421 E. 20th Avenue (in Gary, Indiana)… this empty lot is where the apartment building we lived in once thrived, a lot of things happened in and around that building, much of which I will be sharing with you as we go forward… we lived in that building from about 1956 to 1967. My memory begins with me and my brother being bathed by my mother in a thing called a “foot-tub.”
foot-tubs
The room where she bathed us was not in the bathroom, but in the living room, the main thing I remember about that room is it being dimly lit. After my mother would bath us (both together) she would scurry us off to bed… I would “always” ask her if I could watch the “puppet show” first before going to bed.
The puppet show
The puppet show was a segment of the News & Weather that came on CBS at that time around 10:00 pm. After all the news was broadcast… it featured the weather presented by a mister P.J. Hoff (on CBS weather from 1953 to 1968), as Mr. Hoff presented the weather he would have these little puppets that he would entertain the viewers with… they where fantastic… each day he would have something new, and a new way to make the puppets actuate, I must admit that my interest was not in the puppet show… but in “how” Mr. Hoff was making those puppets work, I could tell even at that age from the look on my mothers face that she was perplexed as to how I could be so interest in those puppets, as I look at those puppets now as an adult, I see that they where really quite simple. I think my mother thought that it was a ploy I was using to try to stay up a little longer and not have to go to bed. But oh how wrong she was, each day Mr. Hoff had a new devise that he would use to actuate the puppets… and I was fascinated to know how he was doing it.
Back to the foot-tub
I remember my mother bathing my brother and me together in that foot-tub. I also remember her bringing a big pot of water from the kitchen into the room where we would be bathed and poring it into the tub as we waited, I remember seeing steam come from the pot as she pored it into the tub. She had heated the water on a stove in the kitchen, there was no hot water in that apartment. The whole apartment was heated by a big pot bellied heater that sat in the middle of our kitchen…
…the fuel for that heater was coal oil, that thing was a dangerous, dangerous devise… (more about that later)… but to finish this foot-tub thing, as my mom bathed us I remember telling her and letting her know that the soap (or something) in the water was causing my penis to burn at the tip. For all of you males reading this I know you are familiar with that burn… it is caused by soap getting into the urethra (I understand that some soap can affect a woman’s urethra the same way) to this day it still hurts when that happens, careful with the soap my darlings.
The porch
As time moves on a lot of events took place in that house… but first let me reminisce for a moment, I must tell you a little about this apartment…