Who remembers S&H Green Stamps? They’re still around, but they now call themselves S&H Greenpoints. For uninitiated, they were given away as “value added”  at service (gas) stations, supermarkets and so on. The more one spent, the more stamps one earned. One then pasted them into little books. The books could be redeemed for merchandise.

A trip to the S&H store was always a treat. (Okay, I lived in the middle of nowhere with a mother who didn’t drive. A trip anywhere was a treat.) There are two visits to the S&H redemption center I vividly recall. The first was when I laid eyes on a lamp. A beautiful lamp. A lamp any little girl would adore. I begged, pleaded, cajoled, etc. And the next trip to the store–after the family had accumulated enough stamps–was to procure that lamp for my bedroom.

You see, the girl on the swing actually swings. It moves. I was fascinated.

And yes, I still have the lamp. Right now, it has no shade. The original shade is long gone, probably scorched from tilting to get more reading light. The second shade is also gone. I believe I tossed it because it was in tatters. I’ve been looking for a replacement, but no luck yet.

The lamp has history. I shared a room with my sister. One morning, I woke up to a nasty smell and a weird crackling noise. I sat up and saw the cord sparking. I screamed for my sister to unplug the lamp (she was closest to the outlet). Then I screamed at her not to touch it. Back and forth until my father came into the room and handled the situation. He discovered a puddle near the sparking portion of the cord. After a brief examination, he concluded the cat had bitten the cord and had the pee shocked out of him. Dad replaced the cord and all was well.

My sister wrote her name on the underside of the little girl’s skirt in a misguided attempt to the claim the lamp for herself. Ha! I’m the one who gave birth a daughter, and my daughter had the lamp in her room for many years. It now resides in my office with a black light bulb in the socket.

A lamp with a swinging girl was a big deal back then. A treasure. My parents saved to get the lamp for me. We didn’t have computers, electronic games,  or even more than one television in the house (and only two channels at the time). I had decks of cards, board games, a back yard, and cousins.  And it was all so very, very special.

I have recently taken to wearing plastic bags inside my snow boots. They make the boots easier to get on and they add a layer of insulation. Someone, when they saw me doing this, cracked: “You need Wonderbread bags, not grocery bags, like we used when we were kids.”

Except in my family, we didn’t eat Wonderbread. We were a Millbrook family. There was a Millbrook bread bakery on the north side of the city. One could smell the bread baking when whizzing by on the interstate. My Girl Scout troop took a tour of the factory, where we learned that at least part of their advertising campaign was true: Millbrook Bread was baked to music.

Many years ago, when I was a single, career-minded young woman, I read an article in Cosmopolitan magazine that changed my life. No, not a piece of the “how to satisfy your man” ilk. “How to Be House-Proud” by Rita Barnett struck such a deep chord in me, I cut out the article and re-read every couple of years.  The article became a guide in my quest to build a life I loved.

I am a homebody by nature, a nester, as one friend described me. What the article made me realize was that if I took care of my home, my home would take care of me when I needed it. When unexpected company dropped by. When I had a food craving. When I was sick. The mind set served me well for many years.

But life changes. Marriage, children, career advancement, career loss, new job, serious pursuit of my writing, and so on. Besides, when one lives with others, one has to accommodate their concepts of home, too, which might not always coincide with one’s own.

Some habits, however, are worth clinging to.

The habit I developed of keeping certain nonperishable foods on hand is one I’ve maintained. In upstate New York, winter weather can be uncertain. I feel secure (and even smug at times) knowing if my family and I get snowed in, we wouldn’t go hungry. To me, that’s what home is: hearty, (mostly) healthy meals.

Are there days when I wish I could come home from my day job to a clean house? You bet. But I’m not the only one who lives here. And serious pursuit of my writing career meant serious reappraisal and restructuring of my available time.

Being house proud, as the article states, is not about mopping and dusting. It’s about the making of a home.

Today is National Get to Know Your Customers Day. You get to see slices of my life. What about your life?

• What’s your favorite color?
• If you had to eat only one food for a month, what would it be?
• Favorite snack food?
• Favorite winter activity?
• Coffee or tea?

You can answer any or all of the above questions.