Tomato Soup Days

It's one of those rainy Saturdays. The stormy downfall has streaked the windows, leaving snaky rivulets running through a dirty film left by previous hot afternoons. The sky’s overcast, a dingy gray like spent, soiled mop water. It is indeed a dark and stormy day today. No, this isn’t the beginning of some poor hack novel, just the reawakening of a memory of youth. It’s a memory that comes to life every time I’m stuck inside, cleaning and doing menial things, when the weather is cold and wet and uninviting. Something about these dreary circumstances stirs up scenes of childhood, living in our old house on West 13th Street. There were many such days, when I was young, spent doing the same kind of cleaning with my brothers and sister. And, there were many such pails of mop water in those days, in a galvanized bucket I used whenever I scrubbed the back porch. I did that weekly as a kid, in our old home. And, too, there is a familiar, nostalgic whisper of disinfectant and ammonia trapped in the air as I write this. These are also reminiscent, of rainy days of youth spent in anxious labors, anticipating rewards to follow.1


Memories of those rainy days are as strong now as if they’d happened last week. A kid of twelve then, living in a time of transition, between being an adolescent and realizing that I would be a teenager some day soon, I was just beginning to discover there was more to the world than school, homework, and my paper route. Still, on dark, rainy days, for a short while, it seemed all the world was encapsulated in an old, used black and white television set purchased at Goodwill. 2

After breakfast and breakfast dishes, bedroom cleaning, or helping dad clean the basement, it was hot chocolate and popcorn for everyone in front of that television set. Those days were filled with superheroes and Seasick Sea serpents Sky King, My Friend Flicka, Alvin and the Chipmunks, and Rin Tin Tin. Those were tomato soup days, because lunch was tomato soup in cups, with toasted cheese sandwiches and losing oneself in fantasy. Things like those made dull hours trapped inside acceptable and enjoyable. Those afternoons we would spread out on the linoleum floor with color crayons and newsprint liberated from the mailroom of the Columbian, Vancouver's local newspaper by my mom. Mom worked part time there, inserter, (the folks who put the advertising supliments in before they had machines to do that) We’d create all manner of childhood art on that scrap paper, and forget that we couldn’t be out riding bicycles and running with our dog at the river. 3

Rainy Saturdays were custom made for fantasy, which took the place of freedom to roam, when only in the mind could one wander. I would sneak up to the attic and pretend I was on a pirate vessel, or down to the basement, imagining myself a soldier in a bombed out cellar, fighting off the advancing enemy. I could lose myself in a book, traveling to far away places, or into outer space. I could relive times of the middle ages, or the old west, or visit imaginary lands that existed only in fairy tales and dreams. On rainy tomato soup days I made a lot of my first attempts at stories and poetry. They were frivolous, childish things that we dismiss when we are so wise and adult. But, then, those things were very meaningful.4

Those rainy days become family nights, with everyone scattered about the living room, in front of the same old television. The deep well cooker, built into the stovetop of moms white, porcelain finish, Westinghouse oven, would have prepared stew or chili to be served up in plastic soup bowls and eaten in a trance before the flickering cathode tube. Countless hours of fascination paraded past on that screen on those family nights. Science Fiction Theatre, One Step Beyond, Twilight Zone, and my dad’s favorite westerns were always ready to ensnare and entertain. Chuck Conners was the Rifleman, with his trusty repeater rifle. Wagon Train, Death Valley Days, Maverick and Rawhide unfolded in the grandest tradition of old west chivalry. And on Bonanza, at home on the Ponderosa, paw and the boys always had things well under control. Lassie and Timmy were always getting lost and the good guys always won on Combat and Twelve O’clock High. Rainy days like those brought the family together in a way I think many from my generation can relate to. 5

I miss such days of childhood all the more for the fact that my imagination has dimmed and escape is much more elusive in these poor substitutes of today. The spontaneity we all seem to lose, when we are forced to take on the responsibilities of maturity seems so unfair. And I rather think, at times, I might stay immature and irresponsible if it meant I could toss it all aside for another bout of cartoons, classic comedy and care free hours disconnected from the burdens of the world. To be lost in such fantasies in some eternal rainy, Tomato soup, Saturday. And, if that were a possibility, would that be so horrible? 6