More hidden treasures and stories from my mother-in-law!
My mother-in-law is now past ninety. She is mentally alert and spry, but her mobility is declining and her ability to continue living alone in a house is quickly evaporating. To ease the burden of clearing out the house when the day comes that she must move, I have been helping to empty the attic, garage and cellar of sixty years of accumulation. Hercules cleaning the Augean Stables had an easier time then this task I have undertaken.
It is made doubly difficult since the old woman sits there in her wheelchair inspecting every box, crate, and piece of clothing that we carry out like a customs inspector to insure we are not disposing of the holy grail or a long-lost Rembrandt. This also means we have to endure the stories connected with items we are finding that have been stored untouched for decades – adding hours to an already endless task!
This week I came across three crates – a bit larger than Army footlockers – which I remembered moving into the garage about 1973 from the country place my in-laws had. They were labelled ‘Camp, Kitchen, and Bedroom.’ As I emptied them of the camp gear, permanently folded ponchos, rusted cast iron pans, chipped enamel pots, utensils, and melamite plates and my Mother-in-Law kept saying, “Take that home, you might be able to use it” In the ‘Bedroom’ crate I found a time capsule of the early 60’s! In amongst the sheets, and threadbare towels the was a partial box of Modess sanitary napkins, a near-empty tube of Preparation H, a prescription bottle of phenobarbitol, a crusty jar of Vaseline, a bottle of mercurochrome, plus Ipana toothpaste, Mennen foot powder, A dried up bottle of calamine lotion, Listerine, a pair of deteriorated yellow Platex gloves, and a Davol Paris combination syringe and water bottle in the box! At that find my mother-in-law (MIL) brightened up and said, “I had forgotten about that, and often wondered what became of it. It was almost five dollars when we bought it – and that was a lot of money in 1959!” I waited for the rest of the story and was not disappointed when she kind of whispered, “You know, there wasn’t much birth control available in those days. If you didn’t want another child right then you had to use a diaphragm. You know what that is?” I nodded and said my bride had used one when were first married and we were young and poor. My MIL went on, “You had to wash yourself out, you know, douche, afterward or it might not work. Well, every time we went to the country, my husband wanted to, ’you know’ so we brought this along.” In her old age, my MIL overshares everything with little regard for ‘too much information!’ She continued, “you know it wasn’t so easy up there. You had no running water, no hot water unless you heated on that two-burner propane stove, no toilet, and the outhouse was not always the nicest place!” I nodded, “I remember using it when I visited you there. Spiders!” She laughed, “Oh, the worst were the wasps!”
I had this vision in my mind of my Mother-in-Law heading out to the outhouse, full enema bag in hand hoping the bears, bees and spiders didn’t interfere with her feminine hygiene!
Happy to have an audience, she continued and said, “My daughter, your wife, just about refused to use the outhouse! After a weekend in the country she was so plugged up I almost always had to give her an enema after we made the trip home.” I replied, “She never told me that. She did say that she didn’t much like the country place – there was not much to do!” Now I know what she didn’t do there!!
She lifted the bag from the box and said, “My daughter says she gives you enemas, why don’t you take this home. You might need it.” I nodded added it to the growing pile I was taking, and just said, “OK, Thank you.”
Once back home, I greeted my bride and told her that mother sent her a gift. I produced the long flat box and she asked, “MY MOTHER SENT THIS?” I nodded and said, “it came out of the stuff from the country place, your mother said you would remember it!” My bride said she certainly remembered it! “I truly disliked the ‘country place’ – it was a beat-up old trailer, it was hot, there was no AC, no privacy, no electricity, and there was nothing to do except read or walk in the woods. The outhouse was gross and full of bugs. You know, you were there when we cleaned out the place.”
This new piece of information about my bride surprised me because we have travelled to locations on three continents where an actual sit-down outhouse would have been a great luxury! She has never had a problem taking care of business in primitive conditions since we’ve been married!
I told her, “Speaking of cleaning out, your mother said she had to give you enemas up there when you got constipated because you wouldn’t use the outhouse.” She said, “I told you it was gross and huge spiders were down the hole! Why did my mother tell you all that stuff?” I answered that she no longer is very discreet about private stuff. I also told her that her Mom said she used to douche after sex while they were there – “she really likes telling me her juicy secrets, I think! Who else does she have to talk to?”
“Oh God! I remember my parents would have a couple of cocktails after dinner, then go into the back room of the trailer and close the sliding door. My bed was the converted dinette and you could hear EVERYTHING! It really did gross me out! They thought I was sleeping and couldn’t hear! When the creaking stopped, my father would come out and go to the outhouse and my mother would come out with that same bag, fill it from that big plaid thermos where she stored the hot water she made, add some vinegar, and go to the outhouse by herself. By then, he was back and he went to bed. That was the routine every time we went there. I think it was the only time they ever had sex!”
She continued, “…and yes, she did give me enemas, but not at the trailer. I used to go pee in the outhouse when I couldn’t hold it any longer, but I just couldn’t bring myself to sit on that seat and poop. So, once we got home, she almost always gave me a soapy enema. That went on until my father got sick and they stopped going to the country. I guess I was about fourteen when that happened. I figure they left the enema bag there one of the last times they were there. I know my mother went and bought a different bag – an open top - that she used at home. So, if you helped me move that stuff in 1973 when we got married, this thing hasn’t been used in nearly 50 years!” All I could say was, “For 50 years old it looks in good health!”
My wife asked, “Why did you bring all this crap home? We don’t need any of it!” All I could say was that her mother was so happy to see it all going to someone who could use it, that I didn’t want to disappoint her. Most now resides in the big rolling garbage can, but not the Paris Combination syringe!
I would love to now tell you that my bride suggested we adjourn to the bathroom and give the old bag a try out but that was just a dream. She said, “We have enough enema bags and certainly don’t need another. Just toss it out.” I didn’t. It always helps to have a spare – even one 50 years old!