Aquacade

Is every reducer haunted by the specter of the next plateau? I certainly am. The scale seems to be cooperating with me these days, but the prospect of having to ratchet things up a notch is always in the back of my mind. They say that the pounds get harder and harder to lose the smaller you get. So I'm arming myself with ideas these days. Laying by strategies for the day when I just can't get that scale to budge.

One sport popular with women in the '40s was swimming. Beauty expert Alicia Hart explains why in this March 9, 1940 newspaper feature on actress Ruth Gordon:

When you see a woman who looks years younger than she really is, you can bet your last nickel that she does not lead a sedentary existence…

Miss Gordon believes that swimming is, for most people, the best all-around exercise for all the muscles of the body. She agrees with prominent physical training instructors that swimming eliminates bulges in the wrong places… Furthermore, no matter how firm the muscles become through perfection and practice of the crawl, or even the side or breast stroke, they just never do get too hard or knotty. You can slim down by swimming without fear of losing any of your natural feminine curves…

For those who find it impossible to swim often or, for that matter, to go in for any active sport, a brisk one-mile walk a day, supplemented by five minutes of limbering and stretching exercises in the morning, will keep muscles firm and supple, the general appearance decidedly youthful.

One of the exercises I've been doing in the evenings is actually supposed to be a stand-in for the woman who doesn't have access to a swimming pool. I'm basically doing the breaststroke while lying on top of my bed! Hey, maybe I could mix up my daily walks with a dip in the pool. They have an outdoor pool at the rec center and it might be cool enough to use it come October. Alicia Hart explains in a later article that a woman seeking to maintain her figure should "swim a reasonable distance three times a week."

Nope, no "natural feminine curves" missing here...

Responsorial

As those of you who are Catholics - or have visited a Catholic church - know, the Mass contains a whole series of responses from the congregation. Some are spoken, some are sung. One of the things I've learned over the years is that every parish has its own special set of tunes for these responses. They may be singing the same words as are sung at every other Catholic church in the English-speaking world, but the melodies are as unique as if each parish had its own thumbprint.

Here's the tough part: these melodies are almost never written down. A newcomer can stick out like a sore thumb since there's no way of knowing how to sing along with each of the responses. If you attend Mass in that parish regularly, you'll eventually get to know the tunes --- but it certainly takes time. And just when you think you've got 'em down, the choir director will decide it's time to freshen up the service with a new melody or two! I'm not sure if this is peculiar to Catholics or part and parcel of every church experience, but you gotta laugh. It's like this secret code you'll only be in on if you do indeed attend church regularly. Heaven forbid you miss Mass the Sunday that the choir director introduces a new response to the congregation! If you can't sing along, it's a sure sign to everyone around that you've been sleeping in on Sundays.

The church I've been attending for the last three weeks is one I attended probably a couple dozen times beforehand. So I'm already familiar with most of the responses that are sung. There's one in particular, though, that I can't for the life of me catch on to. The melody doesn't seem to follow any rules of nature. It twists all around, up and down, sideways and inside out. It's a really long response, too. Oy. Where's Father O'Malley when you need him?

Shallow, huh? And sadly - not quite as shallow as the fact that I've spent the last two Sundays noticing that there are a heck of a lot of single dads in my parish. I sure hope one of these Sundays I'll be able to tune out all these distractions...

This Ain't Your Mother's Farina!

Cream of Wheat is so good to eat
That we have it every day.
It makes us strong, so we sing this song.
It makes us shout "Hooray!"

It's good for growing babies
And grown-ups, too, to eat.
For all the family's breakfast,
You can't beat Cream of Wheat!
(Advertising jingle, 1942)

I've been eating my daily vintage breakfasts for several months now and farina has definitely become one of my favorites... You may know it as Cream of Wheat. My mom used to dish this up during the winter when I was a kid. It wasn't a favorite, but I remember preferring it tenfold to the oatmeal my mother made from scratch. (Sorry, Ma!) When I was a teenager, instant Cream of Wheat would sometimes appear in the pantry, usually in the maple brown sugar variety.

These days, I'm loving the cooked version, and - as luck would have it - Cream of Wheat is now available in a whole grain variety. I think it finally qualifies as a healthy breakfast. One serving prepared with water (100 calories) contains 15% of the recommended daily allowance of fiber, 50% of the recommended daily allowance of iron, and 4 grams of protein to boot! This is the kind of breakfast that sticks to your ribs and keeps you from feeling hungry for the rest of the morning.

Sometimes, I take my Cream of Wheat straight up. Especially if I'm having fruit along with it, like a dish of berries or half a grapefruit. Other mornings, it's all about the accessories. If you prefer a little crunch with your hot cereal, how 'bout sprinkling on some flax seed or crushed walnuts? Raisins, bits of date, or dried cranberries would be fantastic in farina --- especially if you added them to the cereal as it was cooking and gave 'em a chance to plump up. My favorite way to eat farina is with a smidge of margarine and a sprinkling of brown sugar. Heaven!

The key to cooking farina is to remember your whisk. Use the whisk to stir the cereal as you cook it - which only takes two or three minutes after adding the cereal to a soft boiling water. In fact, it cooks up so quickly that you can have a hot breakfast in the summertime without heating up your kitchen! Whether you rinse your pot right away or leave it to soak for a bit, it's super easy to clean up after. The ever-thrifty author of The American Woman's Cook Book (1945) even has a suggestion for leftover farina (as if!): "Mold... for tomorrow's luncheon dessert. Sweeten with brown sugar or honey and add vanilla." Farina Pudding should be served with Sliced Bananas and Top Milk.

20 + 1 = 21

The last two weeks have been a whirlwind. For those of you following my little reducing saga, you'll remember that two weeks ago I had to stop taking the diuretic I'd taken for the last couple years to help control my blood pressure. After losing 20 lbs., my blood pressure had dropped so low that I needed to begin stepping down on the meds, and the diuretic was the first to go. Within four days, I gained 4 lbs. in water weight. During the last 10 days, I've worked my patooty off and managed to lose not only 4 lbs. to compensate for the water weight but 1 more lb. to boot. And all the time I've continued drinking 64 oz. of water per day - the same amount of water I was drinking while I was taking the diuretic and the same amount I drank everyday last week --- so I'm feeling pretty confident that what I've lost this last week has been genuine poundage. At any rate, I weighed in at 173 this morning. We're back on the move, dear readers!

The red Mexican bird of paradise is now in bloom which means our long-winded desert summer is about halfway over --- it also means, unfortunately, that my little apartment is starting to smell very stuffy. I've tried to keep things sealed up in here since it became blazing hot in June. The windows are never opened and the door opened just long enough for me to exit or enter. I'm not sure what the cure for this midsummer stuffiness might be. Is there some secret none of the natives have filled me in on yet? It's too hot even in the middle of the night to crack the windows. Ah well, I guess I can endure the stuffiness for a couple more months.

The Woman's Home Companion Household Book (1948) has some wonderful suggestions for those seeking to cool their homes - in looks and in temperature - during summers in a pre-air conditioning world. Maybe these'll come in handy for you lucky dames living in a more temperate climate! It's fascinating to me how much more amenable people once seemed to adapting their decor to the season instead of fighting Mother Nature tooth and nail to keep things looking the same year-round. It was almost expected - either when you did your spring cleaning or about the time you put up your window screens - that you would switch out the furnishings, linens, and draperies throughout your home for the summer ahead.

The first few are very practical tips for cooling your home and circulating air:

• Closed windows and drawn blinds throughout the day will prevent sunshine and warm air from penetrating the house, as southerners learned long ago. Wait until the sun has left the horizon before opening windows and raising blinds to welcome any cool air the evening may bring. Opening upstairs windows and keeping the lower ones closed will permit the warm air, which has risen to escape.

• Electric fans put in action in strategic points throughout the house will keep the air in circulation... In front of the fan or fans, place a tray filled with chunks of ice - they will cool the air which is circulated by the fans.

• Evenings will be somewhat cooler if candles are substituted for electric lights.

• Sofas and chairs, which in the winter faced a cheerful fireside, should now be directly or obliquely in the path of any breeze the windows or doors may lure into the room.

These next two have the comfort of the housewife in mind:

• With an eye to relief from the burden of cleaning tasks, many housewives use a blanket cover instead of the traditional bedspread. A dressing table which has good lines can be left unskirted during the warm months.

• Summer is no time for laundering fine damask, babying fine crystal or polishing prized silverware. During the warm season, use only the simplest, most informal luncheon cloths and place mats.

This last series is all about "cooling" your decor:

• Bright slipcovers [examples: white with green ivy print or a floral print in blue, white and a bit of wine] rank high in importance among summer transformations. Not only do they play a part in cooling off the color scheme but they protect upholstery fabrics from the harm to which dust and sunshine streaming through summer-open windows expose them.

• Large rugs - Oriental, velvet broadloom, wool piles, etc. - deserve a professional cleaning annually and it is practical to send them out for cleaning and storage when the warm days arrive. Living room, dining room or bedroom floors left bare by their departure will look much cooler and will have a chance to display their own hardwood beauty.

• Use sheer white fabrics to make cool, filmy summer curtains to replace warm winter draperies.

• In place of the usual kindling wood and logs, pile laurel or pine branches across the andirons and in the woodbasket. For a more dramatic change, store the andirons, etc., and set a big potted plant or basket of greens in their place.

• Wooden bowls... are nice for serving rolls, fruits and vegetables, as well as salads.
  
  
• This is the time to use vegetable-shaped soup bowls, leaf-shaped serving dishes. Hunt out amusing salt and pepper shakers and relish dishes of all kinds. Have pottery vivid in hue - in one solid tone or colors which combine.

Soap Opera

What on earth did people do when there were shortages of soap during the war?

If there's one thing that's become absolutely clear to me with these nightly baths, it's that I'm going thru a lot more soap than I was in the shower. One bar lasts me about ten baths before it breaks into pieces and has to be recycled to the soap dish beside my sink. Now imagine if I had a family of six (considered average in the '40s). My household would probably be going thru a bar of soap every other day. Unless I had a passel of little boys, that is! I know there are tricks to making a bar stretch. Like turning the little bits and pieces into a jellied soap. But even a few tricks like that won't keep your family squeaky clean. The only thing I can figure is that folks just got used to being a little less clean than they'd like to be...

Another thing I've noticed about my baths is the bathtub gets grimier and in need of a cleaning much more quickly than it used to. It no longer surprises me that the authors of America's Housekeeping Book (1945) recommended that the tub be thoroughly cleaned each and every day. Here in a single-person household, mine could probably use a good scrubbing twice a week.

Though the vintage articles on bathing I quoted from last week were split on whether a woman should soak in the hot water before - or after - doing her washing and exfoliating, I've fallen firmly into the before camp. The water is at its hottest and most likely to take the knots out of your shoulders. And it's not all cloudy with soap scum and, well, probably dead skin cells. If I waited to lie back and relax until after I got myself all cleaned up, I'd be soaking in my own grime! Definitely, definitely a before kinda girl.

All told, my nightly baths take me about 40 minutes. That's counting from the time I begin drawing the water until I'm drying off after my brief post-bath shower (for shaving and for washing my hair). It's more time consuming than a single shower in the morning, but I love the feeling of being super clean when I climb under the covers. Even better, it's a ritual that's actually getting me to bed earlier at night. It used to be I could easily stay up until 10:30 or 11:00 puttering about, surfing the net. These days, I'm into the tub by 8:30 or 9:00 and ready to turn out the lights and go to sleep by 9:30 or 10:00. I'm all mellowed out, I guess, by the time I get out of the tub. Don't feel like watching TV or even reading. I just want to call it a day. And you can't beat a little extra beauty sleep!

One of my vintage beauty missions this week is to be very mindful of giving myself a vigorous dry with the towel after my bath. It's also made me more mindful of my towels! So I'm going to go thru them in the next few days --- thinning out the linen closet, so to speak. If it's threadbare in spots - if it's not something I'd put out for a guest - then it's time to hit the rag bag. (The ratty towels will make great cleaning rags once they're cut up.) If I spy any loose threads, I'll trim 'em off with my sewing scissors. This will clear up some room for a few new towels in vintage colors.

Wordplay

I sat down to write my post tonight and came very close to kicking things off with a saying that proves an interesting reflection on the value society has for housekeeping. What I was about to say is, "First, a little housekeeping." A funny saying, isn't it? Something you hear a lot in meetings or classes or conference breakouts when the team leader/professor/speaker has some dull details to get out of the way before they launch their agenda/lecture/workshop. Maybe they need to announce something about the schedule. Maybe it's something about the date the next assignment is due or an announcement about a room change.

As those of you who keep house know, there's nothing "little" about it. It's the kind of work that breathes life into a house and makes it a home. Work that nourishes, clothes, and provides a clean roof for a family. Housekeeping is absolutely indispensable --- and yet people who work outside the home are constantly dumbing it down and diminishing its value in the very choice of words like the ones above.

So I take it back! What I'd planned on saying is that one of my readers, Wendy, asked me a while back to add a gadget to my blog which would allow her to read it through "My Yahoo." Wendy, if you're reading this, I haven't been able to find that gadget for the life of me. If you could point me in the right direction, it'd be much appreciated.

Can you think of any other phrases that started out as housekeeping lingo but morphed into something else? I can think of a few. When you "put something on the back burner," you're leaving it be for awhile. Today, "light a fire under" someone means something quite different than it did to housewives in the age of woodstoves. Let's not forget "airing the dirty laundry" and "clean sweep."

Breach of Etiquette

Ladies, I'm sorry to say that I committed a capital breach in vintage etiquette this morning...

I went out in public with my curlers.

*gasps, shrieks, and fainting*

Granted, it was 6:15 and I was only walking to and from the laundry room in my apartment complex. And that the men who live in my complex are all frumps themselves. It takes time for those clothes to dry --- if I'd waited 'til then to roll up my hair, my hair wouldn't have had time to dry before I needed to leave for work.

Etiquette experts of the 1940s railed against the woman who lolled about at home with her hair in curlers. Your husband, particularly, should never - under any circumstances - see you in this vulnerable state. (They didn't even mention wearing your curlers outside the home. Guess that wasn't on their radar!)

There is no excuse for coming down to breakfast in hair curlers undisguised. If you put your hair up in curlers, then wear whatever is becoming to you to cover them - perhaps a bandanna tied on like a bathing cap, perhaps some pinned-on puffs. At the moments, milliners are showing evening helmets made of curled “belting” ribbon to imitate a wig. They would be excellent for breakfast! Anyway, not curlers.

“Be Polite, Even at Breakfast” by Emily Post
(Milwaukee Journal, January 28, 1940)

Women who worked outside the home had no excuses either:

She is often just as tired as her husband is - not only that but she has to take time for cold cream and curlers at some moments when they are both at home…

If you need curlers on your hair, cover them with an attractive turban. This can be made by wrapping silk or net around your head.

“Working Woman Tends to Relax Into Dowdiness”
by Josephine Lowman
(Spokane Daily Chronicle, June 18, 1940)

Despite her dictum against hair curlers, Miss Post does relent a bit when it comes to housecoats at the breakfast table:

But may you wear a housecoat? Certainly, if it be a zippered or buttoned princess dress. But not a wrapper - at least not if you go to breakfast in the dining-room with your family, still less if you work in the kitchen. And yet - if you and your husband breakfast alone and you have servants to prepare it and serve it, a negligee (if it be glamorously becoming) does fit into the picture of breakfast-for-two-at-home.

Rats! I guess only one or two of these beauties will do.

Curly Top

It's like Christmas every day here at Casa Jitterbug!

Putting my hair up in curlers totally makes me feel like a kid on Christmas Eve. I'm still very new at this, so I'm never quite sure how the curls are going to come out. It's kind of exciting --- waiting with anticipation while the hair dries. I have to remind myself to be patient. Though the hair on the top of my head dries pretty quickly, the hair on the bottom takes a bit longer. When it's finally time to take the curlers out, it feels like I'm unwrapping a present I didn't even have a chance to shake beforehand.

When I began taking nightly baths the week before last, I was psyched to have the chance to work a "wet set" into my schedule. So after looking about to see what's out there, I picked out a set of self-holding rollers by Scunci. They're wrapped in a material kind of like the prickly side of a piece of Velcro. My hair is very fine, so the last thing I need is to lose any strands unnecessarily in clips or pins.



What I'd forgotten is that you can't sleep on curlers like these! Sponge curlers, maybe. Maybe even rag curls or pin curls. I gave it a good try the first night I took a bath, but it definitely wasn't going to work. Back to the bathroom. Took out all the curlers and resolved to re-wet my hair in the morning and try it again. And that's how I've worked it into my schedule ever since. When I get up in the morning, I duck my head under the shower to get my hair good and wet again. Then up in the curlers so it can dry while I go about my morning chores. Just about the time I finish my breakfast, the hair is dry and ready to unroll and style. A little hairspray, and my style holds for the better part of the day. It's usually a bit looser late afternoon/early evening, but still pretty curly. Hey, if I brushed it a bit more and pinned up the sides, I might even be able to pull off that pageboy I was picturing about a month ago.

I haven't tried using any setting lotion or other product before curling the hair, but suspect the style would hold even longer if I did so. Any recommendations for product that'll make curls a little more glossy, but still natural-looking? I suppose the right setting lotion would've been super important was I truly a '40s gal and washed and set my hair only once a week...

Also - I'm a complete dolt when it comes to rolling my hair. My bangs definitely need the smallest curlers, but what about the rest of the hair? I'm not really shooting for a tightly curled look, so is it best to use the biggest curlers on the top of my head with medium curlers at ear level and small curlers at the bottom? Or am I going about this backwards? I don't want to end up with triangle head. And should the curlers be rolled into place horizontally or vertically?

Week Thirty-seven: The Mission

As those of you who read my blog last Sunday learned, I've now lost enough weight that my blood pressure has begun to fall naturally. This is great news! For the last two years, my blood pressure has been so high that I had to take both a medication and a diuretic to treat the condition. When I saw my doctor a few weeks ago, she told me that I didn't need to take the diuretic any longer and - if I continue losing weight - I should be able to slowly reduce the medication dosage over time. I held off as long as I could, because I knew that I would gain some water weight when I stopped taking the diuretic. As my body adjusted to carrying around a normal amount of water in the tissues, I'd see that reflected on the scale.

Sure enough, I have. Sunday was my lost dose of the diuretic. Since that time, I've gained 4 lbs. --- presumably in water weight. I've gone from a fantastic 174 to a dreary 178. I'm trying not to panic. This is a good thing. It needed to happen. I'm thrilled to see my blood pressure responding so nicely to my weight loss. But, boy, are those numbers hard to swallow. All my instincts are screaming at me, "Just stop eating entirely!" "Work out five hours a day!" "Stop drinking water!" And I'm trying desperately to talk myself down and stick with the hard work I've been doing all the while. It's working. I know it's working. I've just got to keep slogging away. My body is loving the added water weight. It's better for my skin, better for my hair, better for my organs. My kidneys alone have got to be singing "Hallelujah!" that they're no longer pulling overtime.

So here I am. 4 lbs. heavier than last Saturday, but with a decidedly healthier anatomy. Maybe the distraction of a new vintage beauty mission is just what I need...

Fitness
It's time to add some strength training to my fitness routine. I've been giving so much attention to my legs that my arms could really use some work. Rather than use the dumb bells and barbells that might have been found in a '40s reducing salon, I'm going to start with a very modern pair of 1-lb. wrist weights. I found a set made by Reebok last night and strapped 'em on before my walk this morning. They're just heavy enough to make my arms work a little harder. I'm also planning to use them while I do my limbering and stretching exercises in the mornings and evenings.



Reducing
1940s nutritionists were acutely aware that women following a reducing plan might not be getting all the minerals and nutrients needed for optimum health, so they frequently recommended some sort of "vitamin concentrate" or "multiple-vitamin preparation" to supplement the diet. This was an era of steadfast faith in science, so the idea of vitamins was hot, hot, hot. People figured if they could formulate precisely what the body needed to function then it was simply a matter of taking a scientific approach to things in order to supply those needs. I've always believed I could do that just as easily by eating a varied diet (and my bloodwork has usually agreed), but I'm not perfect. I've still got plenty of work to do in building a better diet --- so in the meantime I'm going to begin taking a multivitamin. It took some time to pick out a vegetarian-friendly formula, but I purchased one a few days ago. It needs to be taken three times a day with meals.

Grooming
Here's the next step in the 1946 grooming routine. After taking my evening bath (or morning shower on the weekends), I'm to put that bath towel to work:

Rub yourself dry, so that you tingle all over and chest and back turn a healthy pink.