--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Palmer, Annie D. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 32 number: 3 published: 1929-01 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Annie D. Palmer, “Weather Forecasts,” *Improvement Era* 32, no. 3 (January 1929): 230–235." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3203unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera3203unse start_page: 230 end_page: 235 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1929-01) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3203unse publication_year: 1929 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1929, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Weather Forecasts Weather Forecasts By Annie D. Palmer "Eleven dollars for wiring, five for a meter and seventy-five cents for globes — sixteen dollars and seventy- five cents." Jacob Nord figured it over for the hundredth time this month. Whenever he had time to think about it he fumbled the bit of yellow paper on which it was written and tried to think of some way to stretch his small savings or reduce the amount of the bill. Early in the spring he had sold the little old home in Meadowville where Jane and Laren were born and reared, in order that he and Nancy might live nearer the children. They bought the three-room frame cottage in the sub- urbs of the city because it represented about what they were able to pay; and of course they intended, as fast as they were able, to modernize and make it comfortable. After all, it conformed to the standard they had been able to maintain previously, and that was something. They had not moved to the city with any intention of putting on airs. But Jane and Laren had electric lights in their homes as did also nearly all the neighbors. To be sure they had a great many other conveniences to which Jacob Nord and his wife were not accustomed and which they felt they could get along without. But electric lights that snapped on by turn- ing a button, that were so bright one could see to darn stockings, or even file the wood saw, and that had no smoky chimneys to wash — that was different. Oh, yes; he had seen electric lights before, plenty of them, but when one lives five or six miles from every- body, and from almost every place, one isn't concerned much about what the neighbors have inside their homes. Be- sides, Jacob's neighbors in Meadow- ville had been as poor as he, so there probably weren't any wires connecting them with the center of modern light. But once located within a really lighted zone, the thing that was once a luxury became a necessity; and the dingy lamps they had enjoyed so long be- came obnoxious and unendurable. So ever since the first of September, when evenings began to be cool enough to entice Jacob Nord indoors, his heart had been set on electric lights for Nancy's Christmas present. It mattered very little to him that the lights would mean quite as much to him as to Nancy. It had been his custom to give her household gifts; such as a table cloth, or towels, or a tea kettle, and she reciprocated in giv- ing him sofa pillows and kitchen linoleum and dishes. Only once that he could remember did he receive really personal gifts. That was when Jane had a Christmas tree at her home. There were five parcels for him on the tree — one was a five-cent package of raisins and four were socks. Four pair of new socks that had really been bought for him. Just the colors he liked, too! How odd they should be so much like the ones he had recently bought at a sale! It was all ex- plained when he went to put them in the drawer with the others. There were no others. Well, let that go. He had long since forgiven Nancy the joke, but ever after kept his belongings under lock and key at Christmas time. Sixteen seventy-five. Beginning Sep- tember first, he must save at least four twenty-five a month, one dollar every week, seventeen cents every day. Surely — and then another idea popped into his head. A bright-red flower for Nancy's coat — what a splendid Christ- mas. Beautifully bright, wonderfully light. In September he made good. Several WEATHER FORECASTS 231 rows of old poplars had been cut down in the neighborhood and he got the job of sawing them into lengths for stoves and furnaces. He saved five forty. In October there were a few jobs of apple picking and he got an odd shift shoveling coal. He added four ninety to his savings. Now it was late in November, and he had saved nothing. In fact, he had for several days been short of food rather than take a quarter from his savings to buy bread. He had no work on those days and so he told Nancy he did not feel like eating. "Seems as if the snow holds off un- usually late this year," he said to Nancy as he scanned the sky on a crisp November morning. "That'll be something to remember on Thanksgiving day," answered his wife thoughtfully. "You, with such thin soles an' no rubbers, sure ought to be thankful for dry ground." He did not seem to hear. Presently he added, "Thirty cents an hour for shoveling snow, and a job as soon as it needs clearing away. But it looks as though it might hold off till Christ- mas." "And if it does," Nancy replied, "the long afternoon walks will do me a lot of good. I can't go out much after the snow comes." "Nancy, I don't believe the walks do you any good at all. You come home so tired you're all nerves, an* can't even enjoy your bed. Why don't you let me go with you if walks are so good?" "I've never said a walk was good for rheumatism, have I? Nor for asthma, either." "I suppose walkin' is only a cure for female diseases," Jacob murmured in a complaining voice. "And yet," he continued, "there was a time when two could enjoy a walk more than one." "There was a time when we two enjoyed a lot of things," snapped Nancy, irritably, "but that's forty years ago. We haven't had enough money to enjoy anything together since you paid for the marriage license." "We've made a lot of mistakes. Nancy, and not much of anything else. Maybe the marriage license was the biggest mistake of all." He spoke bitterly, and with rising anger. "I'm not saying which was the big- gest mistake nor who made it; but I've had nothing but drudgery and poverty all my life, an' I never expect to have things better. But what does a man care? He doesn't sit and look at the dirty walls and bare floors and ragged curtains. I'm sick of it all — the pov- erty and the dirt and the everlasting grind." "You know I do care, Nancy. You know — " "I know you've never in your life had ambition enough to get your nose off the grindstone. You're just too much like your old dad, and I ought to have known it before I married you." "And maybe I ought to have known a few things before I married you. Seems like there's a lot to learn on both sides after folks get married." Mr. Nord took his hat and saun- tered out, looking wistfully at the sky again, and again wishing it would snow. That afternoon Nancy went out as usual for the "long walk" which she was unwilling to share with her hus- band. On her way home she stopped again at the men's outfitting store and left a dollar with a good-looking young man behind the counter. "How much do I still owe on the leather coat?" she asked, although she knew exactly how much she owed. The question had become a habit in the fourteen weeks since she made a small deposit to have the article held for Christmas. "Only three dollars more," an- swered the smiling clerk, "would you like to take it home with you?" "Well, hardly," she replied, "I'm not in the habit of takin' things home that don't belong to me. An' besides 232 IMPROVEMENT ERA I'll get to look at that ugly thing enough after it really becomes a part of the family make-up. There ain't any word that I ever use that expresses my dislike for leather coats, an' cow- boy hats. But it's what my husband's wanted ever since I've known him, so I'm goin' to give it to him for Christ- mas— that is if the weather's favor- able." "The leather coat is particularly good for stormy days," suggested the clerk. "Yes, I know," was the decisive answer, "but payin' for it ain't. You see, I tend babies for Mrs. Howe so she can go out selling silk stockings, an' she gives me twenty-five cents for an afternoon. If it storms she stays home — that's the arrangement with Mr. Howe — an' so do I. Two weeks more of good weather and I'll have the coat paid off." "It will be nearly Christmas, too — " "Within ten days. Say, you couldn't afford to put a pair of them silky look- in' sox in the coat pocket, could you? I don't suppose I'll be here a lot more Christmas days, an' I want to make Jacob as happy as I can for this once." "Oh, we might stand a pair of socks, I'll think about it." "You see," Nancy went on, en- couraged by the kind manner of the young man she was dealing with, "Jacob has really been mighty good to me all these years since I took him for better or worse. He ain't made a lot of money — never did seem to get on much in a business way; but when it comes to honesty and square dealin' — well, he's just been clean an' square through an' through. I could always depend on his doin' the right thing, an' I'm mighty proud of that. There ain't a livin' soul on top of the earth can say Jacob Nord ever cheated him out of a penny or took a thing that wasn't his. I don't tell him about these things as often as I might — -we just sort o' take each other as a matter of course, an' that's why I want to give him the coat. For the same reason, I guess, as Jacob gave his son the coat of many colors. You under- stand, don't you?" And that was the reason the weather forecasts were watched so eagerly by Jacob Nord, who secretly prayed for snow; and by his wife, who as earn- estly wished for sunshine. Ten days before Christmas the snow-fall set in so heavily that Mr. Nord felt sure his work would last for at least a week, but his coal was low in the bin, and Nancy had an- nounced the need of a bag of flour. So, even at the best he could possibly do, he now feared it would be impossible to get the lights in for Christmas. Six- teen seventy-five is a lot of money when coal is low and flour gone and only fourteen dollars to the good. A few more days went by, during which Jacob Nord shoveled snow furiously. Then neighbor Sullivan put a new idea into his head. "Come with me, Jake," said Sulli- van, "let's go up and report at the Salvation Army for a Christmas bas- ket. We had one last year — sure fine — big roast, sweet spuds, celery, cran- berries, and everything." "How much?" asked Mr. Nord, who had not learned the ways of charity baskets. "Free," Sullivan replied. "You must give your name and tell them you're down and out, an' that's all there is to it." "But I'm not down and out," said Nord, "not that way. So far as I know they hain't never been a Nord name on a charity list yet; and the Lord knows I ain't goin' to put it there. Why, man, I'd starve first." "You can put some other name fer that matter — wife's maiden, or your dead uncle — they'll ask about your children, maybe — ." Mr. Nord's fists doubled up spas- modically and his teeth bit together hard. It was but for an instant, then he broke into a loud laugh and said jokingly: "I was about to say 'get behind WEATHER FORECASTS 233 me, Satan; but of course you couldn't know just how I'd feel to see Nancy cookin' a charity roast." "It cooks like any other so far as I can tell and is as good eatin' — . Sullivan got no further. " 'Nuff said," Jake answered, grab- bing the neighbor by the shoulders and turning him around roughly toward his own home, "when I married Nancy I promised to support her. I ain't made much of a show at it, but we've never eaten the bread of charity yet; an' I'll starve before I'll take a basket of things I can't pay for. To think of Nancy sweatin' over a charity roast!" Sullivan continued on down the path while Jacob went on, perhaps to himself: "Maybe one of the children could make me a small loan. Laren's wife would object to his doing it — but Jane might. Sixteen seventy-five; let's see. I only lack about two dol- lars— three if I'm to get the coat flower. I'll see Jane anyway." His job was, for the present, ended. The snow was piled high along the sides of the pavement and the weather was clear and cold. That afternoon he visited Jane. She had a toothache. The kitchen fire was out, and she explained that they could not afford to keep up two fires. Baby Ellen's apron was torn from the neck to the bottom hem: and little Jakey, his namesake, was coaxing for a shiny- red coaster for Christmas. Jane, sweeping the floor with a vengeance, paused to set him down rather vigor- ously with the remark that unless something happened at their house, chances were, there wouldn't be any Christmas at all. After a very brief stay, during which he said almost nothing. Jane's father took up his hat to leave. "I hope you and mother will have a merry Christmas," said Jane. "I'd have you spend the day with us, only the youngsters make mother so ner- vous. Sam has to work till noon, any- way; and then I guess we'll go to a show. Sam said he'd have to stop in and get the tickets today. It's that wonderful play of the Christ life — I can't remember the title; but every- body's wild about it." As he walked slowly away, Jacob Nord took a backward look to the time, forty years ago, when Jane first saw the light of day. The home was a two-room log — if the small lean-to at the rear might be called a room. The lean-to held Nancy's bed, a tiny table and one chair. He remembered the bed with a rope bottom, a tick filled with fresh straw, and a "love- knot" quilt. He could see again the pictures on the wall, one a Madonna and child, and the other a bunch of bright roses. He had got them both as a premium with "Happy Hour Magazine." and they were tacked up without frames. He remembered the hours of Nancy's travail — the deep concern of the women who attended her, and the agony of his heart as he realized how helpless he was in the time of suffering. And then he thought of the time when Jane and Laren both had whooping cough — how Nancy watched them the long hours of days and weeks with no rest and little food. And so he followed on down through the years, living it all over again — dreaming, dreaming. And now Nancy was sixty-four. Her eyes were not so good as they once were, she could hardly thread her needle, by lamp-light — and the lights would cost sixteen seventy-five. Im- possible. He must forget the lights for the present and try in some other way to make a happy Christmas for his wife. Yes, he would be ever so careful with his money. The electric lights must not altogether be forgotten. They would still need the lights after Christmas. Two hours passed and in the earlv dusk he reached home. He had tickets for the matinee — for once they would enjoy a show together — the red coaster for little Jakey, and a beautiful doll for baby Ellen. He had gone to a 234 IMPROVEMENT ERA store where bright, artificial flowers were sold and had selected a wonderful red rose for Nancy to wear on her coat; and the nice little girl who sold it had induced him to add a pair of hose that were as shiny as real silk, and cost only half as much. "I just know she'll like these. They look as nice as real silk and wear better. I buy them for myself and wear them to the dances and everywhere," said the little red-cheeked flapper ever so sweetly. "Seems like they're not very warm. Don't you have woolen stockings?" Jacob asked. "Nobody wears wool," the girl an- swered. "You'd be surprised how warm these are. Besides— does your wife go out much?" "Well, no; not a great deal," he began. "These are plenty warm enough in the house," was the argument. "What size, please?" "She used to wear a number three shoe — -yes, that's right, number three. I remember the first pair I bought for her. She ordered two's and a half and I figured I wasn't gettin' the worth of my money, so I got three's; an' when I took them back to the store the two's and a half was gone; so she kept the three's an' said they fit better than the others would. Paid two and a quarter for them — two and a quarter worth of grain. Wife was sure proud of that pair, an' I reckon they lasted a whole year. Nancy could take what you spend for clothes in one month an' clothe her whole family for a year. She sure does know how to make the dollars go a long way." "I guess she'll wear about nine's don't you?" the girl hastened to ask. And while she was wrapping the rayon hose and the bright flower, Jacob Nord admitted to himself that the little girls of today are right smart and pretty. "Yes, smart and pretty is right. But when it comes to bein' really a — a- — well a woman and a helpmate, Nancy's worth a dozen of 'em any day." One of his purchases he did not bring home. He had stopped to look at a window of a second-hand store. A poorly dressed woman coming out was saying to the man inside: "It would keep the old man so warm and nice through the cold nights and he would not cry with the pain. But I cannot buy it. I must buy bread." "Is it a stove, lady?" asked Nord. "Oh, no. An electric pad to warm the bed when the fire is out. My father is very old and has bad sciatic pains. This would keep him warm all night." There were further explanations about her getting electric power free because of some relationship of her dead husband to the power company; and before he left Mr. Nord had given the second-hand dealer a dollar for the electric pad. There was a degree of happiness along with the disappointment as he plodded toward home. The grand- children would be delighted, and as for that poor old man — perhaps he was "one of the least" of whom Christ had spoken — how the pad would comfort him. And there was the beautiful flower and the tickets and the stock- ings for Nancy. But the lights, if only he could have put them in. Well, he still had seven dollars to tuck away as another start toward getting them. He came home at noon the next day, sick and discouraged, after making the usual round in quest of work. The postman met him outside and handed him a letter. It read: "You have been recommended to us by your wife. We want an honest, clean man to look after the furnace and take care of the house plants while we spend a month or six weeks in Cal- ifornia. You will have the keys to our home, but will not need to stay at night. If you are interested, please see us at once." Mr. Nord lost no time in making his way to the place, with the result that he was hired and given two- weeks' pay in advance, bacause of the WEATHER FORECASTS 235 nearness of Christmas. The mystery home, and Jacob was happy. He of it was explained to Nancy when knew exactly where the switch button she went to the clothing store for the would be; and while Nancy fumbled leather coat. It was the employer of in the usual place for a match, he her young clerk who had hired her turned on the electric light, husband. The appearance of the beautiful star They went to the matinee on of Bethlehem could scarcely have sur- Christmas afternoon, Jacob in his new prised the shepherds more than did leather coat and Nancy with the ridic- this illumination in her home surprise ulous red rose pinned on her shabby Nancy Nord. She stood for a moment brown fur. Jacob figeted a good deal with folded hands, spellbound. Then and felt that the play was really longer she threw her arms about her hus- than necessary. Nancy on the other band's neck and exclaimed: hand enjoyed every minute of it; — the "Dear Jacob, it has been a beautiful religious spirit, the brilliant oriental day! The snow and the sunshine costumes, the people, and the lights, helped to make it so. Isn't the Lord To her it was a beautiful day, though good?" she felt very conspicuous on account "You are happy, Nancy? I — ." of the red rose. She was wearing it "I am very happy! The light is for Jacob. wonderful! It helps me to see the It was dark when they reached rose!" Loved Companions The flow'rs of summer fade and die, And leave the earth so bleak and drear; All nature seems to heave a sigh, Each faded leaf to shed a tear. For they are gone, sweet scented flow'rs, Their leaves have fallen to decay, And all through winter's dreary hours Beneath the frost and snow shall lay. In deepest silence they will sleep, While we who live can only wait, And sigh for them and even weep Just for the sadness of their fate. Our loved companions, too, are gone; They, too, are sleeping 'neath the snow; They left us sadly, one by one; With tender hands we laid them low. But flow'rs shall bloom again in spring And deck the earth with beauties rare; All living creatures join and sing. While earth is robed in garb most fair. And loved ones, too, shall rise again And live and love forever more; Life, life eternal shall attain, Their Savior and their King adore. Logan, Utah SAMUEL B. MlTTON