Donnie

He will have a parade, too.

He will have a children’s parade.

Donnie saw a parade.

Donnie wants big toys in his parade.

Big shiny toys.

Shine, Donnie shine

This is Donnie’s big parade.

What is Donnie in the parade?

Is Donnie a sailor?

Is Donnie a soldier?

No silly.

Donnie knows just how to dress for the big parade.

Donnie is a clown.

Silly, Donnie.

For many Americans a gun represents the heart of our nation’s foundation and identity and symbol of their freedom and democracy but on this cold war creed of American rights, gun ownership was noticeably absent.

What you may ask, is more fundamental to the American Way of Life than a gun? Who could argue that gleaming AK 47 automatic rifle is a shining and powerful example of our basic rights which protect the dignity and freedom of the individual?

In fact, most would agree the right to keep and bear arms is written in stone.

Or is it?

A cold war Credo of the “American Way of Life”  that highlighted all the freedoms and rights unique to democracy didn’t deem it necessary to include gun ownership in their patriot doctrine.

This full-page color illustration that ran in Family Circle Magazine in 1956 was the visual embodiment of this Credo of democracy. In the painting set in a symbolic location that depicts George Washington and his men at Valley Forge, the Credo is emblazoned on a stone monument as though the articles had been carved on twin stones resembling the tablets of Moses.

The American Way Of Life

The creed, a summary of basic freedoms intended to distill the essence of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence was formed by a group with the hope of building greater awareness of the value of the American Way of Life and improving the understanding of the American Constitution and Bill of Rights at a time when they felt Americans took their freedom for granted.

Curiously enough this Credo with nary a mention of the right to bear arms was not produced by some left leaning liberal group bit by an ultra-conservative organization called the Freedom Foundation.

Freedom Foundation

Formed in 1949 this pro-American, patriotic group could boast a roster of illustrious founders. Hoping to continuously sell the American system to the people during the Cold War, the Credo was cooked up by ad man Don Belding, financier E.F. Hutton with major support from Dwight Eisenhower. As a bulwark against Communism the Credo would help promote responsible citizenship, character, and freedom. And Capitalism.

Each article of the Credo was brief and easy to understand; some were obviously drawn from the Bill of Rights (like “Right to free speech and press” and “Right to assemble”), while others had an economic bent (like “Right to bargain with our employers”).

The words of the Credo  “have been sifted, revised and approved by many great statesmen, industrialists’ jurists and historians,” and has “has been endorsed by over 200 chief and associate justices of state supreme courts.”

Yet it is noteworthy the second amendment which has today taken center stage in our national dialogue was not even worth mentioning in this credo.

Mainstream America

Far from a fringe group the Freedom Foundation gained national media attention distributing more than a quarter billion copies of the Credo by the mid 1950’s.

The Credo was reproduced on magazine covers and for decades celebrities like John Wayne and Bob Hope joined the star-spangled wagon train promoting the foundation’s Americanism on radio and TV spots.

In the cold war climate of 1956 it’s not surprising that Family Circle was proud to devote ten pages to the Freedom Foundation Credo and its patriotic principles.

Own a Piece Of Democracy

The monument was still an artist’s rendering and the Foundation was eagerly looking for donations to build its monument in Valley Forge.

A full color enlargement of the Credo illustration by artist Isa Barnett was offered to the reader for the first time ever, and would be “a perfect addition for your home, school, office church or club.”

Democracy in Five Easy Pieces

“The Credo, the accompanying article explained “brings together a series of short, simple, easily understood propositions derived from our great heritage of citizens’ rights and freedoms. All of the Credo rights fall into easily remembered groups, under five headings.

“Here and on the following pages are pictures that capture the essence of our rights as free men- rights that are not common in the world of 1956, although we who enjoy democracy may take them for granted.”

At a time when it seems the Trump presidency has accelerated the decline in democracy, it is worth reviewing our cherished rights.

Protection

Rights of Protection – Right to Petition for Grievances; Right of habeas corpus-no excessive bail; Right to trial by jury-innocent till proven guilty

“Our democratic form of government protects our individual rights by giving specific courses of action to invoke when necessary.

“General of the Army Omar Bradley says: “I feel that a monument to freedom…will stand as an American symbol of our pledge to the world that we will eternally serve in this cause…The Freedom Shrine project will place upon imperishable stone – for all to see –the mighty concepts of freedom and liberty which mark the American way of life.

Freedom Foundation – in sponsoring this project-is giving a symbol to the world of the most powerful weapon in this global fight against tyranny – a monument to the principles of freedom… In addition to serving as the arsenal of democracy, we must remember that we are also regarded as the arsenal of hope.

Sadly today we have relinquished our roles as beacons of democracy. America’s global reputation for personal freedom has taken a beating as has our prestige. Trump and his minions  have quietly been dismantling our protections we have fought for since FDR’s New Deal.

Government

Govrnment- Right to free elections and personal secret ballot; Right to the service of government as a protector and a referee; Right to freedom from arbitrary government regulation and control.

“To secure our personal rights, our identity, we must establish and participate in the kind of government that guarantees our rights to us.

Shown here are some of the many ways all of us enjoy our rights of self-government. The Freedom Shrine will restate these rights in simple terms to remind Americans of fundamental principles

President Dwight Eisenhower, on contributing the first dime to the Freedom Shrine said: “ Thus we will show the world our nations fundamental belief in God, our constitutional government  designed to serve  and not to rule the America people, and our indivisible bundle of personal, political and economic rights…

Identity

Identity- Right to Worship God in one’s own way; Right to free speech and press; Right to move about freely at home and abroad; Right to Assemble

Those personal rights that allow individuals to establish the identity that is unique in every human being.

Ownership

Ownership- Right to privacy in our homes; Right to contract about our affairs; Right to own private property

“Grouped here are the Credo rights that entitle us to have property and enjoy full ownership of it- our homes, fields, businesses and all the other possessions that help make life comfortable and secure.

Property has always been dear to men because it is a bulwark against distress for them and their loved ones.

We have only to look at countries where these rights are not enjoyed and compare our conditions with that of the deprived, to rededicate ourselves to preserving our bundle of freedoms – of which these three give us such rich benefits

Enterprise

Enterprise- Right to work in callings and localities of our choice; Right to bargain for goods and services in a free market; Right to go into business, compete, make a profit; Right to bargain with our employers and employees

“As citizens of democracy we are privileged to express our individuality through creative work and to enjoy its satisfactions. Because our form of government encourages individual initiative and imagination we enjoy full freedom to translate our work into enterprise.

Pictured here are Americans enjoying their precious rights that relate to enterprise: rights we must remind ourselves, that disappear under a totalitarian regime.”

“As citizens of democracy we are privileged to express our individuality through creative work and to enjoy its satisfactions. Because our form of government encourages individual initiative and imagination we enjoy full freedom to translate our work into enterprise.

Pictured here are Americans enjoying their precious rights that relate to enterprise: rights we must remind ourselves, that disappear under a totalitarian regime.”

 

Democracy Now

Those words directed against the fear of cold war totalitarianism, ring just as eerily familiar today.

The Credo was formed with the fear that the freedom of America’s citizens was gravely at risk, not only from the threat of communism but because Americans took their freedom for granted.

Today while the spot light on gun rights as an attack on our freedom seems to outshine all other rights, many of our basic rights are already being infringed on.

The foundation on which the monument stood was the words “Constitutional Government designed to Serve the People.”

If our democracy is slowly eroding, we must pay attention to who is being served .

Copyright (©) 20018 Sally Edelstein Envisioning the American Dream All Rights Reserved

Donald trump loves immigrants.

And he is generously willing to acknowledge the contributions immigrants have made to this great country, that is if they hew to the immigrants portrayal of his youth. Like his wives, Trump likes his immigrants to be of the European model.

Fixated in that dated, mythical all white place he grew up in, the place and time when America was so great, Trump never advanced beyond 1965 when immigration policies  changed the face of America. He is still stuck back in the school book pages of his childhood where white Europeans were the majority of immigrants

A look at an illustration from a 1954 World Book  encyclopedia that purports to celebrate  American Diversity  and the Immigrant’s contribution to our greatness,  appears to be a page straight out of Trumps policy book

Immigrants Come From Many Lands

“How Immigrants Helped to Build The United States”  is the headline to this illustrated map citing  typical contributions made by the various national groups to American industry and culture. The depiction of a multi racial ,multicultural society is sorely lacking, other than an occasional nod to Mexican farmers, and Chinese railroad workers. Naturally they  note the happy Negro “immigrant’s “ varied contributions such as spirituals and sugar cane growing, whereas the English proudly gave us theories of government.

To people raised in the 1950s,  encyclopedias not unlike  like American history textbooks were the truth of things. They carried the weight of authority.

They were or so it seemed the permanent expression of mass culture in America.

Vintage advertisement World Book Encyclopedia .

These heavy set of  books that predate Wikipedia offered knowledge at your fingertips, that like the history books we read at school contained the demeanor more than any other books of authority. Teachers treated then with respect.

Inside the covers of theses weighty tomes the histories were seamless. . American heroes were white. As were the ingredients of our melting pot. The society was a regular patchwork of nations as long as you were European. “ Real” Americans were of “European descent. The browning of America  that would occur later changed the recipes  which was not to many people’s liking. Like KFC  they wanted to stay with the original recipe.

The mass of poor immigrants who arrived at the end of the 19th century were “they” to these books  – aliens whom “we” had to assimilate and mold into citizenship. Lest they become an indigestible and undigested element in the “melting pot” recipe and a menace to our free institutions.

Many People From Many Lands

By the publication of this 1954 World Book Encyclopedia  1950s immigrants are fine people      because their decision to come to the US proves that this is a land of liberty; the fact that they were not turned away- by the Statue of Liberty- proves that Americans are uniquely generous. Then in order to prove that American generosity had not been squandered, the texts list “contributions: that individual immigrants have made to America.”

“By 1900 many people from many lands had settled in America. Through the years these people had built farms and villages and cities across the breadth of the country. They had conquered the wilderness “from sea to shining sea” They had come, most of them because of a dream. It is sometimes called the American Dream.”

“And so they came through the years people from many lands in search of a better way of life. About 1 million came from Norway. More than 10 million came from Italy. Millions of others came from the British Isles, from Germany and many other countries. “

A classic original recipes people didn’t want tampered with.

“For many of them the first sights they saw was the statue of liberty It stood at the gateway to the New World . It reminded the immigrants of the dream that led them to America – freedom justice and a better way of life. These people from many lands built the America we know today. We and our sons and daughters will continue to build, for the story of America goes on.

The story did continue.

The 1965 immigration law changed the country in dramatic ways by  abolishing long implemented preferences for immigrants from Northern and Western Europe over African Asians and other developing world nations. Trump would love a return to pre 1965 policies that give preferences to highly educated usually white Europeans.

Though most of us have turned the page on these dated notions, Trump is stuck  on that page.

The Thanksgiving table is as laden with myths as it is with stuffing and pumpkin pie.

Immortalized in countless mid-century illustrations done by some of the country’s most esteemed illustrators, these indelible images have served up a mouth-watering,  idealized version of that most American of holidays.

Set in a gracious house the traditional meal anchored by a burnished turkey is flawless and faultless.

The table large enough to accommodate all the guests is gleaming with silver, fine bone china. The snowy damask cloth is always pristine with nary a drop of spilled gravy or wine to blemish its perfection, not unlike the smiling unblemished white family that surround the mahogany dining room table.

Thanksgiving Day and the feast are nationalistic myths created to provide a past that never was and to create a shared national identity.

As long as you were white, middle class and Christian. In a country loaded with choices the typical American family was truly limited to one.

In reality, our Thanksgivings are messier and more diversified and that is something we all can be truly gratefult for.

Though we may fall short of the romanticized vision of Thanksgiving feast, where conflict, burned Brussel sprouts and undercooked turkey never exists, my wish for all of you is to have for a perfectly wonderful Thanksgiving, no matter how imperfect it may be.

As Hanukkah approaches, I share a little secret.

Like many American Jews, I secretly covet Christmas.

Though taught in the Ten Commandments not to covet thy neighbor’s wife, there was no explicit directive to coveting thy neighbor’s holiday.

Holiday cheer for some Jews also includes a touch o’ holiday envy. This has nothing to do with not fully embracing my own cherished Jewish traditions of Hanukkah.

With its pervasive display of merriment, Christmas can feel to outsiders like the twinkling embodiment of the American Dream.

One in which we are left out in the cold.

Perpetual observers of this ultimate national celebration, we are never full participants. As though peeking through a picture window looking in at the Norman Rockwell tableau’s of happy gentile families gaily decorating their Christmas trees with glitzy shimmering lights and cherished heirloom ornaments taken out of hibernation, we could enjoy it from the sidelines.

This glittering part of American life winking at us seductively from neighbor’s homes, shop windows, and the mass media always seemed just outside my grasp. It is a constant reminder we are a minority here.

When it comes to Christmas, Jews are the Other. Except when we are not.

The truth is, in my pre-school years, my Jewish family did celebrate Christmas.

Sort of.

Christmas Celebration

It helped that my paternal grandfather, Papa Moishe was born on December 25th just like Jesus another Jewish boychik.  In Dad’s family, his father’s birthday became a day of celebration and big family gatherings of the whole mishpokhe on Christmas Day carried over into my own childhood. Whose birthday we were celebrating was at times unclear.

Because Papa wasn’t the only one to get presents on December 25th.

For the first few years of my childhood, Santa Claus in fact did squeeze his corporeal self down our narrow brick chimney to deliver cheerily wrapped presents. In a suburban house without a fireplace like ours, I suspect Santa swooped down directly to our finished basement landing softly on the ping-pong table having to trudge up the stairs to leave presents for my brother and myself.

I often wondered whether Santa made a pit stop in our kitchen as he did in the classic Coca-Cola ads. Of course in our refrigerator, Santa wouldn’t find any of the frosty green bottles of Coke which he was accustomed to, but he could pause for a refreshment courtesy of Cotts Cream Soda, or Dr. Brown’s Cel Ray, perhaps stopping to take a nosh of the Hebrew National salami that was always stocked in our Frigidaire.

Naturally, my parents had their limits when it came to certain Christmas traditions.

Neither a stately Douglas fir with its scented blue-green leaves or a shiny silver Aluminum Xmas tree ever graced our mid-century living room. There would be no sentimental ornaments, no glowing bubble lights, nor silver icicles. The exotic scents of balsam and baking holiday ham were strictly off-limits, as forbidden as Oy- Gevalt! a ceramic crèche.

Nor would there be there any merry red felt Christmas stockings. In its place were my father’s oversize woolen argyle socks stuffed to the gills with small tchotchkes.

The one lone Christmas decoration often shared space with our menorah.

A tall plastic Santa Claus figurine beaming merrily from the top of the mahogany Emerson TV set. He watched over the proceeding on Christmas Eve as my parents wrapped toys assembling and fumbling with D batteries all through the night as Perry Como and Nat King Cole sang out their Christmas tunes on their RCA hi-fi.

Truth be told, I am not sure this was all kosher with my more observant Jewish mother.

Christmas is after all inescapably Christian as much as it’s been commercialized and secularized over the years. She did not want to keep the Christ in Christmas.

“You’re Entitled!”

I suspect it was the cajoling of my more secular father who was beguiled by Christmas’s charms and didn’t want to deprive his dear children of this gift-giving extravaganza.  The miracle of Hanukkah couldn’t hold a candle to the magic of Christmas, or so my father felt. The heroic exploits of the Maccabees would not be enough to hold our attention, hoo-ha!

A Santa Claus Christmas won hands down.

Initially.

Yes Shmulie, There is a Santa Claus

If gifts were involved a visit to Santa was mandatory  Since Santa Claus was as American an icon as Uncle Sam, my mother saw no harm in it. Plotzing down on a jolly plump man’s lap to request a litany of consumer items seemed as American as apple pie.

The week before Christmas Mom and I would head into N.Y.C. Along with viewing the magical Christmas displays in all the department store windows, we stopped in Best & Company a  Department Store on Fifth Avenue to have my hair cut and curled at the tony children’s salon.

I would exit picture-perfect for sitting on Santa’s lap in Macy’s our final destination. My blonde hair and blue eyes belied my heritage and I fit in seamlessly with other little boys and girls who waited patiently on line for their chance to ask for the most sought-after toys likely heard hawked on “The Mickey Mouse Club.”

A glance at my baby book reveals what I got for Christmas. Along with with a record of my vaccinations and my first steps, is a record of baby’s Christmas diligently written in by my mother. There is nary a mention of holiday gelt but a single recording of what Santa delivered for my third Christmas. It was a lollapalooza of gifts fit for any mid-century boy or girl or both:

A gasoline pump, hunting equipment, gun, canteen, mess kit, a doll stroller, doll high chair, Ginette Doll and  Blue Teddy Bear.

My religious identity was apparently as diverse and inclusive as the list of toys I received.

Enough With the Christmas!

My visits to Santa stopped abruptly as did my Christmas celebration once I began grade school. Perhaps in an effort to solidify my identity as a Jew and dispel any confusion, Hanukkah would forever take prominence. The gift-giving now stretched out to eight full days which for a child was the real miracle of Hanukkah.

Curiously, the few pictures taken of me with the department store Santa suspiciously disappeared years later.

In a house of hoarders, no colorful Kodak snapshots of that event exist.  Was evidence destroyed as part of my parent’s plausible denial allowing me to sail through Hebrew school without this taint to my past? Was Jewish Guilt to blame?

But for the baby book inscription, no trace of my former life as a shiksa exists to this day.

The fond memories, however, remain.

Next: Jews and Christmas – Not so New

My father was not alone in his feelings and in fact, there was a long history of Jews in America celebrating Christmas. Hanukkah had long been a minor festival in the Jewish religion. As a way to feel assimilated many immigrant Jews at the turn of the last century adopted Christmas customs such as gift-giving. The Yiddish press at the time even took note running articles asking “Why should Jewish children not have Christmas trees?”

© Sally Edelstein and Envisioning The American Dream, 2019. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Sally Edelstein and Envisioning The American Dream with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

If supermarkets are a showcase for the American way of life, the profusion of colorful packages and containers are the glitzy showgirls winking, shouting, and seducing us to select only them.  Each shopper free to choose from an array of thousands of dazzling options points to our democratic freedom of choice.

Or so we choose to believe. Wink, wink.

Brand names, packaging, and supermarkets form the trifecta of 20th-century food retailing. Codependent, the success of one reliant on the other.  Together they changed not only the way we ate but how we shopped.

Self-Service Grocer -This Little Piggy Went To Market

“Rows of bright, trim packages, individual as people; rows of familiar shining tins and gleaming bottles, colorful, cheerful, gay, each with a host of possibilities- what was more attractive than a well-stocked, well-kept grocery shelf,” rhapsodized General Foods in their 1929 cookbook that was an ode to corporate packaged foods.

Oh, the choices!

That bounty was what awaited the up-to-date homemaker of the 1920s when she shopped at any of the thousands of new self-service grocery stores that were sweeping the nation.

“Along with aeroplanes, skyscrapers, and metal furniture, self-service shopping all tell of swift changing ways of doing things,” General Foods extolled.

Mrs. Modern could pick and choose from the plethora of packaged products on the shelves of her local Piggly Wiggly. Though not quite as large as the soon-to-be-supermarket (that phenomenon was still waiting in the wings) these self-service grocery stores were groundbreaking.

Gone were the days where she had been dependent on the clerk at the grocer to advise and fetch all her items, adhering strictly to her list. Gone where the days of open bins and barrels filled with foods sold in bulk to be doled out by the clerk at his discretion. Grocery stores were now just plain old fashioned.

Why depend on the advice and persuasion of a store clerk when she could now wander the stocked aisles herself and choose what was best for feeding her family.

The forward-looking homemaker filled with all the latest nutritional knowledge didn’t need anyone to tell her what to buy and what to consume.

She didn’t need a salesman.

Or did she?

Out of the Cracker Barrel

Modern Food Packages- Designed For the Housewife. “An amazing amount of care goes into the designing of modern food packages. Each package must give maximum protection to the product, maximum convenience to the housewife.” General Foods Cook Book 1930

 Technology and American know-how would change the physical shape of food purchasing causing a major cultural shift to packaged consumer goods and shelf-stable food.

The big game-changer happened in the 1880s when folding cardboard cartons for crackers and cereal could be made by machines.

But it was Uneeda Biscuit that took the crackers out of the barrel.

National Biscuit Companie’s patented, moisture-proof In-er-Seal wrap for Uneeda Biscuits launched in 1900 promised that their crackers would not get soggy or stale while waiting to be purchased. The airtight container, a  cardboard box lined in wax paper ensured every customer received the same high-quality product at the same price nationwide.

The packaging not only insured freshness, it enabled manufacturers to turn from selling out of cracker barrels to providing individualized, identical packages.

All stamped with brand names.

With a name worthy of a Don Draper, few missed the meaning of the brand name  U-nee-da, the first multimillion-dollar ad campaign.

Packaging which at the end of the nineteenth century was still only a means to protect a product had now become a thing-in-itself.

Who Can You Trust?

The purity of the factories was emphasized by manufacturers. Vintage Postcard Postum Cereal Company stating they are the largest Pure Food Factory in the world.

Like many of her generation, my great grandmother was suspicious of packaged goods. She was used to purchasing things at the small grocery store where food was sold in bulk or shopping at outdoor markets of pushcarts where she could rely on her senses.

With factory packaged food that she could not smell or even see, the products she was buying were naturally suspect. Why should this unseen food, produced in a giant factory by who knows what kind of workers and recommended by no one, be better than homemade or better than food chosen by a local grocer and small local manufacturers?

She did not trust food disguised in packages.

Friendly Persuasion

But you could trust that American ingenuity would come to the rescue.

Clever ad men turned the doubter’s argument on its head.

Not only could factory produced foods be more sanitary they said because they were untouched by human hands and then packed in protective packages, but the customer could rest easy that with its brand name on the package, the company would have the incentive to take responsibility for its products and guarantee its own accountability. Corporate Foods took the guesswork out of not only how to use their product but why only their’s was the best.

To Market and Marketing

 As food and other household products came to be individually wrapped and more easily transportable it was only a matter of time before someone thought of a new way of selling them.

And so in Memphis 1916  Clarence Saunders hit on the novel proposition that he patented under the name Self Serving Store. He called it Piggly Wiggly. The precursor of the supermarket.

 “Choose For Yourself…Help Yourself – Select What You Please…By Yourself”

“At last women are free to make their own decisions when they buy food. There is no one to persuade, to urge at Piggly Wiggly- women choose for themselves –help themselves,” a  1929 ad for Piggly Wiggly promised.

Without a grocer, a clerk, or salesman, the products themselves had to do the tempting and the choices could be perplexing.

Self-service stores all depended on name brands to sell themselves. And only the most dependable names deserved to be on m’ lady’s shelf. But which were the most dependable?

The increasing size of the stores, the increasing number of items, the increasing competition for the buyers’ attention by items displayed so that the buyer could reach them for herself, made branding and packaging into a newly sophisticated industry.

The salesman was nowhere to be seen. Yet he was very much there.

Each colorful item cried out- their’s was grander, more wholesome, more tempting more easily digestible, with more nutritional value than the other one, preferred by more women and thousands of mothers agree.

Bombarded with nutritional information as never before, the homemaker was also bombarded with choices. Who could she trust?

Suddenly there was anxiety about the right choice.

The New Nutrition

The Housewife was now a scientist n the kitchen

Mothers have always fretted about their family’s diet.

What was different beginning in the 1920s were the new attitudes towards nutrition. Food itself entered a modern scientific age. Along with new ways of shopping were new ways of eating. Women absorbed the most up to date information showing her new ways to think about diet and digestion. Exciting scientific advances and discoveries about food seemed to unfold every few weeks.

Although it was a German scientist who had come up with the new idea of classifying foods into proteins,  carbohydrates, and fats, it was American industry that was putting it to good use in the hawking of their products.

Scientists  had recently discovered vitamins, and the corporate food manufacturers jumped on the bandwagon touting their product as “protective foods.” Words like fresh, pure, and wholesome were factory food favorites. Every new product claimed scientific backing for their nutritional theories. These messages were conveyed in advertising and on the packages themselves.

Don’t Take a Chance Take a Name Brand

General Food’s family of fine foods wanted Mrs. Homemaker to be part of their family

Even armed with the latest scientific advice on sound nutrition, the housewife needed assurance she was choosing the right product for her family.

Articles in womens magazines warned: None but the most dependable products – the ones worth knowing- should have a place on your pantry shelves; for here stands that select company you depend upon for everyday needs and emergencies day in day out.

Forward-looking food manufactures, as well as food editors, urge housewives to know the products they buy- know what they are made of and how the important component of food were discerned only in a scientific lab  by a trained expert eye.

The overwhelming new power of packaging then came from self-service.

Now that the modern homemaker had to rely on her own judgment for choosing products it was up to the food manufacturers and the ad agencies to assure her of their quality. And the wisdom of her judgment in selecting the right one. Theirs.

Fortunately, corporate food manufacturers were working overtime, establishing home economic departments and consumer services to assure the American woman of their quality.

You don’t have to trust guesswork anymore, the homemaker was re-assured.  And you don’t have to take just anyone’s say so. The sanitary testing kitchens of food manufacturers were all working overtime to put their knowledge at m’ lady’s disposal. Who could provide more authoritative judgment about a food product than the esteemed directors of the Home economics  department in the many corporate manufacturers of fine food?

For the family’s health and well being, only their product, they claimed, had the exact nutritional elements that offered purity, wholesomeness, and dependability that could be used as vital food by the millions of cells in the body.

Take a Name Brand and Take it Easy

Everyone was vying for the attention of Mrs. Homemaker to entice her to make their product a regular pantry occupant.

“Guesswork has given way to knowledge about food selection, about what to eat.”

And the early Mad Men of Madison Ave would be happy to impart that knowledge.

Every package in the food market was now in competition with every other. Now the package- as well as, or instead of, the product- was what was advertised.

Take a name brand and take it easy!

Next : The First Supermarket. And to better display this abundance supermarkets were waiting in the wing.

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Copyright (©) 2020 Sally Edelstein All Rights Reserved

Given Lysol’s history, it’s ironic that Lysol was first out of the gate with a strong warning against following our toxic president’s suggestions of using their product for internal disinfection against the coronavirus.

Once upon a time, Lysol actually advertised itself as both a disinfectant for the home and for m’lady’s internal private parts. Both forms of strict housekeeping would assure a happy hubby.

According to Lysol in a series of ads that ran 70 years ago, there were two neglects few husbands could forgive- but Lysol promised it could correct both in a jiff.

No decent woman would neglect her lovely home and risk being called a poor housekeeper, and it was the wise wife who made sure to protects her personal daintiness- the very thing that won over her husband. That’s why no wise girl trusted a bath alone to keep her fresh but relied on  Lysol, just as no wise girl trusted housekeeping to anything but Lysol.

This was why many doctors advised patients to douche regularly with Lysol just to ensure daintiness and to use it as often as needed to protect their married happiness…keep you desirable. Now we know why the happy homemaker was so happy. She had Lysol in her corner.

And in all her private nooks and crannies too.

Perhaps that is how this disinfection notion came into Donald Trump’s addled mind, recalling that brown glass bottle of Lysol in its familiar yellow box that stood in the medicine cabinet of his youth. The one that mother Mary Trump used religiously to feel fresh, desirable, and dainty for Fred.

Like every smart post-war wife did. If she wanted to hold onto her marriage.

You Can Trust Lysol

Vintage Lysol Ads (L) 1934 Lysol Personal Hygiene (R) 1937 Lysol Disinfectant for Home

Lysol, long a trusted disinfectant in hospitals and homes since 1884, began advertising in the 1920s for use of their product as a douche. The question of woman’s daintiness  “so vital, so important that it cannot be ignored” Lysol explained,” yet it had long been embarrassing to discuss.”

Truth would be the best disinfectant.

Who better than a manufacturer of a product to clean your linoleum tiles to address this shame. Suddenly Lysol morphed into advice for the lovelorn, hanging up their shingle for Marriage Counseling. The use of their product would not only revive a loveless marriage but promote confidence as nothing else could. “When marriage is freed of fear marriages were remade by the advice of proper marriage hygiene,” Lysol advised.

Vintage Ad 1928 Lysol

Speaking frankly to the newly emancipated woman of the twenties who was a gal on the go,  Lysol addressed her greatest fear. Losing her desirability.

Vote shmote!  An unhappy marriage would lead to disaster.

Ladies, if you hope to stay young sweet-natured energetic and joyous you must be well. A woman’s neglect of herself often leads to serious consequences. No woman can afford to be indifferent to the delicate matter of  feminine hygiene or ignorant of the means now offered by science for problems of health youth and happiness.

Even today, many girls don’t realize what is involved in treating “the delicate zone”. They don’t ask, nobody tells them. Often a young wife was too timid and shy to learn the intimate facts.

It was time to talk frankly to the American woman about internal cleanliness – to arm them to combat one of woman’s most offensive deodorant problems known to man!

It’s the Woman’s Fault, Naturally

“Worry and nerves in so many cases are a woman’s own fault,” begins this ad from 1928 that ran in Ladies Home Journal, “ Neglect of the proper care of herself or misunderstanding of the facts about personal hygiene often lead to listlessness premature old age needlessly unhappy marriage.”

“And  in this enlightened frank day, a woman can scarcely be forgiven for not knowing about this vital subject”

Just the Facts Mam’

But don’t just take our word for it.

To the enlightened woman of today, this subject is too important to be trusted to hearsay. She wants authentic facts.’,” Lysol stated somberly.” Then she can judge for herself

Glowing testimony from eminent doctors attested to both the safety and effectiveness of the product. What could be wiser than to rely on the antiseptic that experienced doctors all over the world, in hospitals and private practice have used since 1884?

That they used it on their instruments and equipment was not mentioned.

They swore on its proven ability to rid the body of this most offensive enemy.  As though they were  Edgar Hoover and his G-Men  in pursuit of Al Capone,  Lysol swore to “pursues germs into hidden folds and crevices,” in its pursuit of the hidden unseen enemy.

“Lysol has amazing proved power to kill germ life-truly cleanses the vaginal canal even in the presence of mucous matter. Appealing daintiness is assured because the very source of objectionable odors are eliminated.

“Using just anything is practically a crime against yourself in this day and age,” claimed one expert.

 

Vintage Lysol Ad 1934 Number 11 in a Series of Frank Talks by Eminent Women Physicians

A 1934 ad presented the testimony was from dr Clotilde Delaunay a leading gynecologist of Paris whos declared “Lysol is Safe.”

Score of women come to me every year with their married happiness tottering on the brink of ruin, all because they are positively ill from fear. Needless fear. In 9 cases out of ten the way out is merely simple education in marriage hygiene. My advice is given in 2 short words – use Lysol.”

“I always recommend Lysol because it is certain,” another doctor advised. “It always destroys germs. Yet it is safe. …soothing to the most delicate feminine membrane.  It can never sear or harden as others do. I prescribe it regular use in marriage hygiene for the health and peace of mind of every wife. Yet gentle noncaustic Lysol will not harm delicate tissue.”

The Age of Anxiety

Vintage ad 1946 Lysol

It was in the post-war years Lysol ramped up the fears directing their advertising to the now pitiful young woman who definitely needed to be instructed on how important vaginal douching was to feminine cleanliness, health, charm, and married happiness.

If she were to survive an Atomic Attack, she’d best not have offensive odor while stuck in a fall out shelter, lest her husband becomes sulky and resentful.

Vintage Lysol Ad 1948

The old story. An ideal marriage…until fear crept in.

Doubts, inhibitions ignorance misgivings. Too often…too frightfully often…the romance and tenderness of married love is shattered on one sad neglect.

She feels her marriage is breaking up heading for divorce. Yet she finds herself helpless,

This neglect makes a wife unsure of her feminine daintiness…slowly but surely succeeds in causing trouble between her husband and herself. Far too many wives are guilty of this neglect…fail to practice the complete effective feminine hygiene that assures allure. Yet all they need to do is take regular vaginal douches with a scientifically correct preparation such as Lysol.

Yet all they need to do is clean regularly with a scientifically correct preparation such as Lysol. So easy a way for a wife to banish this unsureness…which may stand in the way of normal happy love

Vintage Lysol Ad 1948

Vintage Ad 1949 Lysol

It was so easy to offend and never know it.

Take the case of poor Joan,  a peach of a girl:

She didn’t realize that she herself had been at fault….in a matter of feminine hygiene Lysol would have helped save the happiness of marriage.

“Popular girls everywhere use Lysol. Many a girl who could be attractive is losing out because she isn’t dainty. That’s why nowadays no wise gal trusts a bath alone to keep her fresh in treating a woman’s delicate zone.

Send for our free booklet put out by Lysol, sent in a plain envelope. This book shows that Lysol is as safe to use as pure water. It cannot harm or poison your delicate danger zones. No powder or bleach can clean your delicate zone like this…especially made for the job and non-injurious to paint or hands.

In fact even if accidentally swallowed it would not produce fatal results. Yet Lysol is actually far stronger in its power to kill germs than any dilution of carbolic acid. Imagine that! Don’t experiment with new preparations. Don’t take unnecessary chances.

Now you can see why screen stars and the very nicest women of two continents never think of neglecting the ritual of Lysol…it is regarded by them as fundamental to daintiness and good breeding.”

If you are in doubt regarding the wholesome method of Feminine hygiene, ask your doctor about Lysol’s disinfectant.

Just don’t ask your President!

Copyright (©) 2020 Sally Edelstein All Rights Reserved

The coronavirus is still on the march.

Somehow amidst all the protests filled with wall to wall people, that concern has receded in folks consciousness.

We are still far from a vaccine, the only thing that will be a game changer.

Until a vaccine we are all vulnerable to this virulent virus.

A Miracle Vaccine

I would take for granted one of the most remarkable developments in modern history.

The polio vaccine.

Approved in April 1955, a mere two weeks after I was born the polio vaccine was nothing short of a modern wonder. For the first half of the century, polio was the most notorious and feared disease until AIDS appeared. And for good reason. Polio hit without warning. There was no way of telling who would get it and who would be spared.

As a child, I was constantly reminded that mine was a charmed existence, protected from deadly contagious diseases that had previously wiped out families and communities forever. And not just in the Dark Ages but in my own mother’s lifetime. Vaccinations were not only vigorously embraced but each new vaccine was viewed as a victory for mankind.

Receiving my first set of vaccinations as a baby in 1955, I felt invincible. The injections may not have rendered me faster than a speeding bullet or more powerful than a locomotive but with my newly acquired powers that went far beyond those of third world tots, I could now stand down whooping-cough, diphtheria and laugh polio in the face.

Ravages of Polio

Polio Precautions Poster

Summer was open season for polio. Before 1955, there would be no youngsters swimming in public pools since most municipal pools were closed for fear of polio.

Like clockwork every summer, newspapers, with headlines screaming “Polio panic,” would appear with frightening photos of jammed packed polio wards and deserted beaches. News stories about containment competed for space, whether it was iron lungs or the iron curtain.

No disease struck the same terror as polio.

Fueled by feelings of helplessness, my mother like other nervous mothers zealously checked and rechecked my brother’s every symptom; a sore throat, a fever, the chills, or even an aching limb, could all point to something ominous.

The rules were written in stone: Keep kids away from new groups of people. Don’t drink from the drinking fountain in the playground if you’re thirsty. Don’t put any foreign object in your mouth; Don’t run around in the heat with a sore throat, and make sure house screens were tight against flies and mosquitoes. Those dirty flying pests were thought to be the carriers of the disease.

The images of little children enclosed in an iron lung would haunt frightened parents. Unable to breathe due to the virus paralyzing muscle groups in the chest, the iron lung, a tank respirator, maintained respiration and was a life saver

Losing Battle

This particular disease targeted defenseless children

This particular disease targeted defenseless children. It didn’t matter how good you were, how clean, how rich or poor. Polio was the great American equalizer.

For nearly a decade into the buoyant postwar era polio remained a frightening disease to haunt our lives.

Iron lungs in the emergency polio wards at Haynes Hospital in Boston 1955 Photo AP

Flush with the triumphant victory of winning a war on two sides of the globe, we were still fighting a major battle right here in our own country, and in a way unfamiliar to Americans.

We were losing.

At a time when our confidence in American know-how and scientific expertise was at an all-time high, polio seemed to mock our can-do optimism. It seemed impossible that in this modern age of penicillin that polio could still ravage our nation. Not in a country where Americans were not just clean but Clorox clean, where physicians worked twice as fast for faster relief and creative chemistry worked wonders killing germs on contact.

The triumph over any enemy was an American birthright, so with that same can-do spirit, the troops were rallied with their resonating war cry “Polio can be conquered.”

It was all-out war.

March of Dimes

Franklin Roosevelt founded the National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis in 1938 to combat polio. The name March of Dimes was coined by comedian Eddie Cantor as a nod to the famous newsreels “The March of Time.” He urged the public to send dimes to the White House and thousands mailed cards and letters each containing a dime. A redesign of the dime was chosen in Roosevelt’s honor after his death. The Roosevelt dime issued in 1946 on would have been FDR’s 64 birthday.

My Mother was a veteran of that war and would play her part against polio, supporting the March of Dimes, the grassroots fundraising campaign used by the National Foundation for Infantile paralysis.

In 1951 Mom had every reason to get involved in the campaign. Pregnant with my brother she was soon a first-time mother just as polio season hit.  As the front line defender of her family’s health, Mom became a foot soldier in the March of Dime’s “Mother’s March on Polio. ” Along with the millions of other concerned mothers across the country, Mom was on a mission, going block by block, house to house ringing doorbells for solicitations. People were urged to leave their porch lights on to show the volunteers they were welcome.

Mothers March For Polio gather in kitchens before the march. (R) Modesto Tribune cartoon on Mothers March on Polio Night

For two hours each year on January 30th the birthday of the late President Franklin Roosevelt, these women formed the largest charitable army the country had ever known.  The annual “Mothers March For Polio” raised millions in dimes and dollars each year which was used for polio research and to aid communities suffering from a polio outbreak.

These female marchers once an indelible image of postwar America served as models for much later marches by mothers against nuclear testing and the environment

The women all carried the familiar March of Dimes Collection can decorated with the heartbreaking pictures of little girls with steel braces, These cans were ubiquitous in post-war America, appearing on every store counter from candy stores to libraries to corner grocer. Even taverns displayed the cans.

Their goal- to get a Vaccine.

Salk Vaccine Trials

A nationwide trial of experimental vaccines using schoolchildren as guinea pigs would be unthinkable in the US today. But that is exactly what happened in 1954 when frantic parents looking for anything that could beat back the horror of polio- offered up 1.8 million children to serve as test subjects.

On April 26,1954 The Salk Vaccine field trials began.

For the first time, the double-blind method was used.  Neither doctor nor patient knew if the inoculation was the vaccine or a placebo

By 1954 the Salk vaccine trials rivaled the other big stories that spring – Brown versus Board of Education and The Army McCarthy hearings. In fact, more people knew about the  Polio Field trials than knew the full name of the president. The kids in the trial were called Polio Pioneers and a polio pioneer card was given out to each child along with a piece of candy when they participated in the first national trial tests of a trial vaccine.

The trial was the largest peacetime mobilization of volunteers in American history. With no money from federal grants or pharmaceuticals,  financing came from private donations.

In April 1955, my parents, along with millions of others had cause for celebration – the polio vaccine was approved! Jonas Salk using March of Dime donations had successfully developed a vaccine to prevent polio

Victory for a Vaccine

The host of NBC’s Today Show Dave Garroway announces the polio vaccine works.

A very relieved Mom, along with most Americans of that age who were frantic to protect their children, would remember exactly where she was when she heard the groundbreaking news.

Early in the morning on April 12, 1955, with the dishes washed, laundry folded, baby bottles being sterilized in the electric bottle sterilizer awaiting refill of formula, Mom could sit back, relax and give me my mid-morning feeding.

As she warmed up the bottle, she warmed up the TV. With the skill of a safecracker, she delicately adjusted the large knobs on the mammoth mahogany encased set. Shaking the baby bottle, the milk felt pleasantly warm on Mom’s wrist and I drank it in satisfaction.

She settled in with a soothing cigarette in one hand my bottle in the other just as the easy-going voice of Dave Garroway host of NBC’s Today Show could be heard.

“And how are you about the world today? he would begin, the relaxing conversational tone making Mom feel as if she were sitting in the studio with him.

“Let’s see what kind of shape it’s in; there is a glimmer of hope”.

Of course, that was the understatement of the day when with his chimp sidekick Fred Muggs at his side, the scholarly looking Garroway jubilantly announced: “The Vaccine Works. It is safe, effective and potent.”

Mom would recall that the once in a lifetime excitement felt as if it were like another V-J Day, the end of a war. That it was announced on the ten-year anniversary of FDR’s death added to the poignancy.

The bespectacled Garroway’s trademark sign off of an upraised palm, uttering simply: “Peace” had never seemed more prescient.

It would, gratefully,  be a terror I would never know.

© Sally Edelstein and Envisioning The American Dream, 2020. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Sally Edelstein and Envisioning The American Dream with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

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It’s now time to think about moving Donald. I know I have.

No, not only visualizing the sizeable moving vans pulling up to the big white house at 1600 Pennsylvania  Ave, but another large moving van pulling up to my own Neo-Victorian home in Huntington. The tedious task of residential relocation is one I now share with Trump. Happy for him, not as happy for myself.

I suddenly find myself in the odd place of having something in common with Donald Trump.

Like our president, my move is not one of joy or choice but a necessity. We are both being dispossessed. It is crushing, disappointing and for us both the future is unknown. Unlike him, however, I will not have to be carried out kicking and screaming by the National Guard. I accept my fate, bracing for this huge life change under difficult circumstances.

Vintage illustration George Hughes

At the very start of this annus horribilis that is 2020, I lost my home to foreclosure.

With pressure to move, I went into immediate battle mode preparing for the inevitable. Preliminary checklists and pre-moving packing went into effect pre covid. Then the pandemic hit, putting a pause button on everything. Including foreclosures and moving.

I’ve stayed in my home.

But now the pause button has been released.  Despite the pandemic intensifying into its deadliest phase, my bank, in a gesture worthy of Ebenezer Scrooge, has decided to hit the play button and things are being set in motion. Merry Xmas and God Bless us, everyone.

Unlike Trump’s lawyers who feed his fantasy about remaining in the White House, my lawyer called and said to start packing.

“Moving Day” by Steven Dohanos Beer Belongs Ad 1947

Ask any psychologist and they will tell you moving ranks in the top 3 lists of stressors along with death and divorce. Moving during a pandemic as the winter numbers spike, elevates that stress as though on steroids.

Unlike the January 20th, 12 pm move-in date of the Bidens when the Trumps must be out before, I have no actual firm date when to vacate. It’s ambiguous. It could be several months at best but I must prepare for the worst. The courts are clogged and sluggish creating uncertainty of an exact timeline of processing but  I am certain it will happen.

Just like Trump must leave.

It’s just a matter of the when.

So this Christmas season while others have visions of sugarplum fairies dancing through their head, boxes and bubble wrap dance through mine, as I’m making lists and checking them twice.

More than Trump, I fully understand the monumental task of moving. Truthfully, the only concern Trump ever had about packing, was about packing the courts.

Being a life long collector/pack rat means there’s a whole lot for me to pack up. Not even counting the emotional baggage. Nostalgia mixes with frenzy. With a household chockful of artifacts, historical tchotchkes, and sets of antique bone china to rival the White House, the daunting task of packing up has weighed heavily on my mind.

Of course, Donald and Melania are not going to be throwing out their backs boxing, lifting, and schlepping. They literally have others doing the heavy lifting for them relying on White House staff and the Secrets Service who oversees the moving in and out of presidents. During social distancing, I can’t count on the generous offer of friends to help. This is a solo activity, supported by the metronome wagging tail of my lab Stanley.

There is no White House curator, just me logging and cataloging the hundreds of thousands of artifacts, pop culture items, and ephemera I have amassed in my collection over the decades. While Trump’s documents, memos, schedules, and emails start being moved to the National Archives, mine will be boxed and decisions must be made which mementos go into an inevitable storage unit.

Where To?

The pandemic has made it all so complicated.

Moving companies themselves are faced with new and difficult challenges as is the consumer hiring them. It is likely Trump is not hiring 2 sketchy guys with a van he found on Craig’s list, but there are now very detailed protocols and guidelines adding one more checklist for safe moving. How much simpler it once was to move, when disinfectants, gloves, and social distancing weren’t an issue.

Like Trump, I’m also uncertain where I’m relocating to.

Without a clear-cut destination, the “where to” weighs heavy.

While returning to N.Y.C remains one of the top choices for me, Manhattan has all but pulled out the welcome mat for the Trumps. And Palm Beach neighbors don’t want him either.

My choices feel limited too. As the suburbs on Long Island have rapidly filled up with frightened urbanites fleeing the city, they have gobbled up all available rentals, leaving in its wake seriously picked over properties. With the COVID mass exodus, city rentals have plummeted making it an attractive choice for me to return to my earlier roots. Unable to view anything other than virtual tour lends a surreal quality to it all.

Where Donald Trump can actually live a peaceful life seems fraught.

Unwelcome anywhere (other than Russia) maybe Trump should just consider moving back to that Mythical America he longs for.

That soft-focus world where America is still great. Perfect for a president stuck in time. A town populated by friendly white folk where nearly an immigrant or person of color can be found, save in the service quarters. A town filled with fear-based conservative men who want to return to those good old days where women stay at home and everyone stayed in the closet where they belonged.

A big shiny moving van with a rearview mirror is at the ready Mr. Trump to transport you from the White House back to that fictional America you’ve been trying hard to move America back to these past 4 years.

Me, I’m packing up the past but moving into the future.

© Sally Edelstein and Envisioning The American Dream, 2020.