s/o calling for time: other childhood memories

Calling for the time, calling for the weather, and a milkman. We were the only people I knew where we lived who had a milkman. We had a box on the porch where he would put everything. In the summer, we would get gallon jugs of limeade from him.

 
We lived on a farm so we didn't just have a burn barrel, we had a burn pile. And that's how a lot of stuff was disposed of back then. My brother is still on the farm and tons of garden stuff and tree trimmings are still burned.

We had a milk cow when I was really young, and then we had a milkman after that. 

I grew up on L.A. I remember milk deliveries, Helms man (bread and baked goods), there was also an Asian food truck that came down the street once a week.

We had a TV with a remote that actually made a clicking sound. And when the TV got bad, we had to fiddle with the dial and rubber band it into a certain position so we got reception.

We moved to a tiny town when I was in fourth grade (I'm 43) and for the first year or two, we had a party line phone. I used to pick up the phone & eavesdrop on conversations or dail 9 (rotary phone) to let the other people know I needed to make a call.

We went to our uncle's dairy farm for milk until he went crazy, then we went to the store. We had/mom still has a burn barrel. I remember my friends were amazed at how many phones we had in our home (they were free from another uncle who worked at the phone company). I remember that same uncle saying you should buy stock in phone companies because people will always need home phones. We had a trampoline that was rectangular. Like one of the first ones sold. Most are overwhelmingly round.

We had a 70's home; shag carpeting, harvest gold appliances, brown and orange, brass fixtures....

we had a coal chute in the first house I lived in - I don't remember it as I was a baby but remember mum talking about it and how cold that house was.

we had a milkman in the last house we lived in before we moved to the States - the milk was left in glass bottles with foil lids. We could get other things too - butter and eggs I remember but probably other things also.

That house also had a backyard loo - in a shed - it was a duplex and the shed was also with a loo on both sides. Later on one had been added inside also. That house also had a larder and a box room. They were all torn down in the early 80s shortly after we moved out (military housing)

Where I live now burn barrels and burn piles are super common. So are dirt roads still.

Burn barrels are not usually near as bad as you are describing.  It should just smell like a bonfire.   I would imagine he's burning things he shouldn't be burning. You could see if your county has restrictions on them and report him.  

I remember our party line but things like ice cream trucks and milkmen were gone by the time I was growing up.  I rode around on banana seat bicycles like the boys on Stranger Things, though. 

I still have a milkman. He comes every Monday.
One of the perks of living in the middle of nowhere. 😀

We had milk delivery and I still do today. Comes in plastic bottles instead of glass bottles though. If mom was out hanging clothes on the line when the milkman came, he would just take the milk in the house and put it in the refrigerator.
We also were suppose to leave our doors unlocked on Meter Read day as the meters were inside and the Meter Reader needed to come inside to read the meters. The meters were in what we call mudrooms or wash rooms, so it wasn't like they came right into the house.
In reference to the burn barrels, we had a cement container that they called incinerators. I remember mom burning her cast iron skillets in there to "season" them.
I still have a rotary dial phone in a drawer. Figured if the electric was off longer than the cell phone stays charged, it could be a back up. However, I'm seriously thinking about getting rid of my landline, so it will be of no use then.
The Avon lady came door to door leaving samples. Little packets of lotions or perfumes and the little bitty lip-sticks. And, we had the Fuller Brush man come ever-so-often and he too would leave goodies like a vegetable scrub brush, basting brush or turkey baster.
Ahhh, the good ole days!

For those who don't live in areas plagued by mosquitoes, this is a truck that is spraying pesticide to kill the mosquitoes.  It comes out of the machine on the truck as a thick fog.

This always makes me smile.  In my youth, it was great fun to run into the fog.  Now, people are warned to stay inside as they city will be spraying after 10 PM that night. 

Remember needing to reach someone urgently and calling . . . and calling . . . and calling . . . and stressing out because there were no answering machines or cell phones? Outside of emergencies, I miss not being expected to be available 24/7.

I think it’s crazy that just 2 decades ago we did run around in the neighborhoods without adults. The only rule was be home when the street lights came on, which in the summer could be almost 10pm. That just doesn’t happen now. ☹️

I remember having a milkman and making sure we didn't forget to fill out the slip of paper for the next delivery or we didn't get chocolate milk and cookies delivered. We also had the Helm's Bakery truck bringing fresh bread and doughnuts. He would open up the back of the truck and pull out those huge drawers to display all the yummy doughnuts. He also had a drawer in the back of the truck that held candy. We would sometimes buy those candy necklaces and spend the day wearing them and snacking. It sounds so unhygienic to me now. And of course, the Fuller Brush man.

We had an ice cream guy for a while, but my mom felt he was creepy so we were not allowed to run out there to the truck without her. Then one day, the ice cream delivery truck just stopped coming. Weeks went by with no ice cream. One of the mothers on the street called the company and learned that our driver was also selling pot out of his ice cream truck and he was in jail. They seemed to take forever to find a replacement for him yet.

We also had the metal skates that went over your shoes and had to be tightened with a skate key. We wore those on a ribbon around our neck along with our house key since my mom was a single mom and wasn't home for a few years. We just reported in to the next-door neighbor and played out front until Mom came home. There wasn't the massive amounts of homework that they had when my son went through school. I think the only assignment we ever had to do at home was for a craft project, like make a volcano, or maybe read in a certain book. We pretty much had playtime every afternoon once we came home from school for kick the can or Barbies.

Our neighbor was an Avon distributor and would give all the little girls in the neighborhood a few of the lipstick testers. We would put on some super dark red lipstick and think we were just beautiful. I also remember getting the first television in the neighborhood. Our living room would be crammed with kids on Saturday mornings to watch movies. I can't recall having a party line on the phone. One yearly ritual was to find out the day that school class schedules would be mailed out and we would all run behind the mailman like little mice to his Pied Piper. When he would get to our home, we would get that all important letter to discover who our teacher would be for the next school year and would our best friend be in the same class with us? There was always loud cheers or anguished groans, depending on which teacher you were assigned.

Calling someone and no one was home. There wasn't an answering machine to leave a message. So, we had to call them later.

Calling on a party line when I was visiting my grandparents.

Dialing only 4 digits at my grandmother's home.

Oh, and dialing a phone number without having to put in an area code first.

Moving out on my own and going to the phone company to set up my phone and choosing either a table top phone or a wall phone.

Whenever my family or I moved (college/apartment) having to memorize and share my new phone number with my friends and family.

Working on a switchboard with the cables. When a call would come in I'd have to grab the cable and tap the tip on an opening to find out if the line was busy or not.

Wanting to talk in privacy on a corded wall phone so I stepped outside onto our deck and closed our sliding glass door.