Well, I got another great email from my old friend today!

Here it is:


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Hi Charles,

I contacted my mom tonight and asked her about her old Electrolux vacuum cleaner. She told me it stopped working a few months ago, so she had to get a new one.  She still has the old one, because I had told her to save it for me, so when I told her that you wanted it she said, "But I thought you wanted it."  I told her I did, but not if it doesn't work. 

Anyway, I was going to let you have it because it obviously means more to you than me, but I don't know if you still want it since it doesn't work.  I'm guessing it can be repaired, but I'm not that mechanically inclined, so I don't have any idea what's wrong with it.  I'm guessing since it's older than I am that old age just got to it.  Let me know if you still want it and the next time I'm over to visit her I will get it and bring it home. 

I asked my mom if she remembered the time you walked into our house to watch her vacuuming, but she said she didn't. 

I have a couple of memories from when we were living in our house in Hampton.  One is catching crickets one night in your back yard.  I remember I was afraid one might bite me and your dad telling me it wouldn't.  I also remember one time I had a piece of rope and you were trying to get it from me.  You were chasing me as I was dragging it behind me and running across our front yard.  I ran by our rose bush, but you were too intent on grabbing that rope that you weren't watching where you were going and you ran right into it.  You had quite a few cuts when you managed to get yourself untangled from it. 


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I wrote back:

I would still love to have your Mom's Electrolux, and if you do want an old Electrolux I have plenty of them and will be happy to send you one that works!

Just as well that your mom doesn't remember me coming into your house to watch her vacuum -- if she did remember she'd probably still be mad at me hahaha!

I do remember catching crickets at night, and also fireflies. I don't remember the rope or rose bush incidents though.

I've jotted down a few "Leicester Terrace" memories that I'll send you in another email.

btw, I haven't heard from your brother Tim. Do you know if he would remember me and my family? I had thought, looking back, that I was closer to his age than yours. But when I saw your birthday on your Facebook I realized you and I are about the same age. I was born on March 27, 1956.

[Greg was born in October 1956.]



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I'm pretty sure most of you understand my fervent wish to have Mrs. Stroud's Electrolux. There's just something magical and wonderful about the idea of having one of the ACTUAL vacuum cleaners that I remember from my childhood. Even it if doesn't work. (Besides, I'm sure it will be very simple to fix.) To have it here and actually be able to see and touch it will stir up some deep emotional and spiritual resonances.

I've always envied my collector buddies who still live where they grew up, still live next to people they've known all their lives including their childhood friends and their families' vacuum cleaners. There's just something really special about that. It's hard to explain I guess, but I guess I could just say, "It takes me back to days of yore."

Every so often over the years I'd contact people from Hampton, Newport News, Gwynn's Island and Mathews and always at some point in the conversation work their vacuum cleaner into it. "Say, speaking of vacuum cleaners ... do you still have that old chrome and leatherette Electrolux you kept in that green vinyl hamper on the back porch?" Time after time the reply has been a disappointment. "Good Lawrd, I got rid of that yeeeeahs ago."

I will say, it was quite a thrill when I was talking to my Uncle Walter on the phone one day, gee 10 years ago or more. He told me he had been visiting George Silk and saw an old Electrolux in his garage. He said to him, "I know someone who sure would love to have that!" George told him that he'd be glad to send it to me, so I gave him a call. I was happy to have the old Electrolux, but especially when he told me it had been Aunt Virginia's! I clearly remember it, where she kept it, and how mean she was about not letting me use it! So I guess I got the last laugh, heheh! He did send it to me and it still has a place of pride in my collection -- because at that time it was the only "extant" vacuum cleaner I remembered from my childhood.