We had it tough in our days ...

I was thinking today how life has become so much easier in our very own lifetimes.
Yes there are many modern conveniences we now have to reduce our past irksome chores and we can get on with living, working and relaxing in the time it saves us.

And, not all these modern appliances are electronic or even electrical either.
Take what I losely describe as 'decoration'. Even forty years ago in our homes we had and had to clean;
Brasswork, whether knobs and plates or ornamental. They needed cleaning and polishing regularly.
Ironwork, we 'blacked' and shined it with 'Zebro'.
Stonework, we scrubbed our steps and hearths then polished them with a thick red polish, 'Cardinal Red'.

These are just a few of the time consuming domestic chores our mothers had and we have only relatively recently abandoned in our modern life styles.
There are many more.


I don't think my parents ever had central heating until they moved into sheltered accommodation in the mid 80's.
Living in the country we were probably 10 to 20 years behind the time anyway.
Houses had to have supplementary heating which often was, what we now would call smelly paraffin stoves.
Always in danger of being knocked over or causing local fires by placing too near to fabric etc.
Of course paraffin also meant we needed somewhere to store it and that could mean at least a 5 gallon drum somewhere outside.
And it had to be collected unless you were lucky enough to be on the route of those delivery wagons. Remember them!

Then those portable electrical convector heaters came along and we generally lost the paraffin after that.
Funny though, the little electric radiant heater was an early contender but always a little expensive to run.
Probably a godsend for a quick warm up while dressing in cold bedrooms?

My luxury heater that I installed many years ago and still cherish is a circular built in radiant bar heater cum ceiling light in the bathroom. Despite heated bathrooms, still useful for getting out of the shower to in the colder months or before the central heating is switched on.
We've again gone a long way since putting the oven on and opening the door for a quick source of heat!  


I was born with 'Club Feet'. So I spent most of my childhood in and out of full plaster cast legs, leg irons, callipers etc.
But I managed to get in the army at 15 (told a fib) and keep up with the physical most of the time.
Now when I mention 'club feet' nowadays, younger people have never heard of it.
Although common in our days, it is no longer a birth defect.
(remember callipers and kids with big made up boots?)
Club feet was caused by the baby not lying in the womb correctly. Apparently since we have been able to see the growth of babies in the womb, the problem can be spotted and corrected before any deformation and birth!


My mum took the warm iron shelves from the kitchen range oven, wrapped in newspapers, to warm the beds up in winter.
I can still see the steam coming off the sheets as they warmed up!
Even then, getting into bed meant putting your feet under the sheets bit by bit to get used to the cold!
We would have a rag mat by the side of the bed to stand on as we got out of bed into a cold bedroom in the mornings. Otherwise it was bare feet on the cold lino floor. Then we learnt to get dressed under the bedclothes!
Yes, I remember jack frost patterns on the inside of the window panes ... 


And, we had a 'wireless'. Not a 'radio'!
And it wasn't just take it out the box, put in the batteries and switch on.
You had to have an accumulator battery and a spare which went down the the bicycle shop for charging each week. (like the old battle batteries?)
You had to dig a copper or brass rod into the ground under a nearby window and make a connection for a good earth and string up a copper 'tee' aerial.
Most stations had to be tuned in and often moved off the frequency when the wireless warmed up.
Our first convenient portable dry battery radio was an 'Echo'. (?)