Watermelon Chunks and Mercurochrome Bunnies


When I was a kid and bored at the end of the summer, my mother always had the same advice when I whined I had nothing to do: "Go outside and find somebody to play with."

So I did. This was the 1950s. I'd find a pal, and we'd ride off on our bikes until we weren't sure where we were, just for the adventure of finding our way home.

Didn't parents worry about anything back then?

They gave us carte blanche to take off to parts unknown and not return until suppertime, with nary a thought to the possibility of predators in the park, bullies in the schoolyard, or the thousands of fool things kids could get into without adult supervision.

Yet they weren't stupid, and they certainly weren't uncaring. They just seemed to take things more in their stride.

Like summertime illness, for example.

There was always something "going around." Mysterious summer maladies "went around" the neighborhood, striking down playmates one by one with fevers, headaches, and upset stomachs. Large families always seemed to have somebody in bed.

When my sister or I fell victim, my mother fought back with common sense and home remedies: a darkened room, and ginger ale and plates of cold, wet watermelon bits for those days before air-conditioning when you were burning with fever and nothing else would stay down.

We saw the doctor when we were "really sick," but the first line of defense against germs and "bugs" was a well-stocked medicine chest in the bathroom.

Ours contained staples like the big, blue container of Phillips' Milk of Magnesia for any and all stomach problems, calamine lotion for mosquito bites and poison ivy, and bottles of all-purpose APC pills. 

My father found out about these in the Army during World War II. He told me that APC stood for "aches, pains, and colds." Good for whatever ails you, he'd say.

I later learned that the A and C stood for aspirin and caffeine. The P was phenacetin, withdrawn from the market in 1983 because it was shown to cause liver damage. Who knew? But it seemed to help every time, a placebo effect, I guess.

When I came crying with cuts and scrapes, it was time for Mercurochrome, the bright orange-colored liquid anesthetic in a little bottle with a tiny, glass applicator stick. And tears would cease as my mother daubed the fluid on my wounds in the shape of little bunnies.

The fact that the name Mercurochrome suggested the stuff contained mercury never raised any concern. But then, parents in those days never worried about what might be in vaccines either.

For colds, my mother broke out the dreaded nose drops, gooey Vicks VapoRub, and yummy Smith Brothers Wild Cherry Cough Drops in the little white box with the illustration of the two bearded Smith Brothers, looking like something out of the 1800s -- which they were. The product had been around since 1853.

For painful, sleepless nights, I remember the comforting "medical devices" that brought relief:  the infrared "heat lamp" which glowed with soothing orange light to treat my nighttime "growing pains," and the beloved red, blubbery hot water bottle to take to bed for belly aches.

My mother was the GP, but it was Dad who was the surgeon. He extracted splinters with heated blades and needles, patched together toddlers' foreheads with adhesive tape, and served as medical assistant, holding my frightened sister close as the doctor set her broken arm, right in the office.

Looking back on those times, I realize how fortunate I was. My recollections of the misery of being sick or hurt were almost always connected to memories of my parents taking care of me. They calmly dosed me with whatever they thought would do the job and told me that I'd be all right.

Yet they knew very well that one of those summer plagues could be polio, which killed, or crippled, or put kids in iron lungs. And they knew that something as treatable today as scarlet fever could take their child from their arms to confinement in the county sanitorium miles away.

Years later, my mother once confided when she was helping me -- an overwhelmed, scared, young mother with sick children of my own -- that she herself would get sick with worry whenever my sister or I fell ill.

But you'd never know it. They let us roam free and took care of the illnesses, bumps, and bruises we encountered along with way. And for both, I'm very grateful.