Glimpses Into the Past

Although most people are probably halfway done with their Christmas shopping by now,  I still have Easter candy lying around I'm still stuck in Thanksgiving mode and don't seem to be in any hurry to shift gears.

In fact, I'm stuck in reverse.

After spending two days preparing for Thanksgiving and another two days sleeping doing dishes and cleaning up, I didn't have time to read last Thursday's Gazette Journal until yesterday.

One of my favorite columns is Glimpses Into the Past:

100 Years Ago
Thursday, November 24, 1910
from the Mathews Journal
"Editorial:  In olden days our puritan forefathers were wont to regard Thanksgiving as almost a holy day.  They rested and feasted and returned humble and sincere thanks to God for his manifold blessings. 

We wonder if in this Twentieth Century, when progress is the motto; when accumulation of wealth is the only ambition; and when mechanisms and machinery, invented by the genius of man, have supplanted the old time methods of doing things, we appreciate and are sufficiently thankful for the many advantages and multiple blessings we enjoy.

It would seem that even in this age of turmoil the people could spare one day to return thanks as did their forebears in simple and earnest fashion.  Then Thanksgiving Day would be more than a mere holiday and the people would have, in a slight degree only, discharged the debt they owe to the Allwise Creative Power that has guarded their foot steps safely through the years and rendered it possible for them to enjoy the privileges of this enlightened age."

The references to the "mechanisms and machinery invented by the genius of man" make me wonder what the author might say to all the i-have-this and the  you-tube-that.

He'd probably say, along with my son, "Chesapeake Bay Woman, get with the program. Can you give us one good reason why you don't have an i-anything yet?"

Speaking for CBW, she'd say, "Fear of change.  I don't know."

Speaking of the clash between past and present--and we may have been, however briefly---this weekend I spent a lot of time dawdling lounging in front of the TV with my children.

One night, I forced them to watch the Wizard of Oz, after it dawned on me that they hadn't seen a non-3-D or computer-animated movie since ancient history in recent history.  So while I ooooed and aaahhed at the costumes and the music and the colors and the hooked noses and the flying monkeys, they pretended to watch while doing who knows what on their i-gadgets.

Whether they were paying close attention or not, they absorbed the most important parts of the lesson I was trying to teach which may not may loosely correlate to the spirit of that  past and present editorial above, as follows:

1. It's important to slow down.
2. Focus on what you have, not what you don't have.
3. Savor the small things.
4. Appreciate the past.
5. Marvel at the ingenuity and creativity of others.
6. Revel in the present without worrying so much about the fact that it's less than a month until Christmas and you've done absolutely, positively nothing except boil the carcass of your Thanksgiving turkey to make soup, which as we know has nothing to do with preparing for Christmas and everything to do with merely preparing last night's dinner.
7. Make a note to call an electrician so you can put up your artificial tree, since all the electrical sockets in the family room--except, thankfully, the one hooked up to the TV where you force your children to watch movies from the year 1939--are not working, and in order to have a properly functioning Christmas tree one theoretically needs a properly functioning electrical source for the lights.
8. And one wonders why one doesn't have an i-anything, when one can barely get electricity/current to her house.

My justification for avoiding the 21st century Christmas shopping or decorating over the extended weekend is now over.

The End.

p.s. Have a great week, and thanks for letting me gripe  ramble vent.

The Book

This is an early morning shot of the old school near Haven Beach and a prime example of a location that will be going in the book I'm supposed to be working on, Mathews County Then and Now. I'm taking the "Now" shots and must locate the "Then" shots to match.

I can take photos all day long, no problem. The problem lies in trying to locate all the "then" photos to go along with mine.

And that's not all.

There are very stringent technical requirements for the shots. Photocopies are no good. Scanned copies of originals are acceptable provided they are of a certain quality. Digital photos must be saved as TIFF files.

Did I mention I've never heard of a tiff unless you're talking about a spat, and we aren't?

Did I mention that I don't know how to use a scanner, much less ensure proper resolution, cropping, output or print size; color (what is grayscale?); descreening; etc.? I thought descreening was what my cats do to my windows. Who knew it was also a scanning term?

Also? If I want to copy files or photos or what not from the main drive on my computer to a CD? Doesn't work. Even Chesapeake Bay Son says so, so it's not just me. Therefore, I need a new computer, but there are only two problems: money and fear of change money. Never mind that I would have no idea what to get even if I had the money.

So, let' recap the challenges:

1. Locate 80 high-quality, vintage photos of typical Mathews scenes, such as schools, churches, the court house, wharves, estates, homes, etc. (Not easy.)

2. Take 80 high-quality photos to match the 80 older/vintage ones. (Daunting, but doable.)

3. Get (1) and (2) into the proper technical format. (Impossible for me. Does not compute.)

4. Research each location and write a blurb describing the major changes over the years for each pair of photos. (Not impossible, but not easy.)

5. Need a new computer.

6. Tilt! Help!

If anyone reading has access to old photographs or post cards of Mathews, and/or if anyone knows anything about what scanner or computer I need to complete this project, please let me know.

The ideal computer must not cost anything manipulate and save photos in TIFF format; multi-task; do the laundry; cook supper, and cut the lawn while ferrying children to and from school activities and the orthodontist that's an hour away.

The scanner must be able to produce images at a resolution of no less than 300 dots per inch and save as TIFFs. In spite of how it appears to me, the previous sentence was written in English and is not Lithuanian. What, pray tell, is resolution a TIFF?

You can e-mail me at ChesapeakeBayWoman@gmail.com (or my other e-mail if you have it) or leave a comment here. The main priority right now is in acquiring the photos and then scanning them. Oh, also in acquiring the proper technology. Plus learning how to use it. Then doing all the research. While parenting two children.

Help!

p.s. Since I already have a day job, I'll just plan on doing all this during the hours ordinarily set aside for sleeping, i.e. midnight to five a.m.

p.s. Part II This means that at some point in the near future, my blog is going to switch from daily postings to twice or three times a week. Or less. (Hold your applause.)

p.s. Part III Thanks for letting me whine vent.

Glimpses Into the Past

This week's Gazette Journal had a couple of entertaining entries in the Glimpses Into the Past section, which is always my favorite aside from the Best Value and Food Lion weekly flyers.

Here are some highlights:

Snow crab clusters are on sale for $4.99 per pound at Food Lion! This is cheaper than deli ham. Without MVP Card $6.99.

100 Years Ago
Thursday, July 7,1910
from the Mathews Journal
"The Rev. J.A. Winn of the East Mathews Methodist charge is not only a worker in in the 'Master's Vineyard,' he seems also to be a very good truck gardener. On the first day of July he was seen gathering his first dish of roasting corn ears, which puts him ahead of the majority of his neighbors."

Around here you cannot underestimate the competitive spirit of neighborhood corn growing, not to be confused with cornholing, which is practically an Olympic sport.

80 Years Ago
Thursday, July 3, 1930
from the Mathews Journal
"Lightning struck the home of Mr. W. L. Diggs near Diggs post office early this morning during a severe electrical storm and did considerable damage to the home. Paint was burned from the iron rails of the bed in which Mr. Diggs was sleeping as if by a blowtorch. Lightning played about his room but beyond being slightly dazed he was unhurt."

Doesn't it just ruin your day when lightning plays about in your room? The last time it played in mine, my internet was down for five days.

1 Day Ago
Monday, July 12, 2010
from the Mouth of CBW upon arriving home from a long, long day at the paying job

"Why is there a carrot in the bottom of the dishwasher, and even more importantly, why is it floating in an inch of standing water when I haven't even used the dishwasher in a month lately?

Oh well, I suppose it matches the one inch of standing water in the broken down hot tub, which sadly will not be working for Blog Fest. I can buy some baby pools if that would help assuage the disappointment.

Food Lion also has bags of shrimp on sale, buy one get one free. You can't beat the price. Not with a stick.

The Gazette Journal is such a treat; there are nuggets of information all throughout. If only I had time to share some of the other highlights, which include the fact that an independent filmmaker has moved to town....can you say Blog Fest movie?

Have you read anything interesting in your paper lately?

Speed Limit

These photos were taken from my car near Moon. Not near the moon, but near Moon. Downtown Moon consists of an old--very photogenic--post office (no longer used as a post office); a cemetery; some winding roads and trees. That description pretty much applies to most of inland Mathews County.

For possibly the first time ever, today's photos actually have some relationship to the post. It's a novel concept, one which very rarely occurs to me.

In the Glimpses Into the Past section of this week's Gazette Journal, there was this:

90 Years Ago
from the Mathews Journal

"The law relating to automobiles takes up a whole chapter of the State Code and is of course too lengthy to be printed here. However, here are some of the things it provides which are pertinent. A speed of not more than 10 miles an hour is prescribed when rounding curves, at the intersection of cross roads, in any village, or on any road where there is a collection of horses or persons. In passing a vehicle a machine should go to the left and not over 10 miles an hour in passing. When none of the above conditions exists, a speed of 20 miles an hour is permissible. Drivers of machines are also required to slow up when meeting vehicles and to stop when signaled to do so."

This was obviously around the time the automobile was introduced to the county, yet horse and buggies were still very much in use. Most interesting to me is that 10 mph speed limit at "the intersection of cross roads"--meaning there was no requirement to stop. You could make a turn left or right as long as nothing was coming and you lowered your speed to 10 mph. (Chances were very good that nothing was coming.)

Not that long ago, back when Jamestown was founded I was a kid, there were several major intersections that did not require a stop.

(This applied to almost any intersection east and south of the Court House. In nearby Gloucester at Flat Iron, home of my great-grandfather and his blacksmith shop, there was only a yield sign leaving what is now referred to as the Taliaferro Wayside. If you were leaving Ware Neck heading to Mathews, when you hit Route 14 you hardly had to look left and you certainly didn't have to stop. This is a topic for another time, because my mother can describe that intersection from the horse and buggy days, and it was very different.)

There were also intersections where stopping was optional even though a stop sign stood proudly. When there's nothing coming for 15 days minutes, there really is no need.

All this is leading up to a point, which is bound to make itself apparent here soon.

Mathews County has no stop lights other than the obvious red light when the Gwynns Island bridge is open. Ninety years ago, there was no requirement to stop at intersections and crossroads; you could take them at 10 miles per hour. Now, there are stop signs and for the most part people are asked to have to stop.

What will these intersections be like 90 years from now? Will there be stoplights?

Nah.

Although we could seriously use one at the Route 3/198/Get-n-Zip intersection.

My two one local reader: If you could put up a stoplight in the county, where would you put it? Or do you not want one anywhere (which is fine)?

My other three two readers: Do you know a place with no stop lights?