Our old house

When I was a kid, probably under 5 years old, we lived in a big house on Ave B.  Our house was on a large lot with big trees on each side of the house.  The lot was so big that our property was the span of two lots back to back.  I think this house was there before the neighborhood.  There was no drive way only a dirt drive that lead from the street to the house.  My parents bought it from a black family who lived there for several years.  I believe it was the Monroe family.  My parents had moved from Texas to Kansas and back again because my Dad worked for a highway constructions crew.  This was the house I was born in 1974. 

The house was very old and being poor had many challenges.  The three bedroom house was in bad condition.  We only used two rooms, one bedroom and the kitchen. It was easier to heat and cool two rooms.  My mother told me that when we were babies, we slept in a drawer next to the bed because there was no baby bed. When we got older, we had a cribs.  I remember my parents not having money. My mom would wash clothes in the bath tub.  She would ring them by hand and hang them to dry outside on the clothes lines.  That’s what you do, when you can’t afford the Laundromat. My mom would later get a washer when I was in Junior high.

My mother would boil large pots of water on the stove in order for us to take a bath. We only had cold water in the kitchen and the bath tub. There was no hot water at all in the house. We would usually bathe all in the same water.  Usually she would sit my brother and I back to back in the tub.  That way she could bathe us and we would not spend too much time just playing in the water.   I remember that at the end of the tub was a homemade shelf that was made of three short 1 by 4 planks that were nailed together.  This shelf was where the shampoo and soap was kept.  But being a small child I could see under it.  I remember there were spider webs and egg under it. I was frightened that the spider would bite me.  I would cry and cry until finally the bath was over. My mother never knew why I hated taking a bath, and I was too young to tell her.

We had to pour water into the toilet with a bucket in order to flush it. I guess the plumbing was so bad that the water lines were nonfunctional.  It was something that we never told people about; it was common to not tell people how we lived.  Hot water was a luxury but we made due.