Written on 2014-04-17

I have long thought about writing a journal. This would not be a diary, capturing the day to day activities. Instead it would be moments and events in my life, wandering from the present to the past and back again. I will pick and choose what I wish to include and what will be tossed by the wayside. And I cannot promise that all of that I write is an accurate account, only how I remember occasions. Memories are tricky creatures. (My sisters, Bonnie Mitsch, Denise Duncan, Carol Hill and Maureen Duncan have been reading some of these memoirs and filling in the blanks, particularly with the names of people and places. They are also proof reading as my fingers sometimes tend to go in different places than my brain. Thanks!)

One of my greatest regrets is not capturing my Grandmother Duncan’s stories when she was alive. These would be almost one hundred years old, now gone forever. My Aunt Jeanne is the last of her children and we have talked about capturing various memories. But like most things in life, it just doesn’t get done.

My earliest memories are just bits and snatches. I remember, or at least, I think I do, the railroad station in Swissvale when people came and went there. It was a small building next to the tracks. Except for this short memory, I never remember the building as anything but abandoned, empty, overlooking the tracks used mainly by freight trains. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention, standing on the bridge into “downtown” Swissvale, a bridge maybe six cars lengths long, which shook as each train passed under. We would brave the shaking bridge so that we could wave at the conductors in the cabooses.

Even remembering this early memory has triggered a flood gate of others. I started a list of them, so I don’t forget to include them somewhere in this journal. The list keeps growing and growing. They are disjointed, all over my time map. Most of them are ancient ones, spanning back to my “single-digit” days. And of these, most are happy or at least laughable or pleasant. Others are not so nice. The earliest ones are to the point of almost being someone else’s story. However, sometimes I wish that the ones from the 1970’s and 1980’s belonged to a different person. I will figure out how to handle these when I come to them. Right now, they aren’t even on the list. So if it appears there are large holes in my life’s story, you are correct. That being said, the last twenty plus years have been great. There are plenty of good memories and in many cases, I have done and accomplished things I never even dreamt of doing. But for now, I will stay with the early memories.

Denise and Cheryl, in first photo and Mom and Bonnie (back row) and Cheryl and Denise (front row) second photo

Since this is Easter weekend (April 20, 2014) maybe past Easters is a good place to start. We were raised Presbyterian while my father (Charles Paul Duncan) had converted from Roman Catholic when he married my mother (Helen Racy Duncan). Our Easters were a little of a mixture, at least when it came to food. We would have fish every Friday and on Good Friday would not eat from noon until 3:00 PM, the hours when Christ was nailed to the cross. Of course, we made up for it on Easter Sunday.

Easter observance started on Maundy Thursday. We would pronounce it Monday Thursday and then joke about not knowing which day of the week it was. Church service was mandatory in our family with the sermon of the Last Supper and the Garden of Gethsemane. We would partake of communion, one of the four times a year in our church, Swissvale Presbyterian (later United Presbyterian Church). The ushers passed around a plate of bread cubes, then a tray of mini-shot glasses of wine. I never knew whether the proper church etiquette was to eat the bread, then drink as soon as the tray passed by or hold both until we all did it at once. There didn’t seem to be any set way although the majority would wait until the minister finished talking, first about the bread and then about the wine.

Speaking of the bread and wine, I always wondered if it was real wine. I had serious doubts as it definitely tasted like Welsh’s grape juice. And the bread looked like stale, untoasted croutons, cut into cubes. Were these purchased at an official church store or did someone walk up to the A&P, buy so many bottles of juice and loaves of bread? Was the bread pre-cut? I assume it was as I never heard of the Ladies Auxiliary asking for volunteers. And who washed all of those little glasses? Unlike the Catholic church, the Presbyterian church did not have special requirements for the bread and wine.

Saturday was the usual cleaning the house for Sunday visitors. No “redding up” this time. Sunday was getting up early, rushing immediately downstairs to our Easter baskets. We each had a solid chocolate bunny, a smaller hollow bunny, a small candy egg, some hard boiled eggs we dyed the night before and jelly beans. I hated the black licorice ones. Fortunately, these were my father’s favorite so he got my sisters and my black jelly beans. My father would also buy my mother a larger nougat and fruit egg. This was her special treat although each of us was given a small slice.

And of course, there were the Easter outfits, which we wore to Sunday school and then church. Frilly, flocked dress in pastel colors, white hat, white gloves, white sweater jacket, trimmed ankle socks, new black shoes and a little purse to hold an embroidered handkerchief – this was the uniform of the day. I don’t remember wearing them any other time but we must have.

On Easter Sunday, we would go to my Grandma Duncan’s second floor apartment on Locust St, on the Bluff. My two aunts, Jeanne and Alice, lived there as well as did my Uncle Walt, until his marriage. My Grandfather Duncan also lived there but I have difficulty remembering him. Mostly I remember my grandparents’ bedroom, where he spent a lot of time. The door was usually closed but when I would look inside, it was dark and smelled horribly. My grandfather used chewing tobacco and the large spittoon sat right by the bedroom door. I had no desire to visit that room.

I don’t remember much of what we had for lunch, except ham and hard boiled eggs. My grandmother wasn’t a fancy cook, just the basics. I do know we never had anything with rice. As my grandmother told it, when she was in the hospital, having a baby, the woman who was hired to cook for my grandfather and their children made every dish with rice, lots of it. By the end of the seven days, which was how long some women stayed with their babies in the hospital, Grandpap was sick of rice and forbid my grandmother ever to cook rice again.

The rest of the day was spent watching television. Our favorites were the old movies from the 1930’s and the 1940’s. (It’ a real kick to watch these same movies on AMC.) And we read the comics – Prince Valiant, The Phantom, Lil’ Abner, Little Orphan Annie, and even Mary Worth. We didn’t get the Sunday papers and my Grandfather got both the Pittsburgh Post Gazette and the Pittsburgh Press.

The Monday after Easter was still a school holiday, same as Good Friday was. Many times I stayed overnight to spend time with my aunts and grandmother. These were great times, same as the weeks I would spend with them during the summers. I will definitely write more on those vacations later.