Curtis and Bonnie
Miss Cindy has been talking about her family a lot over the last several days. The only one I met was her mother Bonnie and I didn’t get to see her more than a few times.
Bonnie was born in 1914. For a while she worked as a typist for Champion International Paper Company in Canton, NC.
I’ve never asked Miss Cindy but I would guess that’s where she met Miss Cindy’s father Curtis since he worked for Champion too.
After Bonnie had children she was a stay at home mom but in later years she worked at the YMCA in Canton as a lifeguard. I’ve heard stories about how she taught half of Canton to swim over the years. She worked at the Y until she was 76 years old. That’s how old Miss Cindy is now.
Over the years Miss Cindy has shared stories of Bonnie’s waste not want not way of living.
The YMCA supplied soap, in the form of little brown bars, for the patrons to use. Most folks showered and left the soap laying in the stall only having been used one time. Bonnie collected it instead of throwing it away.
She put the bars in a plastic mesh bag that oranges came in. She used it to wash clothes and dishes holding the bag under running water. She just couldn’t bear throwing the perfectly good soap in the garbage day after day.
Bonnie felt the same way about the clothing and towels folks left at the YMCA. The Y’s policy was to keep the items a few weeks to see if anyone came back for them, if no one did the items were thrown away, but not on Bonnie’s watch.
Once Bonnie discovered the unclaimed items were being put in the garbage she started taking the items home to see if anyone she knew could use them and if they couldn’t she sent them to the local Salvation Army.
Bonnie passed along the waste not want not attitude to Miss Cindy. I’ve seen her be very saving with things over the years and just like Bonnie if it’s something no one she knows can use she makes sure to donate it to someone who can use it.
Granny and Pap raised my brothers and I not to be wasteful too. I know Steve, Paul, and I all have a strong sense of waste not want not and I’m glad we do.
Last night’s video: Look Around the Spring Garden With Me & A Few Updates.
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The story about the soap made me smile. My grandma would save scraps of bar soap until she had enough to melt down with some water, making a kind of soft soap. She would use that for hand washing and dish washing. I loved washing with it too.
My parents were products of the Depression, so I grew up learning how to be thrifty and I still am. Wastefulness bothers me when there are so many folks in need.
A very beautiful and handsome couple. We were raised not to waste. I know I do some now but I try not because i always thinking, I know there’s someone out there who could use it or want it. Rather it be clothes or food.
Hi Tipper: Your videos are always an inspiration, as are the Pressley girls videos. Prayers to Miss Cindy and her family. I was also raised by parents who didn’t waste anything. Reused aluminum foil if it was still good, reused tinsel on the Christmas tree, reused wrapping paper, etc. I am so glad for having been raised that way. One other thing, I will always pick up pennys or change if I find some laying in my path no matter where I may find it. Waste Not, want not!! Have ordered your cookbook and can’t wait to get it!
I grew up hearing, “Waste not, want not” and my mom lived and taught it to us. I think I am the only one of her five children, she taught this to that actually continues practicing the old saying. My oldest brother did while he was living, but the other three have somehow falling away from this practice. I tried to teach it to my daughter, but just like my siblings when she grew up and got married she seems to have forgotten the importance of not wasting anything. I still repurpose, recycle or donate. Things are much to costly not to practice this wise saying. I think society as a whole has fallen into the disposable life. No longer do you hear people say, “If it’s broke, fix it”, “find another place to put it”, or “If you don’t want or need it, give it to someone else who does”. Now days it’s “if it’s broken, don’t want it or don’t need it, then trash it”. I think people now days just have to much to appreciate what they have been given. I’m not saying everyone is that way, but sadly more than it use to be or should be. What’s even sadder, it’s people of all ages, not just the younger generations.
My mother worked as a maid and launderess at Nantahala Village for a good while. When she cleaned a room or a cabin she had to remove the old soap and replace it with fresh whether it had been used or not. Most of the guests there were rich so, of course, brought their own toiletries.
It was the same little bars only the soap was white. Like Miss Bonnie, rather that throw it all away she brought it home and used the used bars to wash clothes and the wrapped bars to wash dirty little kids. If we ran out of wrapped bars she would wash one of the used little bars before she let us use it. Seems kinda funny don’t it? Washing a bar of soap.
She also brought home, still wrapped little mints meant for the guests but left uneaten. Company policy kept us in sweets for a good while too but they never lasted near as long as the soap.
I think the Deer Hunter looks a lot like his grandfather, Curtis. And prayers and good wishes for Miss Cindy.
I sat down last Sunday afternoon and read your whole cookbook. I especially love the stories about the recipes and both of your families. Good job!
Good advice and something I need to work on. I have a bad habit of buying more than we need and then stuff ends up going bad before we can use it. I guess it all stems from growing up with a daddy who did outdoor work that depended on the weather, and now my husband also does outdoor work so you never know when work days will be missed and payday will be slim. I know doing without or making due can be done, I’ve done it many times, but I just don’t care to have to do it if it can be avoided. Gotta find a good in between and have enough but not too much.
Loved the picture of Miss Cindy’s parents. My mother actually had a pair of shoes just like Miss Bonnie. She had kept them in her closet and one day I was helping her, I found the shoes and she told me she got married in them! She and my daddy and another couple went off and got married and they were the shoes she wore. I also was raised to waste not, want not. Husband was raised the same way. Matter of fact, our son needed something the other day and said he knew daddy had it because he didn’t throw away anything and sure enough, he did. Saved him a few dollars too. Tipper, I enjoyed the video last night. The garden, the pretty flowers, all look so lovely. Continued prayers for Miss Cindy and all of you.
A wonderful remembrance. I was taught waste not want not. Both my parents were older and lived through the Depression. Mum saved all our bits of soap and melted them down to put in her floor washing bucket. I have 2 one pound coffee cans of soap bits sitting in my cleaning closet, waiting to be used. I learned nose to tail eating long before it was the “in” thing. Dad made head cheese, pickled tongue and pickled pig’s feet. Unfortunately for me he made the headcheese from memory and never wrote down the recipe so I’ve had to look in a lot of cookbooks and online to get a recipe that sounds similar to his. I’m passing along what I know to the younger generation of cousins and at least one of them has been saving the recipes I post links to on Facebook. I was fortunate to have a “2nd Mum” who taught me to cook “awful offal” as she called it, so I know how to clean a tripe fresh from the cow and then cook it up
I will continue to strive to make my garden as beautiful as your. I can’t imagine how hard it was for you to get your soil as plentiful as it is. Because of all the red clay and rocks in upstate Georgia it was a bugger to make it useable. This soil here in upstate Florida is easier to work with and I am trying to grow. This is really the first time, in earnest, I am trying mostly veggies. Prayers for you guys and Miss Cindy. I am sure it is rough on Matt..one only has one Mother. God Bless
I reread my comment and I think it would have been better fo me to have wrote “we don’t know what it is like to not have money for our necessities and even have some for our wants”. We think nothing of running to the store to buy whatever it is we need.
I took swimming lessons at the Canton YMCA in the late 80s. I bet Bonnie taught me how to swim! Beautiful story. Reminds me of Mamaw and Papaw.
Mamaw and Papaw were very conscientious about wasting things. There were still medicines in their bathroom from the 50s & 60s when I was a kid. Mamaw wouldn’t toss anything until she’d used the very last drop.
My parents, grandparents and on down to me were raised to waste not and it is the same even today I find it very hard to throw away items. Tipper, your flowers looked so beautiful!!
I checked Etsy going to order your cookbook but it is sold out and that is great for you. When you tell us they have it back in stock, I will place an order that way I can get one signed by you.
Holding Ms Cindy and you all in my prayers.
My grandparents also were careful about not wasting. They were born in 1898 & 1901. I remember at Christmas with them, we saved the wrapping paper, bows & tinsel. the wrapping paper was very carefully removed from the package & neatly folded. Grandpa always had jars & cans of screws, bolts, nails & washers he saved. he also saved old wooden fruit boxes from the grocery stores & made book shelves & foot stools.
I’ll be praying for Ms. Cindy and all the family. It’s a hard row to hoe, but God is with you all. In good times and bad times, GOD will never leave us nor forsake us.
Continued prayers for Miss Cindy and ALL family members.
Waste not want not is a great attitude to have especially in today’s economy and I admire Bonnie passing that trait to Miss Cindy. I’m a year older than Miss Cindy and I relate to her so much in her lifestyle.
Looking forward to meeting you on the 27th. God bless and have a wonderful day.
Being raised by Depression-era parents and grandparents, and living through WW II rationing and commodity shortages, I came by frugality quite naturally. The slogan then, and even now to some extent, was “Use it up, wear it out; make it do or do without.” That isn’t bad advice for any generation.
Gene Smith, exactly what I was going to say and the way I grew up wearing hand-me-downs, hardly ever had anything new. Great advice and timely
even for today’s generation which has never known real need or want.
What a lovely young couple were Miss Cindy’s parents! And wonderful that Bonnie had that ‘waste not…’ attitude I respect so much.
Miss Cindy has a lot to be glad to reminisce about ❤️. Her comments have been so good over the years. Wishing her all the best in her recent difficulties‼️
That’s such a good photo of Miss Cindy’s parents!
Bonnie and Curtis were certainly very good looking (if not downright sexy) people so that explains where Miss Cindy and her descendants get their pretty features! If you’re living and making it these days, you have to be scrimping and pinching pennies to simply get by. Speaking of which, the boy I raised (hes 25) went to Louis Vuitton (in Charlotte’s big mall for high ballers) and got himself a bright yellow 1,000$ wallet! I advised him not to do it and to spend that money on something he needed. But he didn’t listen. I think he’s a big dummy, but I’m keeping my educated opinion to myself. People sure are gullible if not downright ignorant of the situation which ain’t too good right now. I freak out over a 100$ purse…. I Planted squash, cucumbers and hollyhocks yesterday. Everybody looks good this morning! Lol
my father was the same. I remember taking the tinsil off the Christmas tree to save for the following year. when I was old enough I bought new for the tree. however while not to the same extent, I find myself saving and/or reusing as much as possible
Amen. Waste aggravates me. I think an old time Appalachian attitude was that if it was not sin it was at least ungodly and being wasteful was a character flaw, like the Prodigal Son. A subsistence farm life way underlines that with heavy black strokes. Almost everything can be re-used and in doing so often saves work. An example is the brush fence using living saplings you posted about. Brush was not trash but a resource and served a need. And if it had to be cut anyway, figure on a re-use that will save labor and time. It wasn’t being “tight”. It was conserving daylight and energy to be used in other pressing needs, of which there was no end. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it! End of commercial and off my soapbox. PS: there may well be a lot of people having to relearn ” waste not want not” soon.
My outlook about things is similar to yours. I hang on to everything. My last 3 push lawn mowers were picked up at trash dump, one only needed a ten cent bolt in the handle. This was back before they stopped letting people pick things. One of the attendants I am friends with will now tell me “I can’t say anything if I don’t see you pick it up and then turn his head or walk off”. Today’s comments make me think of the old post about the Deer Hunter and his chocker cable.
A good practice! We don’t have a convenient recycling center so we collect the vegetable cans we use and a couple of times a year take them to scrapyard and sell them by weight. We wash them after use to keep the bugs away. We have enough to eat out to make it fun and do our little part to reduce landfill waste. My mother grew up in the depression so she knew all about not wasting. Thanks, Richard
I’ve always thought it was just a shame that good stuff is so easily discarded these days. Most young people have no sense of needing something. So, I tend to keep a lot of stuff that I don’t really need at the moment, but I figure sooner or later I might or someone I know might ask if I had it. I think a man needs a lot of stuff he’ll never use. Because you just never know when it might come in handy. My philosophy is “If you need it. I got it. If I ain’t got it, it ain’t worth having”.
I think the a lot of the ones in the younger generations of today have never had to work for anything or do without. Everything they ever wanted was given to them, just go by a high school and look at the new cars and trucks in the parking lot. In my day, the ones that drove cars had cars that were only a few miles away from being in the junkyard. A few had newer cars, the ones that had them, worked a full 40 hour a week job in a local cotton mill either on the second or third shift and still went to school. I drove a faded yellow 60 passenger Chevrolet bus my last two years of school making $1.65 an hour for 3 hours a day. I bought all of my clothes and everything I needed in my senior year with the little bit of money I made. I was not asked to do this, but felt like I owed it to my parents for providing for me when I too young to help them out with money.
I agree. As a retired teacher, I saw so many students with nicer things than what I had, and they all seemed to have iPhones. A student asked me if I had an iPhone, and I said I couldn’t afford one.
There’s a little dittie I’ve heard forever:
Use it up
Wear it out
Make it do
Or do without
I agree with all y’all! Too many hard times in life to be wasteful!
Have a beautiful day! It’s finally sunny and warm today! Praise the Lord!
Good morning friends of Appalachia, God bless you God bless your family in Jesus name God bless Ms Cindy, God bless Tipper and her family, praise God for another day Hallelujah Hallelujah!!!
In East Texas we said, “Willful waste makes woeful want.”
My family was thrifty and non-wasteful too. Everyone we know and knew in Appalachia was “green” in recycling and reusing. It’s the ultimate and most reliable investment of our money and our time.
I too was raised to waste not, want not. I save a lot of things others would throw away. Even though I am not suppose to pick things up, I often pick up items thrown away by others at the county landfill. I see so much good, useful things being thrown away. Somewhere down the line, I will have a use for them. Look back at the time Bonnie was born, she lived through the Great Depression, the shortages during WWII and times when there was not much money. My grandaddy born in 1888 would even save old, often bent nails to reuse. I have watched him straighten these nails out on rainy days when he couldn’t be outside doing other things. He had a 5gal bucket full of these nails. He raised a family of 7 farming 40 acres of land during these times I mentioned. I think most of us are spoiled now, we truly don’t know what it is to not have plenty of just the necessities much less our wants. I continue to pray for Miss Cindy and her family of loved ones.