Every now and then you hear one of those old sayings you hadn’t heard before.  I’m sure all of you know this one, but I hadn’t heard it:  “They’re too poor to paint, and too proud to whitewash.”

I doubt many of you know about whitewashing because you didn’t grow up in the 40’s...I doubt anyone uses whitewash anymore.  It’s kind of like watered down chalk.

We have dozens of sayings like that in our language.  I’m sure it is hard for people who speak another language to learn ours.  They say English is the hardest because it doesn’t exactly exist on its own, it just borrows words from other languages.

Ken used to say (when something was tight) “That’s as tight as Dick’s hatband.”  I asked him once what it meant.  He said he didn’t know, that it was just something his dad always said.  I don’t know what a hatband is anyway.  Men quit wearing hats long ago.  So did most women.  But back in the 50’s I had a dozen or so hats.  I took them to my booth at an antique store and a guy came in one day and bought them all as a present for his wife!!!...The women at his church still wore them.  He thanked me for saving them and not throwing them out.