To understand the communal soul of the White House, a rambling Victorian rental on the corner of First Avenue at 32d Street in Avalon, look no further than its dinner table on a summer Saturday night.
On those occasions, three or four smaller tables are pushed together to form one accommodating as many as 30 people. The dishes, glassware and cutlery - none of it paper or plastic - are charmingly mismatched. The fresh flowers are from friends' gardens. Candelabra stand ready to be lighted.
Around 6 p.m., wine corks are pulled, hors d'oeuvres are passed on the wide wooden porch, and the party begins. Ron Swiecicki, a house member from Medford, describes the scene:
"It looks like a bunch of 20-year-olds 40 years later."
Every summer, more than two dozen men and women, nearly all in their 50s and 60s, share this six-bedroom house from late May through late September. Some are married; some are divorced. Some are retirees; most still have careers. Some have returned faithfully for more than 20 years; others have drifted away, then drifted back.
"Four of us own other properties here and rent them out," said Dave Smith, a 23-year member, "but we choose to stay here. Financially, it works out better."
Their old-fashioned lair has no air conditioners (fans only), no heat, no TV, and no washer or dryer. Living room amenities include plenty of reading material and a compact disk player. In the backyard are a grill, a shower head, and a clothesline. The kitchen has a four-burner electric cooktop, two ovens, one dishwasher, and a stash of restaurant-size pots, pans and mixing bowls. The refrigerator sits in a powder room next to the kitchen.
"TV is not allowed because people just stare at TV. We're more social. We don't want to do that," said Dottie Moser, a surgical nurse at Paoli Hospital.
"It's not a sedentary group," said Mary Caruso, a nurse-administrator for a Mount Laurel medical company. "We bike, play tennis, walk, jog, swim."
This White House, built in 1862, has no Lincoln Bedroom, but each of its bedrooms is named. Names include the 2d Floor Dorm (five single beds and one double bed), the 3d Floor Dorm (four single beds, one double bed), the Roaster (two single beds in the hottest room in the house) and the Ghost Room (two single beds, one double), where a friendly female spirit has allegedly been heard in the night whispering "beep-beep."
