Beach-House Life

From letter dated November 2, 1959

Since Bucher got home from St. Cloud, we have been making up for lost time in being together as a family. We have had our weekly picnics in Alex’s boat; Bucher has taken Alex fishing after school several afternoons; we have had our late afternoon swims together as we always enjoy; and we have done a lot of work around the house and yard all together. It has been marvelous.

It now looks as if we can stay on in this house until into next year so we are going to do it. The house sold last spring and, at first, the new owner thought he would want possession no later than the first of January. Now he has said that he would like us to stay on with 60- to 90-days’ notice, so we are jumping at the chance.

This house is small and inconvenient in some ways, but we are used to the inconveniences. We repainted the entire inside last spring, made new curtains, bedspreads, etc., and have it looking quite pleasant. It is still a rough little cottage, but the location on the beach is ideal and we love it.

We really didn’t want to buy a house just now. To begin with, we don’t have any furniture since we sold ours with the screen-cage house, and that would be a big investment. Then, we couldn’t afford the kind of house we really want. Since we are just now getting into the clear after all those years of trying to make good our Belize investment, we would much rather rock along a little while longer in this low-rent house instead of saddling ourselves with a mortgage, furniture, taxes, insurance, repair bills, and all the other expenses that are part of buying a house.

One of the best features of this house is a converted garage that we have used as combined storage and playhouse. Through the months, it has gotten to be more of a junk room, so last week we got busy fixing it up again. Bucher and Alex fixed Alex’s train table so that it could be pulled up against the wall when Alex wasn’t using it. I went through all our stuff, making up a big box for the Goodwill Industries, getting rid of torn-up or outgrown toys and clothes, repacked things, and organized so that I could get at things I occasionally want.  I got most of the mess tucked away neatly in the big cupboards at the end of the room.

I find that, as the children have grown, their toy needs have diminished. The kinds of things they now like tend to be games and gear of the sort that can be kept neatly in their rooms…not the big miscellany little children use.

We now have the playhouse fixed up with my two large trunks in corners where I can get into them if I need to, two children’s card tables with chairs set up for the children to work or play at, a cot that is all right for lounging or even for Alex to sleep on if we have overnight company, a rack to keep Alex’s motor on, and a chair and lamp that won’t fit in the main house and that look nice out there. It is not gorgeous, but it is neat and pleasant…and it represents an enormous amount of long-overdue work.

Friday we added one more thing to the playhouse…a gleaming new Kenmore washing machine. I couldn’t be more thrilled. My old washer and dryer were sold with our house, of course, since we couldn’t have used them in Belize. We haven’t been able to buy one since we got back. We wouldn’t have bought this one now except that, when I took my clothes to the laundromat on Thursday, they told me that they were closing up until January. That really finished me. I came back, told Bucher, and we agreed that somehow we’d install one in the playhouse.

I had already decided on a Kenmore but, to my amazement, they were running a special sale of the new 1960 model. So, I got exactly what I wanted at a lower price. It is divine, with special settings for all sorts of fabrics, including wash-and-wear and even my delicate nylon lingerie.

Installing it wasn’t as hard as we had thought. We found hot and cold pipes outside the play house and were able to attach hose connections to them quite easily. Bucher laid a twenty-five foot drain field for the waste water. That was a hard job and showed him he had muscles he had forgotten, but he enjoys physical exercise and had the time to do it.

This house has a tiny hot-water heater, so actually the machine never has water as hot as it should; however, our clothes were washed in cold water for three years in Belize and were cleaner than they ever have been before or since. So, I guess that for a temporary installation this will do quite nicely. Besides, I can always heat a bucket of water on the stove to add to the machine if I particularly want hot water for it.

I’ve been washing constantly since the machine was installed, as if it were a new toy. And Saturday afternoon when I wasn’t looking, Bucher even put a load in just so that he could play with it.

Our weather has been perfectly divine this fall. We still are swimming every day; we all got sunburned on the beach yesterday noon. We have found, just within the past week or so, that it really isn’t pleasant to swim late in the afternoon anymore. I hate to think that this warm weather will have to end before long. Maybe we’ll have a mild winter. I hope so.

The children are happy in school. Alex has been bringing his grades up some. He has an extremely high I.Q. and his achievement tests put him on the average of one to three years ahead of himself in various fields. But he doesn’t do daily work quite in line with his capabilities and his behavior is a whole lot more like a normal little boy who doesn’t take kindly to long hours of school than like a quiet studious type! Bucher takes the blame…he says that he never behaved in school for a day in his life! However, Alex is happy and is learning, and I’m not going to fuss too much. Carli does excellent work and while she is slow and methodical, sometimes to her own disadvantage, her grades are fine and she behaves perfectly.