By Jan Mills
I have a fig tree in my backyard, and this year it’s had a bumper crop.
My granddaughter, Meagan, and I have picked figs when it was so hot neither of us could breathe and have picked them in the rain when both of us looked like drowned rats. She, of course, was very excited (define excited) to do this and climbed up the step stool to get those in the top of the tree. The netting that Sean and I put over it early in the summer worked, as no birds are getting through and, thus far, no wasps.
We are taking these figs to the farmers market each Tuesday and Saturday in Rocky Mount and have had great success — but I’m getting really tired of figs.
I told Meagan the other day that I know why Adam and Eve chose leaves from the fig tree to cover themselves in the Garden of Eden. These leaves are huge.
The gentleman in the vendor spot next to me is quite a character. I mentioned the fact that we put our figs in an enamel wash pan when we picked them and that began a very interesting conversation about the use of wash pans years ago. There was a wash pan for bathing, a dish pan for washing dishes and a large oval pan used when washing delicate clothes at our house.
If a hole came in either of them, Daddy bought a small metal pin (can’t remember what it was called) to plug the pan to be used for many more years. Cooking pots were repaired in the same manner. Mama cooked some of the best collards and cabbage in an old metal pot. How on earth we ever survived all those unhealthy cooking methods is beyond me!
There were old pans used to wash our hands outside when we came up from the tobacco field or barn. The soap was homemade box lye, and even that didn’t take the gum stain off. Only green tomatoes did that.
Gummy tobacco clothes were soaked in the wash pot before they were put in the wringer machine to be washed. We used two pans to wash our hair — one to wash and another to rinse. After all that and toweling it dry as best I could, I remember using shoebox lids to try to speed up the drying process and then using bobby pins to roll it.
When folks talk about the good old days, I find myself wondering if we lived during the same time period.
Jan Mills is The Enterprise’s customer service representative. Reach her at 252-478-3651 and jmills.enterprise@wilsontimes.com.
The Link LonkAugust 19, 2020 at 10:00AM
https://www.springhopeenterprise.com/stories/pots-used-for-cooking-bathing-and-laundry,214824
Pots used for cooking, bathing and laundry - Spring Hope Enterprise
https://news.google.com/search?q=Laundry&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
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