I promised you this blog would not be “all about me”, but until I find my groove, that’s mostly what you’ll get.  I need to introduce myself so you can understand where I come from, where I got my quirky personality, and how my unusual sense of humor can be triggered.

My mother passed away when I was three years old and my brother, Eddie, was six.  I’m sure my dad was tremendously overwhelmed, and we went to stay at his oldest sister’s house.  Aunt Dee and Uncle Joe took in the three of us on a temporary basis, which turned into at least 15 years.  People often do not believe me, but I remember quite a bit about these days, and I remember that I missed my mom terribly. So, we went to live with my aunt and uncle in a two-story farmhouse that had been moved onto its lot about 70 years prior.  It wasn’t big and it wasn’t in particularly good shape. Times were hard for my dad, a 3 yr. old little girl, and a 6 yr. old little boy, but I’m sure they were especially hard on my Aunt Dee, who was trying to adjust to an empty nest, only to have little ones to take care of again.

My brother and I shared an upstairs bedroom.  My Dad had a bedroom upstairs too, as did my Uncle Bill.  Uncle Bill was going through a separation at the time – almost unheard of in the 1960s.   It seems that instead of moving “home” with their mother, these brothers opted to move in with their oldest sister!  My brother, Eddie, and I were lucky.  We had a gas stove in our bedroom, even though it barely worked.  It would get so cold up there, that we often woke up with frost on our eyelashes!  The walls and windows might as well have not been there.

I give you all this personal information to kind of lead you into the rest of the story, which is kind of funny.  When I was growing up, mealtimes could be a mystery.  We always had food – make no mistake about that.  But my aunt had gone back to work as a nurse’s aide, planning on setting up a retirement fund, I’m sure.  It was hard, exhausting, backbreaking work and she would come home so tired!  In the summertime, that left my dad and Uncle Joe to come home from work to have lunch with us.  Remember, back in the day, men really did not take on many domestic chores and babysitters were only hired for Saturday nights.  But Daddy did the best he could with everything, including our lunches!

So, with all that in mind, here is a list of some of our menu items: leftovers – served cold, of course (before the microwave option); boiled chicken legs (yes, boiled); hominy; fried egg sandwiches; liverwurst sandwiches; radishes; green onions; and any other garden produce that didn’t have to be cooked.  But my favorite menu was fried bologna, a raw potato, and pork & beans – straight out of the can!

Now, I’m sure most people reading this blog are cringing at the thought of what we ate for lunch.  It’s what we knew, however, and it didn’t seem odd to us at all.  I can remember begging for a raw potato.  I think it was my favorite!

Later in life, when you get close to the person you intend to marry, you find out about all the weird things they eat and how their household runs.  You don’t even think about questioning how weird your own experiences seem to them!  My husband’s family (which was motherless for several years before I met him), ate fried chicken three meals a day during harvest! Leftover, cold fried chicken was always available for breakfast and that’s what the boys wanted, even though his dad always had a platter of fried eggs available too.  It seemed to me that they almost always had baked goods such as Kolache. And they always ate at the table.  That was weird, but nice.

I also remember the first time I ate at my friend Kathy’s house. Her mom used a starched, white tablecloth and napkins, China, beautiful silverware and crystal (?) water glasses.  We started with a salad, and I was disappointed because I thought that was all we got.  Then, she served bread out of a wicker basket and put a slice on a small plate for each of us kids, filled our plates for us with meatloaf, whipped potatoes, and green beans.  We even had dessert.  It was a weekday lunch, for pity’s sake!  I was so out of my element.

Most of my summer lunches were served out on the front porch on Melamine plates, and we used silverware stamped “U.S. Army” that my dad had brought home with him from WWII.  We drank our milk or water from tin cups.  If we were lucky, we had Kool-Aid.

What a difference in cultures in just these three examples! How I live today and how I raised my own family, falls somewhere in between these three scenarios.  However, I still like fried bologna, a bite or two of raw potato, and yes, I can even eat pork & beans straight out of the can…on a Corningware plate, sitting at the table, if you please.  Although we have been known to have a pizza party out on the front porch.  Gourmet dining at its finest!

Do you have remarkable memories of lunch when you were growing up?  Please share!