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VINTAGRAPH • WPA • WWII • YOU MEAN A WOMAN CAN OPEN IT?

Living Room Quiet Time: 1976

Usually when my father and Kitty were in the same room she'd be on his lap. Or actually, on a newspaper on his lap while he read another section, forming a kind of cat sandwich. "You're full of hair," he'd tell her after she jumped up on him. Here he's reading the Marin County Independent-Journal bearing a headline about President-elect Jimmy Carter. At this point, you may be wondering if he was ever seen without a newspaper in his hands. Well, at other times, he'd have garden tools: trimming, pruning, cultivating, raking, watering. Or a steering wheel. Occasionally he'd be seen carving a roast. The reason this is a quiet time (around Christmas, as you can see from the decorations here and there) is that I'm not blasting my stereo, thus banishing him to the kitchen. I'd bought a Sony Trinitron to keep him and my mother company there at such times. That's my record collection on the rack behind him, and one of my Infinity Monitors is just visible peeking over the chair in the corner. My Kodachrome, lit by bounce flash. View full size.

Usually when my father and Kitty were in the same room she'd be on his lap. Or actually, on a newspaper on his lap while he read another section, forming a kind of cat sandwich. "You're full of hair," he'd tell her after she jumped up on him. Here he's reading the Marin County Independent-Journal bearing a headline about President-elect Jimmy Carter. At this point, you may be wondering if he was ever seen without a newspaper in his hands. Well, at other times, he'd have garden tools: trimming, pruning, cultivating, raking, watering. Or a steering wheel. Occasionally he'd be seen carving a roast. The reason this is a quiet time (around Christmas, as you can see from the decorations here and there) is that I'm not blasting my stereo, thus banishing him to the kitchen. I'd bought a Sony Trinitron to keep him and my mother company there at such times. That's my record collection on the rack behind him, and one of my Infinity Monitors is just visible peeking over the chair in the corner. My Kodachrome, lit by bounce flash. View full size.

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Ooooh that chair

My parents had that orange chair, only in green velvet.
Their cats enjoyed it too.

Beautiful composition

TTerrace, you should be congratulated on this shot - great use of color and depth of field.

And count me among those who have a twin of Kitty!

Common Childhood

We also had the same chair in green - sort of an avocado - in my parents' bedroom. As in comments in the past, I think many of us Boomer had common objects in our living rooms. The ashtray with the birds beaks, the clay ashtray in yellow or green or red with blobs of other colors. The lamp that was also a table. The carved faux African masks or elephants or gazelles. Now we go on eBay and browse our youth as it passes on to another generation that's never seen a black and white TV or an issue of Look in the mailbox.

Weather Man

What a great picture.

I'd like to hazard a guess here: that the three identical shiny objects hanging vertically next to the front door are a home weather station. A barometer, a thermometer, and a hygrometer?

I say this because my dad had something very similar hanging next to the master bedroom door in our house!

Dads love weather stations. I've always had half a mind to buy one myself.

Human Element

Most photo descriptions are outsider observations, as they need to be since the photographer is not around to ask. So thank you for this wonderful window into a Day in the Life of your father, and the very interesting human interest photo. And that chair pattern had to be common, for I've seen it (the fabric seat of course in other colors like gold or green, but always a solid) in people's homes in NW Indiana, too. BTW, your parents had good taste: that room could've been 1966 or 1986 as much as 1976 from the decor.

What a great shot!

This photo tells so much. It brings some warm thoughts about my dad and how he loved to read the newspapers. It was the only time he could relax, having six sons.

Genetically Linked?

tterrace's Kitty and our present day pussycat Diablo look nothing much alike, except they both have the same striped tail. Maybe they've a little common DNA.

Home Sweet Home

I want your dad's leather club chair. My parents still have one. Cats added a lot to our lives too.

I feel at home

Every time I see a picture of your home, mother and or father, I feel like I have been there a while, my shoes are off, a cool drink in my hand, my eyelids are getting heavy listening to the classical music coming out of your Infinity Monitors, which I guess are just like mine, best speakers I ever had, surprise, I still have them, 30 plus years old and you can still crank them!

Paintings, chairs and other digressions

@jmarkow1: We didn't have a Spanish galleon painting on the wall, just some roses, which you can see here. An oil by some minor California artist from the early 1900s. I forget the name; maybe my sister will chime in. In the dining room we also had a watercolor of roses (arranged in one of those green-glazed ceramic ginger pots) by another artist.

@GeezerNYC: The chair was definitely Father's domain, though not by any explicit fiat; it just seemed meet, proper and just. If anyone was sitting in it when he came into the room, we'd just automatically start to move out; often, though, he'd just tell us to stay put and then plopped down somewhere else. The chair dates from around 1954; I still remember the trip my mother and I, age 8 or 9, took on the Greyhound bus to San Francisco to buy it at some big downtown store. I think I also got some neat toy, but what I most remember was her getting an odd-looking quarter in change, the Standing Liberty design minted 1916-1930. I was so transfixed by this out of the ordinary thing that it started me off on a long pursuit of coin collecting.

Proprietary Question

Was anyone but your Dad allowed to sit in his very cool armchair? The footstool, in all its worn leather glory, is beautiful as well.

Mew and Me

And I had a cat who was a twin for Kitty. Wherever we went, she'd be right there looking at us like we were the most fascinating thing on earth.

Dropping by

I'm starting to feel as comfortable in your house as if I were your neighbor. Thanks for inviting us in, tterrace.

Colors of our lives

We had the identical chair in avocado green crushed velvet. I keep looking at the walls for the obligatory sofa sized picture of the Spanish Galleon.

Through the Looking Glass

Ok--Now I am completely convinced, You & I lived the same lives in a set of parallel universes ! To see that orange chair and all the room accessories I know that you followed me around as a spectral ghost. I can hear Bach harpsichord concerti and smell my mom's Southern style banana pudding and just outside is a three inch snowfall in preppy coastal Connecticut. Creepy....almost.
Charlotte USA (now)

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