Jitterbug 1:1

I've tried to approach The Experiment as an attempt to understand the 1940s housewife as a whole woman. Not just the nitty gritty like housework, beauty rituals, vintage cookery, and not just the fun stuff like hairstyling, clothes, and movies --- but the rhythm of life and ways of relating to others which made up the context for all that. Things like etiquette, arts, and social activities - they can be so deeply engrained in the background of life that my '40s counterpart may not even have noticed them herself. Mind you, there's plenty of things about the 1940s cultural mindset that I'm perfectly happy to leave in the past, but there's much of value, I think, that could enrich our modern lives.

And if I'm ever going to truly understand the world to which my grandmothers belonged, I must hie myself to church.

Now if I can just get across the threshhold without being struck down by a thunderbolt, I wonder how my life might be shaped by going to Mass every week. (I'm being a little over-dramatic with the thunderbolts stuff. I was just in church last Sunday with my parents. Nothing happened.) I hope those of you who are deeply serious and devoted to your faith will not feel that I'm being flippant or proposing this in jest. I'm not. (Likewise, I hope those readers who might feel impelled to proselytize will step away from the comments button.) I've come to appreciate more with the years just how important and meaningful my parents' faith has been to them. My own relationship with God has been a long and stormy one, but there have been many occasions when going to church has been a comforting experience to me. I have theological differences with every religion out there, but despite all the churches I've "sampled" over the years, none has ever felt quite as much like home as the Catholic church in which I was raised.

My grandmothers had very different religious experiences. My paternal grandmother was raised in the Methodist church and married into the Catholic church. Her faith must have been deeply shaken when she was widowed at 36 (my age!) with four small children. But it also must have reminded her of her late husband and helped her in keeping his memory alive in her children's hearts. My maternal grandmother was raised in the Baptist church and married a Catholic man, much to the consternation of both their families. "Mixed marriage" was a big deal in rural America in the 1930s. (Her mother-in-law never accepted the marriage.) She and my grandfather set religion aside and raised their daughter outside either church.

This must have been fairly unusual in the small town in which they lived... Agnostics, atheists, working folks who were just too plain tired on their one day off in a six-day-working-week world - these good folks have existed in every time and place, but they were still a very small minority in 1940s America. If you were a member of the business class, you could lose clients and social standing if you weren't a member of some faith. For many people, the church to which they belonged was the center of their social activities. The vast majority of Americans were Christians and so on Sunday mornings the world came to a virtual pause for church. Stores and restaurants were closed. Social activities were taboo on Sunday mornings. Church services and religious music could be found across the radio dial. Things certainly picked up on Sunday afternoons, but even then most folks shared in experiences like hearty noon-day meals, visits with family, drives in the country, leisurely activities at the park or at home.

It's hard for me to imagine in 2009 how hushed and still Sunday mornings must once have seemed. Today, Sundays are like every other day of the week for almost all of the people I know. And yet, I think there's something of great value in taking regular time out every week to stop and reflect on your place in this world and feel gratitude for blessings. I may have mentioned this before, but I'd really like to bring back that kind of rest and ritual to my own life. So will I chafe at attending Mass so regularly in my Sunday best? Will I listen to the service with a new ear? Will I find myself joining the choir and crocheting doilies for the Christmas crafts fair with the other church ladies? Hmmm... I hope my red lipstick isn't too flashy for church!

"Rest, Relaxation, Correspondence..."

When I embarked on this experiment, I knew there was no way - with a full-time job outside the home - that I could keep house to the standards of a 1940s housewife. Without hesitation, I moved most of the jobs that were done on a daily basis in the '40s household to my "weekly" column. Yet, all these months, I've stuck to the goal of being able to get all of the jobs my '40s counterpart did on a weekly basis done right on schedule.

Well, maybe this would've been possible if I didn't have any friends or family. Or unexpected errands to be run or workouts to be done. But I do, and so it's not. Adding a weekly cleaning of the bathroom to my list of chores has tipped the scales, so to speak. Even a 1940s housewife built time to rest into her day. I see it right there at 2:00 p.m. on weekday afternoons: "Rest, Relaxation, Correspondence, Reading, Personal care, etc." Sundays don't even show up on The Manual's skeleton housekeeping schedule. They were set aside in most American households for a well-deserved and much-needed rest, for worship, visiting with family, going for a drive... maybe even just sitting a spell on the porch.

So my housekeeping routine's about to undergo a little renovation. What I'm planning is to move most of my weekly chores to a monthly basis. Not all of 'em. Things like laundry, ironing, and changing the bed linens do indeed need to be done on a weekly basis. Each of the rooms in my home will still be getting some pretty dedicated attention once a week, but I'll rotate between the rooms each week when it comes to the more thorough chores done on a weekly basis in the '40s. The bedroom one week, the kitchen the next, then the bathroom, then the living room. If I master things at this pace and feel like I could step it up a notch at some point, so be it. For now, I think these chores will be more than enough to make a lovely home. And me a lovelier person than the grump I became last weekend!

It's funny. Being an aunt has given me the ability to see the world anew as my nieces discover it for themselves. Being a housekeeper has given me the ability to protect and cherish my free time. I used to squander all my free time on neither work nor rest. I value it now in a way I never did several months ago. More than ever before, I want to be really enjoying myself in my occasional hours of rest --- to be with people, to see the sights, and - most of all - to be outdoors.

Sunday Dinner

Kitten is f.i.n.a.l.l.y asleep after a long tug-of-war with bedtime. I picked her up at her grandmother's after work and she was in the middle of what would become several meltdowns. From what I hear, she didn't have a nap today so I'm not surprised the evening was such a trial. The good news is that her tummy hasn't been upset in four days now. Her throat is still sore, her nose is still runny, and she misses her mother and baby sister terribly. I tried to clean things up a bit after she feel asleep. Housekeeping in the dark - with just a very dim light in the kitchen - is not a treat. Just 24 more hours...

I was showing a friend my 1945 cookbook yesterday and she noticed right away that the menus in the back are different on Sundays than they are on every other day of the week. Sunday is the one day where the menus shift from a Breakfast-Lunch-Dinner pattern to Breakfast-Dinner-Supper. A telling glimpse into the rhythms of yesterday. When Sundays for most Americans meant a morning church service, a dinner at mid-day that was more elaborate than any other meal of the week, and a light supper in the evening. These were the Sundays I knew as a child in the 1970s and '80s. When we got home from church, my mother would hurry off to the kitchen and bustle about as we played indoors. We were still in our church clothes - my mom looking fancier than she had all week - and we'd sit down to the table at 1 or 2:00.

There's something to be said for sharing these kinds of feasts as a family on a regular basis. Not just once or twice during the holidays, but pausing once a week to express your gratitude for the good things on your table and the people 'round it. A chance to teach little ones about table manners and fine dining. A chance for mom (or whomever the cook in the family might be) to show off some new recipes. A chance for the family to regularly use their finest dishes and glassware. Society as a whole pausing for a day of rest is something we've lost in 2009 and not for the better, I think. I don't have a husband or children to treat to an elaborate dinner, but I'd love to bring back some of that ritual to my Sundays...

For now, I'm sticking to the Monday-Saturday dinner menus. And I'll probably do 'em up on Saturday evenings. That gives me plenty of time to prepare them and clean up afterwards. I'm going to need to get my sea legs before I try doing any of these on a weeknight!