Memories Of The Farmhouse

I often think of the old house on Domino Lane where I was born. It was made of stone, probably fieldstone gathered in the fields nearby. Although it did not seem large, it had three bedrooms on the second floor and one plus a storeroom on the third floor. Of course, there was no bathroom or plumbing of any kind and that probably gave us more room. The kitchen was low-ceilinged and we whitewashed the walls every year. The stairs to the second floor were in one corner with a coat closet underneath.
The boys' bedroom was over the kitchen and was two or three steps lower than the other two bedrooms on the second floor. The main bedroom had a fireplace and two double beds. Ours was a large family and I remember when I was about five years old, I slept at the bottom of my mother's bed while Edmund, three, and Elizabeth, less than a year, slept at the top. Joe, who was about seven or eight, slept in the other bed with my father. Mary and Rose had the girls' room all to themselves while Tom, John, and Jim were in the boys' room. That must have been a very cold and draughty room in the wintertime. I remember at one time seeing a pile of snow on a bed. It had blown in through a crack in the window frame during a stormy night.