Roller Skates

Do you remember the clip-on roller skates that fastened to the bottom of your shoes and tightened with a key? We skated about our musty old cinderblock basement with the ease of master skaters, the old metal wheels scraping along the concrete, catching one of the lally-columns in the crook of our elbows and spinning like Dorothy Hamill on the ice. Scooting around the many obstacles, old bikes, storage trunks, fishing poles, and our Flexible Flyer sleds- we amassed miles on those rusty old skates.   

Stretched and hanging at great length from the pipes in the basement were haul-seine nets that my father was carefully sewing-a master at nautical arts. There was an old metal cabinet that stored the canning efforts of both my parents-tuna, peaches, tomatoes, green beans. The door caught and rattled when you tried to open it. I often hoped they would forget about some of those jars and cans of last season’s fish. There were molds where my father would heat and pour lead to make his own sinkers and a ‘REMKUS’ brand that made its way onto cork floats and buoys, crab traps, lobster pots, eel spears, clam rakes and whatever wasn’t nailed down.

That cellar was like our amusement park, hosting hours of hide and seek, ghost stories and preteen fan clubs. It was quiet and grounding and a bit mysterious. Light bulbs hung every ten feet or so from the ceiling-and like stops on a ‘local’ train, you had to work your way through the basement, lighting each bulb with the pull of a dangling string. The darkest part was back by the furnace that hissed and hummed and always seemed a bit frightening. Once the darkness was peeled away you stood in the midst of a kid’s wonderland. I’m not sure if there was such a thing as a ‘finished basement’ back then, but ours was ‘finished’ with hours of fun and imagination.

 Upstairs, the narrow hallway that led from the kitchen to the three small bedrooms acted as our indoor athletic court. It was there that we played ‘monkey-in-the-middle’, catch and pitched pennies. With three sisters and two brothers there was generally always someone to play with. Aside from three meals a day, every day, for all our years, the kitchen table was our homework spot, a place to filet fish, finger-paint and host hours of board games. It was there that my father taught us to play every poker game imaginable. We had a jar of pennies that we used to place bets and I am certain that is how I learned to add numbers with ease. My mom collected buttons in a large jar-and I keep wondering why that jar seemed so full of treasure? We would tie a large button onto a loop of string to make a spinner.  

Outdoors the world opened wide to endless hours of exploration and fun. Tree-forts, bicycles, an old Grumman canoe, kickball, kite-flying and catching falling leaves. The woods stretched on for miles and became our soulful retreat-before we even knew that we might need one. We were part of this earth, never insulated from it.

It is a wonder how life seemed so amazing - having so little. How our imaginations had to stand in for the 300 TV channels and video games that had never existed. How our modest homes held so much - so much family time, so much joy, so much creativity and of course, so much love.