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Everybody’s Danish – Chapter “Love & the Herring Barrel!”
By fred | February 10, 2009
The next chapter may be a jump ahead related to my age in our family tales, remember this book is not complete, not by a long shot, if I was writing it for the public where it was to be sold, I would have to set up a better time frame, not just write chapters as thoughts of those distant days occured to me.
That it will likely never be published is a fact. So why write it? I have no idea, just it seems to me that what happened then, would be fun for those living 60 or a 100 years later. That folks should know who we were, then maybe it is not wanting to be forgotten after I am gone. Maybe it is not wanting so many, my Dad, my Mom, others that I loved, not wanting them to be forgotten. Hoping that somehow it will be written and saved so someone a hundred years from now would know us, the everyday things that shaped our lives. Yes, life then may sound like it was far more simple, I’m not sure, growing up is not and never will be simple.
So we will jump ahead to when I dated quite a few gals at Poly high, before I choose one lady to be my ‘steady.’ That was the term used in the 1940′s for going with one girl or guy as your love. It was the high school version of being engaged to a girl. Many did just that after high school, got married, so the ‘steady’ stuff was like a audition for engagement. Girls in those distant days did not permit sex, real sex until they were married, a rule that in my mind young girls should adhere to now.
Yes, I have heard young ladies say, but others are ‘doing it’, – like if they do not have sex, they will be left out of most guys orbit for dates, parties. That is so stupid, I will lay bets that girls that do not have sex before marriage are married BEFORE a girl that gives away the goodies to a guy before marriage. This current fear of girls of being left out if they do not let a guy have his way with her is so stupid. Ha, well, at my age of 79 dating is just a memory. I would love to write an advise column for young ladies, now that would be a real riot, I am sure many of the girls may not like my advise.
That I think the ladies at dear old Poly High in the mid 1940′s were smarter than the girls today may make you laugh – BUT – in those days you lusted for a kiss, a few kisses at the door or in your parked car – cause that is all you were gonna get! Yes, every red blooded male wanted more, and so the Poly ladies held their men, kept them wanting more until they were married. Most quite successfully – if you don’t mind me saying so.
Here is a story, a true story, sorry all of you Poly girls that get this, I can’t remember the name of the girl. It was a period of time where I was allowed to drive the family car, use our family car for dates, a big, big, big deal back then. I was just sixteen, I went wild dating so many, having fun, until I chose a tiny, cute, adorable, strawberry blond as a steady. No – I did not marry her, I sure as hell was gong to, however she dumped me for being a bad boy, but that is another story. Genevieve and her super husband Bob, and Sally and I are still dear friends after sixty plus years.
Again – I truly do not remember the girls name in this true story, I DO remember that damn herring barrel!
CHAPTER – ROMANCE AT THE HERRING BARREL
Our Scandinavian store, no matter how much we cleaned the store it still had a unique odor. The open barrels of salt herring, lingonberries mixed with the smells of cheese, Norwegian lute fish, sausage, head cheese, pickled herring, and liver pate could make any red blooded Scandinavian’s nose twitch for joy.
The bakery cases filled with Danish strip coffeecakes, butter rings, pumpernickel, and Swedish Limpa bread could make your mouth water. Add whatever was cooking in the store kitchen, it all blended into what most Norwegians, Danes, and Swedes would consider heaven on earth. We also had a huge Dutch and German trade, and their noses would also twitch with pleasure as they entered the store. I really didn’t realize it smelled so much, I had worked in the store most of my young life, and the smell just seemed natural.
My pet hate was the salt herring. Large Icelandic sloe herring, layered with salt, and dripping with smelly juice, stored in open smelly wood barrels! The Nordic’s love em! Most of the time they are cleaned and boned and made into delicious pickled herring, sometimes they are steamed for breakfast, Dad loved herring for breakfast his young son did not. Try waking up to a house smelling of steamed herring if you still have an appetite for that – you are truly a real square head.
At this time of my life, I had just arrived at the ripe old age of sixteen, and was allowed to drive the family car. I was in the process of leaving for a date with a young lady I really liked, a first date, and wanted to impress. I opened the back door of the store and stuck my head in to say goodbye to Mom, when I saw the front door of the store open and six more couples walk in.
Mom already had all the customers she could handle, and Dad was nowhere in sight. Darn, she was busy with just too many customers. This always seemed to happen. During the slower time of the year you could wait for a half-hour without a customer and then bang, all at once they poured in!
So here I am, in a rush to leave for my date, and Dad had gone off somewhere. Mom was frantically trying to help the customers as fast as she could. There was no ‘self service’ in our small store. You cut, weighted and wrapped individually every purchase made, all very time consuming.
I had no choice but to take off my jacket, but on an apron, and help out. The date had to wait, it was rule number one in our family – our customers came first. Dad had made that rule one, they paid for our living, the food on our table, everything we have was because of our customers, that had been drilled into my head all of my young life. This all slicked up young man was in a big hurry and certainly not in the careful frame of mind it takes to sell drippy, juicy, stinking salt herring. Sure enough, my first couple of customers wanted herring.
We always – first wrapped the salt herring in butcher paper, then double wrapped in many layers of newspaper. (In those days they did not have those wonderful sealed plastic bags.) Even with this double wrap the herring would sometimes leak the vile, smelly juice, a truly awful item to sell. Of course, being in a rush that evening, unbeknown to me a few drops of herring ‘juice’ had to find its way to my pant’s leg.
Finally, the store emptied out and off to an evening of romance. Young women do not like to wait for young men. You were expected to wait for them, but never the other way around! Things started out a little cool.
I’ll never forget my date sniffing the air, and looking at me with an odd decidedly unhappy look. This was not the adoring look I had in mind for the evening. Something was definitely wrong. “Fred, don’t you smell something,” she said in her low enticing voice. Everything smelled fine to me. She had on a faint but enchanting perfume, this decidedly sexy smell however was being over-ridden by the stronger smell of herring. .
Damn, that smell it’s herring – then it hit me, I am in big trouble. This sweet young thing, for some unknown reason could not appreciate the aroma of prime Icelandic sloe herring.
This evening was not going according to plan. I tried to explain about the store and the herring, but I soon realized that it was a losing battle. Whenever I got close, her nose would wrinkle, and she would back off! When the evening was over, she realized that the smell I eluded was not her idea of a romantic male escort.
When you dropped your date off, even on a first date, you were at least hoping for a kiss on the doorstep. Tonight was not the night, this girl of my dreams dashed up the steps to her house, “Bye, Fred” she yelled as the door slammed in my face.
“Bye, bye, it was.” You guessed it, whenever I called for a date after that she was busy. That was the first and last date with that popular and very attractive young lady. It does not take that long for even a thick headed square head to get the message. This was truly one of the worst evenings of my young life. To say the evening ‘stunk” was very true in more ways than one.
Monday while walking down the hall of our high school I could not help but notice her girl friends whispering while glancing my way, giggles would follow me down the hallway. This was not quite the image a stud high school football player wanted to portray to the fair sex.
On future dates I made sure that I never got within ten feet of that herring barrel. A liberal dose of after-shave was also applied to hopefully override any other odor from that heaven on earth store that my fellow Scandinavians loved so well.
I will never, never forget that herring barrel destroying my – hoped for – evening of romance.
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