Requiem for a Refrigerator

I didn’t even know its first name until weeks after it died. When I shared the news with the original owner and my friend Dave, that the Kelvinator he and his wife Jeanette Tabb had given me had been trucked away to “refrigerator heaven,” he shared its name. “The Green.”

“The departure of ‘Green’ is a great sadness,” he responded Sunday morning.
“It was purchased Memorial Day weekend 1975. I had just started my job at Miles Laboratories in Elkhart, IN. We were moving into a rented house at 425 W. Beardsley. It was our first purchase in Indiana. Perishables had moved with us in an ice chest from Abilene, TX. Miles was my first semi-honest job after I finished my master’s degree from Abilene Christian College. Neither the house on Beardsley or Miles Laboratories still exist, so I guess it was time for ‘The Green’ to follow suit.”

(Dave Tabb is a chemist; as sharp as a sharp whip.
Johnny Yuma was a rebel.)

After buying a home near mine in the early 90s, joining and serving with distinction as an officer and board member of Vinegar Hill Neighborhood Association, and becoming my best friend in the course of talking airplanes, going to air shows etc, Dave and his charming wife found Springfield, ill ennui incondusive to the fine art of eating regularly. In 2004, they sold their beautiful house, gave a lot of the contents to local charities, and prepared to load up a U-Haul for the final truck load to their new home in Indianapolis. I helped with the packing and heavy lifting. When Dave mentioned the green frig in the basement would be picked up by Salvation Army later in the day, I offered to save the worthy charity the bother by adopting it myself. Dave accepted.

A year earlier I had found a free refrigerator on the local web site Free (something or other) but it was taking longer to make ice, and the writing was on the wall. So the Tabbs’ kind gift was very well timed. Installed in the kitchen for the first few months, when the cooling was happening, I could almost hear it as I sat on my front porch. Then I discovered how to eliminate most of the racket and life was sublime until about three weeks ago when “The Green” gave up the ghost, and I was sans-cool until Saturday.

The new Frigidaire — I’ve christened it “Polar Poundstone” because it’s so white and refreshing — sounds like the background noise on the bridge as Captain James T. Kirk directs Uhura, Chekov and Spock to new adventures.

When I go into the kitchen and the compressor’s active, I have an overwhelming desire to take blood samples from lab rats; something I’ve nevere don in my life. I’m sure I will get used to the new sound. It’s very quiet and works like it just came from the factory, which, of course, it did.

So here’s to the memory of “The Green” Kelvanator. Thank you for serving so well and so long . . . . .

so long. . . . . .

so long . . . .

lie lie-lie,
lie lie-lie-lie
lie lie-lie
lielielielie, lie

Live long . . . . . . and proper.