Tuesday, May 19, 2009

18 May 1955” TV Tie-ins, Teddy Girls, Crepes, and dealing with the Blues”

rocky jones comic First TV tie in for kids. You can really see this is the beginning of the REAL TV generation. Being closer to 40 than 20 in 1955 I would most likely enjoy some of the TV programs and share in occasional TV nights with friends, but really the children of the 1950s (those darn baby boomers) really begin the framework to build our current state of dependency on passive entertainment. So begins the move towards the world we have today where we constantly need a toy jangled before our face or we get fussy and cry.

teddy girl I thought this girl looked rather 1980s, but this is actually a 1955 photo of an English “Teddy Girl” the counterpoint to the “Teddy Boy” of that era. The British Teddy Boy subculture is typified by young men wearing clothes inspired by the styles of the Edwardian period (1901-1910). The subculture started in London in the 1950s and rapidly spread across the UK, soon becoming strongly associated with American rock and roll music of the period. The U.S. film Blackboard jungleblackboard jungleplayed a role in this movement and when it was shown at a South London Cinema in Elephant and Castle in 1956, the teenage Teddy boy audience began to riot, tearing up seats and dancing in the aisles. At first, hearing of this subculture I thought, “hmm, here is a 20th c. example of a group looking to the past for inspiration”. But, I was disillusioned to find it was only for the fashion and that their attitude and behavior were anything BUT Edwardian.

The movie Blackboard Jungle was really felt to be a big role in showing and introducing the ‘teens’ at the time to rock and roll with Bill Haley and the Comet’s ‘Rock around the Clock’. I watched the film earlier this year, as it came out in 1955, and it was meant to show how harsh the teens in inner cities were becoming. The youth movement was explored to show how dangerous and what little respect they had. You can really see how it shows probably what most schools, even rural schools, today are like. In a way, rather than pointing out the horrid attitudes and disrespect of the youths to fix the issue, it instead glorified the attitude, fashion and music and probably had the opposite affect. I have begun to feel it was a tantamount point in Media forming the “youth is better, I hate old age, in your face” attitude that we take for granted today.

I wonder if we shall ever shake the current mindset that reveres youth, hostility, and self-obsession? Only time will tell, though with the current and continuing hold TV, movies, reality shows, and general media have over the world, I think not. It’s too bad because it does such a disservice to young people. It gives them nothing to shoot for. If they are revered and thought ‘cool’ for merely being young and rebellious, than they strive for nothing. Then, as they age, they feel useless and need to hold onto their youth never wanting to grow up. I really think being a grown up is underrated and it is too bad, as it can really be liberating and fun.

Since my hubby has started his new job two weeks ago, I have had to really scramble to make my usual routine function as it had. Thank goodness I was already IN a routine, but now it is definitely undergoing some restructuring, which is good in and of itself, as I feel it really is testing the skills I have gained thus far. While he once had a schedule of m-f at a set time, he now works all sorts of hours including weekends sometimes and days off are random. It really means I need to rethink and reshape things. That is also, really, why there have been less photos and recipes of late. Not that I have not been busy cooking, but only out of sorts and not remembering to take photos.

However, I did make some wonderful crepes yesterday morning for breakfast. crepes They were so yummy and really quite easy. I am going to be making some dinner crepes in the future. I had once, as a child, made crepes St. Gabrielle as a special treat for my parents, as I wanted to try and cook. They were rather good but really was my only foray into cooking. Here I am many years later, finding them wonderful to make and full of promise. Though there is a crepes heading in my Boston Cooking School book for crepes these were actually listed under FRENCH PANCAKES.  Here is the recipe from my Boston Cooking School book of 1951:

French pancakes are internationally famous for dessert, but they are also the basis for some very exceptional luncheon dishes and provide an epicurean way to use leftovers (I love that!)

1 cup pasty or all-purpose flour, sifted

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup milk

2 eggs

Mix Flour and salt. Add milk and stir until perfectly smooth. Add eggs and beat thoroughly. Let stand at least 1/2 hour.

Heat 5 inch or other small frying pan. Grease with a few drops of oil and pour in just enough batter to cover pan with very thin layer. Tilt pan so that mixture spreads evenly. When cooked on one side, toss or turn with spatula and cook on other side. Cook pancakes one by one. Roll up or fold in quarters. Makes 18 to 24.

There are some variations of these that I will make and then share the recipes with you in the future. When I made these, I first cut up some apples and cooked them in butter and cinnamon, then placed them in the crepes, sprinkled with confectioners sugar and a fresh slice of apple and served with maple syrup and jam. They make a great breakfast or dessert. I found them fun to make and by making them individually, they cooked perfectly and the batter does not have the tendency to cook unevenly or oddly as sometimes I find pancake batter to do.

Lately, we have been talking about dealing with the blues. I know this past year and the beginning of this year for me has had some sad times. As I have briefly mentioned in previous blogs, I have had to deal with my mother’s Alzheimer's, my fathers stroke, putting a beloved pet to sleep among a myriad of other woes. Yet, this year particularly, I feel I have become better equipped to deal with it. The reason? This project has allowed me to grow up. That is not to say that grown ups do not feel sadness, but the way in which I have dealt with my own personal sadness and blues this year has been with ACTION.

I really think older generations, particularly the generation of the 1940s-1950s, after having come through the war and the Depression, had their own way of dealing. They had very real and tangible losses and sadness, yet they had to go on and continue for themselves and for others. Certainly, a woman would break down and weep at the loss of her son during the war, but she would also set aside her own grief to help others and to help the ‘war effort’. This ACTION could be a boon. It would be a salve to sadness.

I think the other element in the elixir of joy after grief is community. Again, that same woman would have lost her son, she would have had others with the same situation or others with sons still alive and fighting and for them, she would stand up and put on a ‘happy face’. There seems to be a difference between denying your emotions and feelings and really ‘trying out happiness’. Certainly, you are sad or lonely one day and you feel it, but I find the less you dwell on the actual sadness and the more you try to take ACTION, any old thing, clean out that back pantry you have been meaning to get to, scrub out the grout you never have time for, and if you can see someone for lunch or coffee, put on the face you would want them to see. Sometimes, practicing happiness will eventually bring it out in you. I think this form of not dwelling is not repression. Repression, to me, would be to deny it or act as if there is nothing wrong, I think that is different than accepting your sadness, but knowing you don’t like it. We hardly wish to be sad or unhappy, so we need to act as if we are not and take our minds off it to ‘cure the blues’.

I am sure this sounds very trite or simplistic, but, in all honestly, it is very real to me now how I deal with my sadness or a blue day. The 2008 me would often dwell on sadness or how I felt bad. I would spend hours, sometimes days, just wondering, what can I do to get over feeling this way. Maybe I will go get some coffee and magazines at the bookstore. Perhaps, I will go shopping somewhere. Or, I will talk with someone about it endlessly, the sadness. Really, all that ever did was help me to dwell and stay in the moment of sadness.

The way in which we now, modern folk, address our personal sadness and depression is actually rather new. It came out of the Freudian psychology of the 20th c. By the late 1950s early 1960’s the ‘analyst’ was the new pet. Evaluating your emotions, raging our your feelings, it was in vogue. The very fact that we now place so much importance on our mental health is due largely to that. Now, don’t get me wrong, we should be healthy mentally, but what I find odd, is many women from this time period 30s-50s) seem to have overcome enormous obstacles of death and loss and came out smiling and honestly happy, raising families and keeping active. We seem, now, to be always talking and dealing with our emotions. They have become some sort of tiger loose from its cage we are always trying to capture. There are countless books and shows and TV about how ‘we feel’. Endless talk shows to express how we feel guilt and sadness and anger, it cannot be good for us, surely, all this dwelling in sadness and anger. But, honestly, it really does go well with our passive sort of society of TV and entertainment. The ‘act’ of sitting and dwelling on our sadness and bad lot in life seems really to fit right in.

There is a similar element to this as there is to the glorification of the sexual and the rebel. Those who once were the fringe of a society became glorified in a way. It is rather odd, when you really think about it. Now the rebel youth with an ‘in your face attitude’ is the norm. The sexy teen is just part of the world. Grown woman today on television often say with pride, ‘Yeah, I am a bitch, deal with it’. We glorify rudeness, why therefore should we not exalt sadness and self-obsession?

Again, I do not want anyone to think that I am trying to simplify or to ignore anyone’s sadness, but there is a reason mothers in the 1950s would most likely tell a sad child, “Well, you have it much better than I did or think of the poor children in Africa”. It was not an evasion of the emotions, but a check to say, PERSPECTIVE. And to learn the lesson that world does not revolve around yourself. A very grownup realization that many don’t come to. Again, please don’t think I am saying it is selfish to feel sad, but in what I have found, I think it can help you to get out of the sadness.  It is true that many people have it MUCH worse than we. People who don’t know clean drinking water or basic healthcare. That doesn’t mean we aren’t allowed to feel sad one day as we sit in our comfortable homes but it does mean, ‘count your blessings and put on a smile’ sometimes it really works.

Here is a case in point for me. Yesterday I had a ‘bad day at work’ which means those in the house have to suffer at that moment. I have not had many bad days, but I was just sort of out of sorts as I am adjusting to a new scattered schedule and I wanted to make homemade doughnuts yesterday to have with hubby for breakfast. I had made them before, but wanted to try a new recipe. Let’s say they did not turn out. The oil was too hot, the kitchen was suddenly a mess, Gussie came down in the midst of it and hubby too and I became upset and they received the backlash.  I was angry and upset and very ‘self-centered’ at that moment. It was true this was anger, not sadness, but believe me, had I allowed myself to only dwell in it, later in the day there could have been a pity-party. Or, perhaps if something happened like this and those around you just don’t want to deal, as we don’t have the pull together spirits often exhibited in older generations, they would have went off and I would have sulked and later in the day I could have been left to feel, “well, who cares, I work hard in the house no one appreciates me” etc. But, that is not what happened. Hubby said, why don’t you just toss it and start over as if it is a new day. Gussie said, “Yes, and here I will help clean up” and away we went. Before you know it, a new clean kitchen, eggs and bacon on the stove the, coffee percolating away, and we all sat down to a happy breakfast.

In this instance, of course, I had others to help me out of the funk; the community that is so important. But, there are many times that I am alone in the house and have felt blue. I remember early on in my project I had a very blue day, I believe I even did a post about it, that I had been very down. I had found some old home movies on YouTube from the 1950s. Watching the silent happy families smiling and living and of course, dressed as I was, I felt sort of ‘left behind’. I felt a connection more with these people than with my own world. This, however, was just self-obsession. I was truly sad, but I was still exhibiting my 2008 behavior of self-evaluation. Rather than just enjoy these movies and possibly use them as fodder for a good post about the time, I turned it inward and felt alone and sad. I was a newbie in 1955 then, now if that were to happen (though it does happen less I have noticed) I would get up, and DO something. ACTION is really a salve to such wounds. I think my sadness in that moment was also the masked sadness for my mother and her really being gone from me. In those silent laughing faces I saw my young family I never knew (as I was born late and therefore very much an only child) the young mother I never met smiling and laughing in the joy of a bygone age. I realize that now, but not from years of self-analysis or seeing a ‘shrink’ but from doing. From living out a life now that is real and tangible. I do and make things everyday that is very real and in those moments, sometimes, I feel a connection to my mother that I could never feel sitting and weeping or crying my heart out to a psychologist. Sadness is and will always be a part of our human experience and the best way to deal with it and enjoy the rest of life is to really work through it, take yourself ‘out of it’.

I think with our modern sadness we have, again, sort of thrown out the baby with the bathwater. Modern psychoanalysis teaches us to dwell on ourselves and our emotions to the point of excluding the outside world. We need to acknowledge our sadness, certainly, but we do not want to be sad so we need to set about changing it. IF we are fat we want to be thin so we try to change it. If we do not like a room we repaint it. So, if you are sad and blue one day, actively try to change it either with action or community. I know part of the sadness we have talked about is being sort of without community. WE vintage gals sometimes feel out of the modern world and would like more vintage gals around us. Hopefully we can use the computer to alleviate that a bit.

I have actually been toying with the idea of setting up a separate website that we could use to chat on and post recipes and use as a vintage forum, but I don’t want it to seem to take away from my project or to be too modern, but if it could be a sort of ‘vintage club’ for all of you that live all over the world, it might be fun. A place that would allow us to forum together and to also remind each other, okay we have had some fun here, now get off the computer and get to work! But, let me know what You think. I won’t do it if it seems a bad modern idea. I will consider it and put it into my daily tasks to find out how I would put such a think together if any of you felt it would be fun to visit and share your things there. Let me know. If you are a reader and have not commented, but would like such a place, let me know. We are, after all, a community, so I think a vote on it is only fair.

Well, I am off to do my ironing, it is Tuesday after all. I hope everyone has a fine happy day and remember, we are all here for one another.

Happy Homemaking and remember, ‘put on a happy face’

31 comments:

  1. I thought I would post my comment on my last blog here as well incase we want to continue the same thread of chit chat...
    GIrl interupted_ I am glad it worked, I love almond anything!
    Jen B-so true about the days to relax. Also, those days we sit and dream and scribble away our ideas are also days of ACTION, as the physical work is just part of the actual making of a home. WE have to use our imgaination and dream up or else it would just be a flat uninspired place, right? I definitely had a 'day off' sunday and realize, as a homemaker i need to schedule a day off, but as you said, I end up looking through magazines, jotting down ideas, mending, that sort of thing, which is fun but it is also work. Yes, I am not sure about the forum either, today in my post I mentioned the idea of it, but want everyone to sort of vote on it, as I don't want to take away from this space. I really am so happy that we all gather here to chat and share. I like the idea of a newsletter, that could be very fun and vintage and I could print it up and mail it out to all of us. It could sort of be our own vintage magazine!
    Looking for ideas and dreaming I think are as important as doing! NOw, speaking of doing, it is FINALLY a sunny day and my garden and the rest of my fence is CALLING to me. Have a great day gals, I will check back periodically.

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  2. great post! my mom and i were just talking yesterday about the tendency that people have to wallow in their sadness, or anger. to make others "feel their pain". we made fun of the "stoics", as we called them, for "denying" how they felt. now i see, in my "old age" that they weren't denying anything. they were just getting on with the business of living. and that is much more healing than continuing to drown in self-absorbed emotion. i agree with you that it doesn't minimize the blues. it doesn't mean that what you feel isn't real. it just means that yes, the world keeps turning, and there is still beauty and joy to be had, people to be helped, things worth accomplishing. thanks for reinforcing that. :)

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  3. Such an interesting post as always and your crepes look so scrumptious.
    ♥Darla

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  4. Love the idea of the forum/newsletter/vintage magazine! I drop by here everyday as much for the "fire lit under my feet" as for the vintage beauty. There are so many voices telling me to collapse into eternal teen-age angst and self-indulgence. I need 50sgal's call to grown-up ACTION. Off to the clothes line...

    Rebecca

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  5. Just checking in on a garden break. My ironing and mending will wait until this evening, as now I am out putting in my tomatoes, cukes, and going to start mulching my veg garden paths.
    Kelly- I know, I used to be the same way, and now I realize how right they had it!
    Darla-thank you, they were scrumptious
    Rebecca-well that is one vote for yes so far and we really can and do help one another to 'fight the teen angst' and 'drive to be forever cool and young' The amount of effort to make oneself young and cool is too much, I'd rather use that energy to build fences, make dinners and wear old petticoats with the 'geeky kids in the back'.

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  6. What you have written about how we dwell on our sadness and anger is so very true. I have been through maybe the hardest time in my life recently. In the past six months my dog was runover, my father died of cancer, and my mother was being abused by her new husband. I greived during and after the funeral of course and Im still grieving but not how everyone wants me too. I still went about my daily life and I still went out to dinners with my fiance and to the movies with my friends it was hard at first but it has gotten easier. The one thing that really bothered me though was the reaction I got from my friends and family, everyone kept saying that I was in denial and that I needed to talk to someone and deal with my emotions. It was almost like they wanted me to be really sad every day and I know my father would not want that so I just kept on with life, and Now its getting much easier. of course I still miss him so much but I don't see how It would be better for me to lock myself in my room and cry everyday. Instead I choose to wake up in the morning, make breakfast, go to work, go to lawschool, come home do the laudry, dishes, go out on date nights with my honey and have tea parties with my girl friends. Thats a better sounding life to me!

    Now to the Vote...I Vote YES to the forum!!! It may be a modern forum but I don't see how else we could do it since we all live so far away. It will be so nice to have a community of women who believe in vintage morals and the vintage way of life.

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  7. I love those Ken Russell Teddy Girl photos. They were kind of ignored or just seen as an extension of their boyfriends, but you get a real sense of them being a very new, modern girl from these images. These are kids who lived through the war in a way we couldn't imagine in the US. They grew up much faster and I can see why they wanted to find a way to separate themselves as a group (although they were little hoodlums)

    I'd love another vintage forum to lurk and occasionally post in! If nothing else, I might be able to get a few people to help me find some resources I've been looking for lately (anyone seen a 1930s (maybe '40s) household manual with daily tasks for husband and wife around? I know there's one on some UK site, I just don't remember where)

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  8. Mmmmmm...crepes. How lovely. I'm glad the donut incident had a happy ending. We all have those cooking stories and I can tell you I'm not always so gracious when faced with a mishap in the kitchen.

    I love the idea of a vintage forum. It is a modern concept but it can be our own on line "party line." Remember those? I'm too young to really remember them but I've seen them in movies and isn't there a song about a party line?

    The Teddy Girl really looks 1980s. Goes to show you what fashion goes around comes around, doesn't it? I think I had a jacket like that in high school.

    I love how you watched 50's you tube. I have XM radio in my car and when my kids are particularly unruly and I'm tired I find it comforting to turn on the 1940's or 50's station. Kind of makes me feel like I'm living in a simpler time and everything will be fine, which it will anyway. I mean unruly children are trying but a real problem, like a terminally ill child is a totally different thing. And luckily my worst problem has been fighting kids and a grumpy husband.

    Which brings me to your thoughts on our society of mental obsession. I agree that mental health is very important and we're lucky to live in a time where medical care for a mental condition is as available as for a physical condition but do we need the Jerry Springer drama? Do we need the in your face- proud to be a bitch attitude? Have we lost the ability to have private thoughts? And why do we care so much what celebrities think? Not that "we" here do, but as a society this need for celebrity info is a big business and is quite profitable. What does this mean? We value our celebrities more than our own lives? Just crazy. (And I am just full of questions today, aren't I???)

    If you have any links to the you tube shows you watched please post if you can. I'd love to see them.

    S

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  9. That forum idea could be regarded as a party line. You wouldn't spend all day on the phone while hubby was at work in the 50's. If you have something to say or add, you gab to the gals on the line, then you go right back to your ironing, washing, baking, cleaning, etc. It just might work!

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  10. Great post!!! Both of my husband's grandmothers were young brides during WWII. Both lost babies, one through miscarriage, one through premature birth. Both lost a parent during the same time. Yet they both went on to live full, joyful lives. It was a conscious choice they made. There is something about that generation...we just don't see that type of strength very often anymore.

    I believe what you said about recovering from grief or the blues is absolutely true. You just keep going because you have to. I say this, at the age of 38, having already lost both of my parents. I believe that staying busy and focusing on others is really a huge help.

    I too would like the idea of a vintage forum if you decide to move forward with it.

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  11. Just another quick check in on the 'party line'. So, it seems thus far, that such an idea would be well recieved. I will add it forthwith to my schedule of to-doing and let you know what I come up with. Luckily my hubby is rather a computer nerd, so he will be of help.
    I didn't get as much gardening done today, but honestly, when IS gardening done? But, what a joyful work.
    I really do now look to that generation as a sort of measure to live up to, they were certainly not perfect, but that had such full lives and did so much with so little and so much turmoil and strife. We really do need to take them as example. Well, time to throw together my meat loaf, check on Gussie and her bread and pop some apple fritters in for dessert. we are not doing dessert every night as we want to lose weight around here, so I have decided three nights a week to do it.

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  12. I have really been thinking about all that you said because not only do I agree, but I think I’ve said here on your blog that in our family we live by the motto, “Focus on the positive, deal with the negative.”, but these bouts of loneliness have been hard for me to deal with over the years because it’s an ongoing problem, and I just get tired of it sometimes. But, I realized after reading your post that I need to figure out a better way of dealing with it when it comes up, and I had a light bulb moment. Normally, like I said, I will watch a movie, etc. to help get me in a better mood and just let the blues pass me by because I know they will; I accept my mood for what it is, don’t dwell on it, and just let it pass. I think I recognized a flaw in how I deal with those moments though. Even though I don’t dwell on the sadness/loneliness itself, I am passive about it, and I think that’s what causes it to be more difficult than necessary when dealing with it. Watching a movie, although I’m “doing” something to help myself, and it does help me feel a little better, is a passive action, not an active action. The more I thought about what you said, especially about just getting yourself active and putting yourself into something to help get yourself out of your funk, the more I began to see the distinction between the two ways of dealing with the problem, and how the active solution would really do me more good than my passive approach all these times past. Thank you for helping me to see that there is a better way of helping myself. I think the thing that helped me to make that connection in my head was your mentioning all the different aspects of life and how when you want something a certain way, you just have to do what’s needed to have it that way. Having recently lost 65 lbs., that was the attitude I had to have for losing the weight, so I “got” what you were saying. I remember before losing my weight bemoaning to my husband the fact that I was mad (not at him) that he could eat whatever he wanted and never gain an ounce, and how frustrating it was for me because I gain weight so easily. And then he spoke the words that changed everything for me, “So? Then you need to do what YOUR body needs you to do for it. If you can’t eat as much, then don’t eat as much. The reality is, you have to WORK WITH YOUR METABOLISM. You can’t change that reality; you have to work with it or nothing will ever change.” Oh my goodness, I can’t tell you how much his words penetrated my thinking. Once I got that concept through my thick head, instead of feeling sorry for myself, I just started doing what I needed to do for my body, and how it works, and I lost the weight. I am continually amazed at how much our life is lived out, and affected, according to our thinking. So, anyhow, it took ACTION and accepting that I needed to do what I needed to do to get me out of that place that I hated being with my weight, and so with my blue days, I need to approach it with ACTION so that I’m DOING something about it, not just passively “doing” something about it…to me there is a difference, and I’m seeing that now. I hope all of that made sense. I’m just trying to condense into words all the thoughts that have been running through my head since I read your post, and trying to convey my “Got it!” moment in an understandable way.

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  13. As far as the forum/newsletter/something or other that you have been talking about, is this the same type of thing that Vintage Angel was talking about, or did I miss something? Will the forum be something that you plan to continue with in place of this blog once your year is up, or will you continue to do both? I like the idea, but my only fear, like I mentioned to Vintage Angel, is that I don’t want to end up spending more time on the computer trying to keep up with another site’s goings on. I guess I’ll just need to play it by ear and see how you work it all out, and see how that works for me. I think it would be great if you did that type of thing to pick up where you leave off with this blog at the end of the year…a continuation of sorts, just in a different way.

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  14. PL_You are so right and my husband (who also eats what he wants and loses weight fast) said the same thing. Sometimes we just don't want to hear the truth we want it easy, thus all the diets and odd things like don't eat at certain times eat only this or that when really, just reduce your calories and increase your exercise, done and done. I am glad I helped you. I sort of helped myself as I was writing it, as I have said, this past year and up to now has had a lot of drama and sadness in it for me and my becoming who I am now in just these past months has helped immensely. Things that come up now are dealt with more maturely and better and less drama and even sadness over other things is dealt with with ACTION.
    Now, concerning the other thing, vintage angel said that on her own, I don't know what she meant exactly, I was just sort of coming to this decision on my own and wondering as many commenters say they wish they could go and have a sort of comment thread that is like an ongoing conversation etc that would be in ADDITION to this blog. I don't know if I will stop this blog as I have not decided what next year will be. It might me my year 1945 who knows? I have toyed with that idea or 1930s and even thought of saving my kitchen redo until then as part of it. I don't want to take anything away from this blog and what it means to me. I also don't even know HOW to make a site that is a forum, but I would be willing to do it and set it up (though I think it does cost something, but if it was not too much I would do it) It would merely be an extension of this in that we could all just sort of ask questions and talk further on topics I have addressed. I know sometimes as people find my blog they may want to discuss something we have already moved away from. SO, that is what it COULD be but not sure if I want it or how hard it would be to make it. AND I would also have it somehow be a place we could say, "Now, ladies, enough chit chat back to your ACTION" you know to sort of help us motivate us when we are home alone and might not be doing our work. I don't know what do you think? By the way congrats on 65 lbs I need to lose about 50 or so to make me happy.

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  15. Was the choice of crepes a subtle choice, crepe soles being the footwear of choice for Teddy Boys?
    I was a rockabilly in the eighties in the UK and it was, even then, Teds and Rockers. I was too Ted for the rockabillies and too Billy for the Teds.
    Loving your blog and v jealous of your whole project.

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  16. I've just given you a One Lovely Blog Award for being in my Top Ten blogs, which you can pick up at http://plotz.blogsome.com Big hugs!!!

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  17. Anon-wow too ted to be a rocker and too billy for teds, I sort of get that. I bet you have wonderful photos of yourself!
    gregorygirl-I will try but I always seem to mess up the whole blog award thing. Not sure what to do with them etc. Thanks though.

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  18. Interesting post as always!
    There are still Teddy Boys over here, although where I originally come from in East Anglia I always remember them working on fairgrounds!

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  19. Natasha-Really?!That is amazing that a style has held out this long. I read that there was some sort of revival in the 90's against the 'wanna-be' Teds in the 80's which I thought funny. I guess if it got too main stream that had to rebel from their old rebellion! What great b/w photo ops of modern Teds working at fairgrounds!

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  20. Please don't make light of depression, which really is a serious mental illness, and not just a low period in your life. It's too easy to generalize--people in the 1950's managed depression vs. people today dwelling in it. In the 1950's clinical depression most definitely existed, and even more dangerously so, as it went unchecked and untreated. Like in so many other ways, medical treatment of the 1950's was very misguided (though well-intended), but the days of locking patients away still lingered.

    Depression is truly a physical illness caused by improper chemical production in the brain. No putting on a happy face can cure that.

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  21. anon-I have NEVER made fun of depression and was only addressing those of us who DO NOT suffer from CLINICAL depression which is certainly different from just feeling blue. I hope that I never 'make fun' of any ailment.

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  22. Anon, I was shocked by your statement as well as we were clearly talking about people who have the blues, not depression. That was a huge leap in assumption that you made. My sister has severe depression, so I'm no stranger to clinical depression. I hope you yourself do not suffer from depression, but just on the chance that you might suffer from it yourself, or someone you know does, there are some people whose depression goes away when they remove gluten from their diet; I have firsthand experience of this happening. If you haven't already, you might want to do a search on the connection between depression and gluten.

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  23. there is also a connection btwn b-vitamin deficiency and same.

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  24. Anon, it's surprising to see you say that anyone is making fun of real depression; that's not the case. Most people know that depression is nothing to mess with. It's quite clear that 50s gal is saying that when someone has the blues or a funk or just a down day, they need to pick themselves up by the bootstraps, stop sulking, gather faith or family or friends (or chocolate) or all of the above for support, and keep going; eventually it'll get better.

    BTW, I speak as someone who was long ago diagnosed with clinical depression and managed to scramble out of it without medication (it made me worse, as in suicidal, a side effect the RX warned us about...great thing to give depressed people, lol!). And the "move on" and "ACTION" theme is exactly what I did.

    Just today on the radio, 50sgal, I heard someone talk about this very topic after they read part of a news story about young people worried about jobs, relationships, et cetera...As if that is something new! Sure, the economy is bad, but it's been worse. Anyhow, he said things quite to the same effect that you have: this up & coming generation has been told the world revolves around them, they do no wrong, and they spend (and are encouraged to spend) way too much time thinking about how they're feeling instead of just moving and doing something. Of course they're scared and down!

    Had, say, George Washington or the 101st Airborne in WWII sat and thought as much about how bleak their situations were at certain points, they'd probably have quit right there, and where would we be now? What about Mr. Hershey, who had a long string of failed chocolate & candy companies behind him before he founded and became so successful with Hershey's Chocolate (in the middle of nowhere, no less)? They kept going instead of whining and moping about it. Washington especially, who had some tremendously bad luck and was in some remarkably horrid situations militarily.

    Instead of wallowing and dwelling on these things, we really need to move on, to keep trudging through (this is different than major depression or, say, catching the plague and needing a few days off).

    This is why it's always good to have a plan and a backup plan, something to do "in reserve" so we're never bored or terribly blue without anything to take our mind off things (because as you pointed out, 50sgal, you eventually came to understand things after a time of busyness, sort of as if your subconscious had worked it out). Psychologists have suggested that if we can't remember something or have a major difficulty, we do something completely different; it gives the mind a break, exercises other parts of the brain, and oddly, people tend to remember what they need or come up with solutions afterwards, having done something far away from what had bothered them previously.

    Things only start to seem insurmountable, unconquerable when we've spent so much time looking at them from every angle that they're the only thing we see.

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  25. Wow, great responses, part of the post I am working on and was going to post last night dealt with this question. I have been mulling it over the past two days and trying to find the best way to say that I was speaking of those with the blues. I see you have done it for me. I agree with you and am glad others did not feel I was 'makiing fun' of a serious problem. Good for you for pulling yourself out of depression, sometimes it can be done without meds.

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  26. Hello,

    Love your blog, and love the 50's.
    I too have suffered with depression & still suffer on occasion.
    I think it's how you are built, plus modern living.
    I have just book marked this one it look's interesting.

    All the best & keep on rockin'

    Crowbar

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  27. I LOVED your breakfast story! You are lucky to have such a lovely husband and dear friend!

    And you are SO right about being a grown up, I also think it is like the world only turns around MY navel! In Denmark I don’t think we are so many that visits a shrink so often as you Americans do. In Denmark we have “crisis-help”, that is e.g. if you have been in a terrible accident, not if your bird has just died. Not that shrinks are a bad thing, but you are right that you can dwell in your sadness for a limited time period and then GO ON! You will not feel better by cultivating your sorrow. Reverse you will get cramped up if you don’t let your sorrow out. It’s the balance that grown-ups master.

    A vintage club!!! :) How FAB is that!?! Count me in! :) I would LOVE being a member. I already feel quite a member of your small community at your blog, or is it around your coffee table! I would love a place where we could share all kinds of vintage recipes, tips, patterns, etc. I can recommend ning.com, if you don’t already know that network-site. It is free and very easy to work with. There you sign up to be a member and get your own page, you can share photos and videos, you can write on each others’ pages, write e-mails to other members through Ning, and you can have create clubs to join on your own network. I am a member of http://vintagelifenetwork.ning.com, which I have enjoyed a lot for about a year. Go have a look. I can hardly wait to be in your club! Please do it, Donna! :)

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  28. PS: How about naming it "The Apron Revolution" or "Gloves and Girdles"!?

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  29. You might also look at this network on ning:
    http://lovelyliving.ning.com
    It might be inspirational. The network is quite dead today, not much action and contribution going on, but it is lovely built.

    Looking SO much forward to being a member of your vintage network. :)

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  30. Sanne-I was thinking of naming it the apron revolution, how funny you should say that. I am going to go check out that site now, I have been so busy, and therefore not many blogs lately, as the house we own and rent out then tenent just stopped paying rent and we have to deal with that and then clean up the place and show it etc so I have been busy with that!

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  31. A fabulous gift idea that any mom & grandma links of london sale would be glad to accept is a mother's ring. There are countless styles to pick from london links charms and every one permits each of a mother's children's birthstone to be placed in the ring so mom & grandma can remember her children wherever she goes.Jewelry links london bracelet that is personalized or engraved makes great jewelry gifts for mom. You can have a particular word or meaningful expression engraved inside a ring, necklace or bracelet links of london earrings to demonstrate to your mother the depths of your feelings.Stylish watches are an additional idea for great jewelry gifts for mom. Your mother sweetie bracelet needs a stylish watch to go with her favorite outfit and perhaps even a few to go with her entire wardrobe.Another example of mom's & grandma's jewelry that makes a great gift is mother's earrings.

    ReplyDelete

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