More Memories That I Remember

Let me ask you a question. How did our generation manage to get along without all the modern miracles of today?

How did we ever get along without television? When I once tried to describe what a radio was in our day to my grandchildren, I had to tell them it was like a television set without a picture tube.

And just think how the generation before us must have tried to figure out how they managed to survive without radio!

And how did our generation manage to get along without jet airplanes? Really, remember when it took our generation almost a whole day to fly from New York to California?

And how did our generation ever get along without electric can openers and microwaves? Somehow or other we survived.

Remember when the only thing made of plastic in our society was a toothbrush? And the only thing we knew as a clear plastic was celluloid or cellophane.

Remember when the first radio cabinets came out that were made of the new miracle plastic called “bakelite?”

Another thing: Remember when folks looked for a house or an apartment and the big concern had to do with how close the house was to a shul and a school? Or remember how close it had to be to shopping and a subway station?

Let me ask you, how did our generation listen to music on a plain old-fashioned radio? And what was so terrible about listening to music on a phonograph machine that you had to wind up? I remember listening to dozens of old Enrico Caruso records. To us they sounded great. Of course, we didn’t know better. And how come we were able to listen to great music without stereophonic sound or even compact discs?

Everything in today’s world is cut and dried for us. I remember when Mama made blintzes; it was an occasion. Today, the modern housewife goes into the frozen food section of a supermarket and, shoen, blintzes of every kind and variety are in the freezer.

But it’s not the same.

In our day, who knew from blintzes with fruit filling? We were Litvaks, so in our house Mama made cheese blintzes with pepper and salt in the pot cheese. All you had to do was add a glob of sour cream and you were in business. Vee kompt today’s generation to apple blintzes or raspberry blintzes? What was so terrible about pepper and salt and a little sour cream?

You know, I could never understand people putting sugar on blintzes or oatmeal. I’ll never forget when I went into the army and saw the other fellows putting sugar on their oatmeal cereal. I nearly died. Gevald! In our house we put salt on the oatmeal!

And I ask you, how did our generation ever get along without canned soups? Of course, there are a great many balabustas who still make their own soup, but the canned soups and the dried instant soups have won the battle.

I once asked my wife if she made her own soup and she replied, “Why, don’t you like the soup I make?”

“Of course I like it,” I explained. “I was just asking, that’s all.”

“I’ve always made my own soup,” she exclaimed. “Why should I all of a sudden use canned soup? What’s so hard about making soup? You take a can of split-pea soup and mix in a little water, add an onion and a touch of garlic and maybe a tomato, and you’ve got homemade soup!”

And another thing, how did our generation manage to get along without push-button telephones? Really, our generation didn’t even have dials! We had a little mouthpiece that we spoke into to give the operator our number. In those days you could talk to a person for free, even if it was just the operator.

I was in a supermarket the other day and there were shelves of gefilte fish. What did we do in our day? How did we manage to survive without gefilte fish in a jar? I remember it was a whole-day affair for Mama to make gefilte fish on Fridays. First, she had to buy the fish, then she cut it up, then she chopped it up. Today you can buy a jar or can of gefilte fish already prepared for less than what a similar amount of fish would cost in the store.

And how about typewriters? In our day, if a person had his own typewriter, you had to assume he was important. Forget about typewriters – today everyone, from big shot executive to grade-school student, has his own computer.

In our generation, everybody wrote in longhand with a pencil. And everybody had beautiful handwriting. If you didn’t use a pencil, you used a pen. What was so geferlach? We communicated and we survived.