Recently, Sheryl Julian, one of the Food Section Opinion writers of the Boston Globe, wrote a whole lengthy piece about her 6-burner gas stove, which died after 25 years, and, by her count, countless, like 1000, chicken dinners.
I read it with great interest because among other facts, Sheryl writes in an amusing way.
However, by the end of it I was thinking, this girl has nothing on me. 😉
Let me explain. Not in the way of cooking or writing. But in the way of our literally 51-year old Whirlpool Washing Machine.
Where do I begin?
Long ago, in November of 1972 to be exact, (OK, go ahead and calculate our ages!), we were expecting our first born.
This was back in the day when Neanderthals like us were using wash-and-reuse cloth diapers. Pampers disposables were just arriving onto the market with much fanfare, but me being me, won’t think of using disposable. 🤦♂️
So for a newborn baby, we need a washing machine to wash the diapers, right?
So we went to Lechmere (Does anyone remember that store name?) in Somerville MA, and purchased a Whirlpool, the brand to be had in those days, you guessed it, in Avocado Green.
Now the Millennials are wondering, what is that?
But even as the magnificent instrument washed diapers of our three girls, by the time our third and the youngest was born, nobody was using cloth diapers, NO ONE except me, of course. 😊
The green Whirlpool has since made the trek from Huntington Avenue, Boston to,
Main Street, Watertown to,
Milner Street, Waltham to,
Pelham Island Road Sudbury, where a couple of weeks ago, it met with an untimely but peaceful passing.
These 50 and a half years were not uneventful, however.
At some point, I believe about ten years ago, it had some problem, don’t ask me what it was, I think it was not pumping out water or something minor (!) like it.
And I called my most reliable repairman, my husband.
Now you have not met a Mechanical Engineer until you have met my husband. I mean, don’t even think of arguing with me on that one. 😉
Our out-of-town girls (and the boys, too, I must say) have a ‘list’ all ready whenever we visit, ‘Appi, can you fix this, can you look at what’s going on with this thing’?
Of course, this guy who loves to tinker, is all over it right away. Henry Ford has nothing on him.
Anyway, back to the story. Where it was not pumping water.
He examined it for a whole while and figured out the problem, but in order to fix it, he needs to reach the innards where no human has ever been, and no easy way to accomplish this, and an outside repairman was out of the question, so he promptly proceeded to cut the outer metal of this 40-year old contraption weighing at least a ton using a saw 🤦♂️, and reached the part that was the source of the problem and voila! It was ‘fixed’.
Now you know about me and tech, so I’m not going to elaborate on what he did lying on his back, toiling, while I was joyfully reading the Boston Globe crouched on our leather couch.
As a natural course of events, in spite of his best attempts and our care, recently something happened, and there was no life support available this time. None. The End.
We bid adieus and the machine was hauled away by some nice guys.
I’m attaching some pictures for your pleasure, as well as to prove to you I’m not making this up. You couldn’t even if you tried. 😊
The men who took it away, as well as the salesperson at Home Depot, who weren’t even born when this instrument was manufactured, told us without any equivocation, ‘they don’t make them like they used to’.
Of course we know this. Sad state of American manufacturing. Not only, ‘don’t make them like they used to’, they just don’t manufacture in America, period.
The Rust Belt that used to be Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan is just that, not the Rust Belt. The Rust Belt has rusted out. 😢
Happy Summer Solstice, everyone…
mercy's musings 