All posts by Dona

Found Items: 2. The Nite Owl

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For the last decade or so of my father’s life his bedroom was his sanctuary. He spent more time in his room than out of it — and not always asleep. I once asked him what he did when he went to bed at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. He said he usually lay in bed thinking.

Dad’s room was pretty much off-limits to anyone not invited in, but the stench of unwashed old-age was enough to not want to be invited in. Occasionally my dad would ask me into his room to look, for the umpteenth time, at the photograph of the navy ship he’d spent 4 years on or to look at something he’d found among his trinkets. I was never very curious about what was in his room — I couldn’t imagine there was anything of interest I’d not seen many times before.

I couldn’t have been more wrong as I found out after my father’s death in October. I found his father’s wallet, still with the cards and photographs he carried while alive. I found his wedding ring that my mother thought was lost. I also found a ziplock bag of things that belonged to my Uncle Don, my father’s brother-in-law and best friend until Don’s death in 1963.

Some of the things in the bag are bizarre — a hat with a tassel and matching purple satin sash from some honorary Moose Lodge event. Some are historical — correspondence between my Uncle Don and the War Department in 1945. Some possibly valuable — an unopened pack of Milwaukee Road playing cards.

My favorite of the trinkets, however, is the plastic box of key-chains. When I opened the box, the top key-chain was one I recalled from my childhood. Probably not the same key-chain, but I had one just like it.

It is a red and white plastic key-chain shaped like an owl. The red part (the body of the owl) separates from the white part (the eyes and tail) to make two key-chains. The white part also glows in the dark. I think the reason for the two parts is because two keys used to be required for the ignition and trunk, so this way you could keep your car running and get something out of the trunk. The back of the key-chain advertises a store called “Rorry’s: Apparel for women who care”. I vaguely remember Rorry’s — I wonder if there was one in Elgin.

Nite Owl Key-chain
Nite Owl Key-chain Rorry's Apparel for Women who Care
Nite Owl Key-chain package
Nite Owl Key-chain

Clare loves owls so, for Christmas, I parted with the Nite Owl key-chain and placed it in her stocking. I feel good that a memory of mine is now a concrete object for her.

Found Items: 1. Grandma Patrick’s record of Baptism

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My mom’s house is a treasure-trove of interesting things. She has stacks, drawers, closets, kneewalls and rooms filled with stuff. Photos, letters, trinkets, newspaper clippings, reel-to-reel videos, and cassette tapes are a few of the items waiting to be discovered in my mom’s house. Some people may consider her a hoarder. I think she’s a keeper of family history.

One of the items I found in a pile of old photographs at my mom’s house was the record of my paternal grandmother’s baptism. She was born in Denmark, so the text is in Danish. The paper is yellowed and old and the spidery handwriting is hard to read. I posted a scan of the baptism record on Facebook with a plea for help deciphering it. Barbara, a long-time friend, suggested that her daughter, whose next door neighbor is from Denmark, might be able to help so I sent Teri an email and attached the scan of the document.

Grandma Patrick's Record of Baptism
Grandma Patrick’s Record of Baptism

After several emails back and forth it was determined that it reads something like this:

Emilie Margrethe Marie Nielsen
Daughter of [kroferpayter] Kristian Nielsen and wife Ane Marie Sorensen(?)
from the city of Rold in the parish of Hindsted in the district of Aalborghus

Born 8 June 1895
baptized in a church 14 July same year

Recorded 13 Dec 1897

I still don’t know what the word or words are just before my great grandfather’s name is. He was an innkeeper and according to Teri’s neighbor kro means tavern or beer establishment. Perhaps the word has something to do with that because it begins with kro.

Here is a photo of the building where my grandmother was born. I’d always thought she’d meant this was the city where she was born — but apparently she was born in the building — which was (and still might be) an inn.

The Story of the Kissing Clauses

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One Christmastime, long, long ago there lived a schoolteacher. The schoolteacher had many students and these students came from many backgrounds. Many of the students gave small gifts to the schoolteacher as tokens of the holiday season. Some of the gifts the students gave the schoolteacher were handmade by parents. Some were bought at the dollar store. Some were purchased at department stores. Sometimes the parents spent too much on the gift for the schoolteacher. Sometimes they regifted something they’d been given. If the schoolteacher thought about the gifts years later, she would probably remember most of them and who she got them from. The school teacher may even keep some of the gifts she received from her students for many, many years.  Some because they are genuinely useful. Others because she has fond memories of the student who gave them to her. And then there are the gifts from students whose parents were sort of celebrities at one time.

The Kissing Clauses was such a gift. It was a set of salt and pepper shakers shaped like Mr and Mrs Claus. They were both slightly bent at the waist, lips all a-pucker, ready to kiss each other. Not really exceptional — the family most certainly did not spend too much on the schoolteacher, but it probably was not bought at the dollar store and probably was not regifted. It was an average teacher gift from a sweet 6th grade girl. A sweet 6th grade girl whose father was an attorney in one of the most public court cases of the year — Bill Clinton vs Paula Jones. He was on Paula Jones’ side.

One recent night when the [former] schoolteacher put up her Christmas decorations she could not find the Kissing Clauses. The schoolteacher could not imagine a Christmas with out the Kissing Clauses so she looked one last time and found, behind the doll house in the knee-wall of the attic, a box of more decorations. Breath held, fingers crossed, she opened the box and there, wrapped in tissue so they would not break, were the Kissing Clauses. Once again, all was right in the world.

Merry Christmas to my blogging friends. Kiss someone you love this season.

The Kissing Clauses