Memories
Originally posted December 2013 but still food for thought.
As a kid I used to read a lot. Over the years while raising a Family and running a Business it has been hard to read leisurely. There was always lots of “have to” Business reading. The last 2-3 years I have been getting into more leisure reading. I am not a novel reader but I love to read History, Geography, Nature, Animal, Travel, Discovery and Exploration books and magazines. This past summer I bought at a yard sale a 50 lb. box of 20 year old magazines for $ 3.00. I have been enjoying reading what writers had to say on events pertinent to the time and comparing the information to today’s realities. I have 2 subscriptions from the U.S.; one is called “Farm & Ranch” and the other “Country”. These magazines have great pictures and interesting articles about both the present and the past. I was born and raised on a Farm and these readings bring back great memories. I find these articles bringing me back to my childhood. While growing up I felt like most other kids that life was tough, unforgiving, never ending, wishing for better days and my parents were unsympathetic tyrants. My parents were actually great and loving but it took me into early adulthood to appreciate and understand what they taught me. These magazines do allow me to go back to a simpler and happy time in my life. These publications are American but it is amazing to learn how many people in all of America had identical upbringings and experiences. The other satisfaction I get from these readings are the real great and memorable things we did as kids. Building forts anywhere we could in ditches, in buildings particularly barns, in and under trees, old culverts, in miles of snow which lasted from October to April. We made things like tools to help us build, bow and arrows, clubs, spears, bats and more. We made things to reach high in a tree, long sticks to poke, clubs to break things, sticks to dig, etc. We were ingenious and spent hours creating. We did even more than all of this but we were active and outside and happy. The world was ours to discover. These moments were also done after a long list of duties, responsibilities, homework and church. Then it dawned on me! What will the kids of today remember as their favourite memories?
Let me speculate what today’s kids will remember and cherish 40-50 years from now. They will most likely remember the video games they conquered, the computers they hacked, the pictures they posted on line, the farm or business they built on line, the friends they harassed by phone, the world they explored but never visited, the hours of surfing on the internet, the great pictures they took and lost in cyberspace without ever getting their hands dirty or getting a cut or scrape, weathering the elements or creating things with their hands instead of drawing them on a computer. I am probably over cynical but it does beg one to wonder what it will be like when comparing to our experiences and memories.
