“Change”
Everybody is talking about change nowadays. Let me tell you about changes I have seen.
Eighty-two years ago I was born on Halloween night and an old farmhouse that was said to be haunted. In those years I have seen many changes. I lived on the farm until I was thirteen years of age. In that rural area people lived their lives close to God and close to the land.
Even though the word “recycling” was not in our vocabulary, we did practice it. Corn husks were gathered and put in heavy cloth bags to become our mattress. Feathers from the ducks where are used to make pillows. When the weekly wash was finished and the noise of the kerosene powered washing machine became silent, the soapy water made from homemade lye soap was emptied and poured on and around the rose bushes. The roses were beautiful. Ashes from the wood burning stoves were scattered in the garden to add nutrients to the soil and to help conquer cucumber beetles. Everything seemed to have a use. The wooden outhouse served its purpose no matter how uncomfortable on those cold winter days. Paper used in that outhouse was recycled from the Sears Roebuck catalogue. In my time I have seen the pages of the Sears Roebuck catalogue being replaced by toilet tissue.
As a child growing up, I did not have to fear some stranger was lurking in the shadows to do us harm. We did not lock our doors. We had no need to do so. Should we be threatened there was always that sturdy shotgun to enforce our security.
How did we communicate with the outside world? There was a long wooden telephone that hung on the kitchen wall. It was a party line that afforded little in the way of privacy. Lots of gossip came out of that situation. I will always remember the day a radio came to our home. Reception was poor so my uncle Lawrence Sollman got the idea of attaching a wire to the bed springs. That did help. There was no television to pollute the hearts and minds of the young as we see so much sex and violence on television today.
The summer of 1936 was one of the hottest summers on record. June 29th, 1936 temperatures soared to 103 degrees. That record has not been broken. Was this global warming? Perhaps. Global warming was not in our vocabulary either. My sister and I slept upstairs with no fan and no air conditioning. There was no electricity. Sleep did not come easily as we endured the heat. As kids of ten and twelve, we came up with a most brilliant idea what night. We would take our pillows out on the roof of the porch with its railing and we would get a better night’s sleep. Mosquitoes soon found us, and they liked us. We became their victims. They gave us malaria. We were miserable. Somehow we survive with large doses of quinine.
When it became time for me to go to school, that was a different trip. The itinerary was a bit complex. We would walk down the long lane that was, on different days, sometimes dusty, muddy, icy, or snow covered. There, we waited until we would see the black horse drawn carriage come over the hill. We climbed aboard to travel about a mile on the dirt road. We passed the old rock quarry that was so unique in that area. Once at the end of the dirt road, we waited for the school bus to come down the gravel road that wouldn’t take us to Fort Branch Elementary School, a distance of about five and a half miles.
Each day of school started with prayer, followed by reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States. One of my high school teachers said she would give any student an “A” in the course if they could recite the Gettysburg Address. I took that challenge. “Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty…” I got my “A” and I developed a deep admiration for Abraham Lincoln. Time came for me to complete high school.
World War II was being fought. Many young, brave men joined in the service of their country, some never to return. They fought and died that we might have freedom. As the noted journalist and radio announcer, Elmer Davis, once said, “This will remain the land of the free only as long as it is the home of the brave.”
There was such a critical shortage of nurses to care for the wounded soldiers overseas and here at home. I joined the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps as did many young girls. The demands were many as we worked long hours, but those demands gave me satisfaction. During this war Penicillin and Sulfa had proven their worth in treating the wounded soldiers overseas, and then they began to be used in hospitals here.
Yes, I have lived and witnessed many changes over these many years. Sadly to say, today I am seeing our freedoms slipping away one by one. As we see them go, we may develop an attitude of discouragement and even one of fear, or we may become determined to try to change things to make for a better America.
Through it all, I believe two things will never change. I believe God rules in the affairs of men, as was so nobly said by Abraham Lincoln. I believe that every individual has the aspiration and the hope to have freedom, to have liberty, and to have justice.
- Berniece Tirmenstein RN, BSN
“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first for sharpening the axe.” “God must love the common man, He made so many of them.” “Don’t interfere with anything the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. And not to Democrats alone do I make this appeal, but to all who love these great and true principles.” – Abraham Lincoln March 1865
