SUBURBAN HOUSEWIFE
By David S. Macpherson
When I was a suburban housewife in the 1970s, before everything changed
so drastically, you could play with your kids and still smoke cigarettes. You
didn’t want your kids to smoke, but back then, we believed in the old adage,
“Do as I say, not as I do.” Soccer had
just become popular so I drove the kids in the station wagon to practices and
games. Or they ran off to another kid’s backyard for T-ball or touch football
or whatever else suburban kids did to fill up their day. You didn’t worry where
they ran off because they never left the block. Back then, your kids were safe
in someone else’s backyard.
When I was a suburban housewife in the 1970s, I had to find ways to fill
up my days as well, but I didn’t have the luxury of T-ball. I had laundry to
do. I had groceries to put away in the green Formica cabinets. I had bathroom
scum to wipe up. I had Tonka trucks to trip over. Throughout the house, I
played music: Neil Diamond, Mack Davis, Crystal Gayle. Back then, music was
wholesome and smooth.
I left the albums of my childhood in the closet. My favorites: Buddy
Holly, The Kingston Trio, Ella Fitzgerald. Those records were too painful to
listen to. It reminded me that I was not in New York anymore. That I would
never get a chance to go to the Village Vanguard to hear Dave Brubeck or
Thelonious Monk anymore. Now, I was a suburban housewife living outside of
Chicago in a land of green manicured lawns and garden gnomes. You didn’t talk
about being a New Yorker, let alone a Jewish New Yorker. Back then, you wanted
to act as goyish as possible. Wonder Bread was safe bread.
