THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 14, 1994 TAG: 9407140617
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Guy Friddell
LENGTH: Medium: 59 lines
Well, speaking of water, we all talk about conserving it, but bless Paddy, gardener Camilla F. Hoffler did something about storing it.
During a thunderstorm, she tied the mouths of a couple of plastic leaf bags, transparent ones, around the vents of drain pipes outside her home in Norfolk.
With rain water rolling from the roof, gushing along gutters, gurgling down drain pipes, she trapped in each bag eight quarts, which, she told me, she would pour on her flowers and tomato plants.
``Be sure,'' I advised, ``to water those tomato plants first.''
Nothing is more alluring than a blushing red, roly-poly tomato, a miniature morning sun, a warm orb promising tasty nourishment.
As a teenager, Camilla and her friends caught rainwater as a rinse in washing their hair.
``We learned about hard water, and we thought the natural rain would be better for us,'' she said. ``And it does feel better.''
It mightn't be wise, with so much pollution in the air today, to use rain water in washing your hair, she said.
When they started going out with dates, some girls put a little perfume in the rinse water, she recalled.
It's astonishing how far you can make water go of a necessity. There flashed to mind, just now, the baths, during the war, you took out of a helmet full of water.
Once, in our army outfit, Clarence Farence liberated an old seaplane pontoon and asked Sergeant Bull Maypop why he couldn't - but that's a story for another time.
Camilla also recalled a technique for keeping cool before the advent of air conditioning that should, I think, be revived.
Why in the world it never occurred to somebody in my family is beyond me. We were always alert to ways to ease life.
She would fill a bowl with cubes or chunks of ice, and then put a table fan, going full blast, behind the bowl. It really cools things in a hurry.
She also remembers that when children were ill, she'd give them crushed ice. Her daughter Martha, now a grand success as a speech therapist in Manhattan, spent an entire summer, when she was a year old, in a high chair with a piece of ice in her hand. She liked to hold it.
In our family, we poured vanilla flavoring and sugar over the ice, I remarked.
``A snowball!'' Camilla exclaimed.
Yes, come to think of it, but we weren't cunning enough to take the next step and pour on strawberry syrup.
I think I'd prefer vanilla, anyway. Why, it was almost a pleasure to get sick.
As I write, another thunderstorm appears to be brewing. If you think of a way to keep cool, I wish you'd let me know. by CNB