Such a tiny space

As WW II raged on in Europe, and so many young American soldiers were away from home, there were as many again young people here at home trying to make ends meet. Mrs. Simpson was one such young lady. She had her hands full - her husband was the US Postmaster for a rural office, and while he was away at war, she had to run the shop. She also had a newborn to contend with - her son.

This would all be fine, and not too much out of the ordinary, if it weren't for the issue of space. How to raise a young boy, live everyday life, and run a business out of a 24' x 17' cabin?

That's right. 24 feet wide, and 17 feet deep. If you divide this space into 4 even quadrants, you have roughly 12' x 8.5' rooms - that's about the average size of a office or cubicle for a professional in your average corporate work environment. One of these meager rooms was Mrs. Simpson's bedroom. Another her living room. A third was divided again in half to make a bathroom and very small kitchen. The fourth, a full 25% of her living space, was turned into the US Post Office for the hamlet of Sunside in upstate NY.

Such a tiny space, and yet she lived quite content for several years, raising her son and running the postal service. She did every bit of the work, and yet her husband's name was on the door. But I'm not here to write about the well documented inequalities of the genders at that time. I'm here to write about my retreat... that very same cabin that Mrs. Simpson lived in on Annie Bush's land... well that's my cabin today.

How I came to own it and discover its rich history, will have to wait for future installments...