Posted on 08/17/2003 12:33:32 PM PDT by hardhead
Yes! And remember what a major bummer it was when it rained either on a summer vacation day or even worse on a Saturday or Sunday during the school year? We used to hate that. We'd rely on the Monopoly game or something similar for those days. If it rained all day, we'd often go build some type of fort outside by the afternoon and hang out in it.
That's great...I'd like to see as many of these traditions kept alive for as long as possible.
We used to do Jiffy Pop popcorn for the annual family viewing of The Wizard of Oz on TV. That was a big deal until we moved overseas when there was no American TV. And we didn't miss it.
Nativity scenes were allowed on public ground.
Before they were taken away, along with all reference to God.
And the same people who TOOK them away now complain Christmas is too "commercial" and should be cancelled as a national hiliday.
Oh yeah, those...you can still buy those in some areas. I used to buy them for my son.
Before they were taken away, along with all reference to God.
I remember that and I remember we sang the Christian Christmas carols like "O Little Town of Bethlehem," "O Come All Ye Faithful," Silent Night," etc. in (GASP!) public schools at pageants before Christmas vacation! And nobody complained about it!
OMG...where did you live?? We were stationed in Naples, Italy for three years (that was when we were crazy for the Fizzies...) and I went to junior high there and did the whole adolescense thing. LOL I had my first glass of wine there (just a wee drop) and we used to listen to Radio Luxembourg on summer nights with our friends for all the latest British pop.
I could go on and on, too...LOL
It's really a shame that most kids will not have the fun we had. Ours does since the Mom doesn't work. Her priority is NOT money but the kids. We sacrafice to make sure they have the best childhood that was similar to our own. No "daycare" for them. Kids want their own parents raising them. Talk about confidence and self esteem soaring!
We used to play a lot of board games. We never said to our mom "I'm bored" because she'd tell us to go entertain ourselves, and if we complained again, she gave us chores to keep us busy.
Later when my kids were older, I used the same tried, true tactic. One time while they were at the kitchen table playing Sorry, I asked them if they were having fun (because they were) and my youngest daughter turned to me and sais "Yes! Now I know why they call them 'bored' games! You play 'em because your bored!"
Out of the mouths of babes...
Appellata est enim ex viro virtus; viri autem propria maxime ist fortitudo.[The word virtu derives from vir, man, while courage best characterizes man.]
The United States is a land of virtue. Through virtue it arose and achieved its technical might...There is a large element of uncertainty here; no one can measure the extent of the erosion or judge how today's virtue differs from the virtue of a hundred years ago. I have attended country fairs--in Oregon for example, in the town of Myrtle Point, Coos County. In that agricultural valley...changing beliefs and convictions have been completely absorbed by the normal course of life, repeated from generation to generation.
The parade down Main Street, the American flag, the beautiful horses of the sheriff and his men, decorated saddles inlaid with silver. A band wearing false noses and Tyrolean hats goes by in a truck. The pom-pom girls, their ages ranging from sixteen to six, the smallest ones struggling awkwardly with their batons, sticking out their tongues. Floats with goddesses of plenty representing Progress or the blessing of Pomona. Clubs, associations, lodges. The Lodges of the Temple of the Orient: shopkeepers with painted-on mustaches, dressed up as Oriental kings in broad silk galligaskins, turbans, and slippers with pointed toes, pipe fifes and pound drums. Again, beautiful horses ridden by the children of farm families, boys and girls, long-legged, lean, straight in the stirrups, the costumes always changing, for one group follows another, the Caballeros, the River Rangers, the Coos Rangers. The cars of candidates running for local office or the state senate: "Vote for." A dragon that streches out its neck every few seconds and belches smoke, an advertisement for a bulldozer company. Trucks, each carrying one felled tree more than a meter in diameter -- the drivers are those who took first place in the professional competition, an event that makes sense in this region of sawmills. Much regal beauty -- the queens of the melon growers, of the fishermen, of the county, the town. They throw kisses, smiles. A few girls are dressed up as squaws. There is even one genuine Indian leading a team of sheep dogs. Then the annual exhibits -- stalls of cows, horses, sheep, pigs, domestic fowl, ribbons for first place, second, and honorable mention..
All this is quite typical and could be found in hundreds of small towns and counties across America. For a revolutionary, this is nothing more than the dull, insipid life of yokels and provicial boors. I, however, have a wonderful time at county fairs and applaud them. The difference between us is that, for me, all the frameworks that permit the daily practice of virtue are very fragile, it is easy to destroy them, as I saw for myself while observing ideologically planned regimes at close range. Virtue: to be thirteen years old, jump up every day at dawn to feed, water, and brush your own horse, bullock, ram, to learn everything that could ensure victory in the livestock competition. The long-haired revolutionary, usually raised in a big city in a well-to-do family, has no idea that a few thoughtless edicts are enough to ruin agriculture and set the lives of farm children on a completely different course, not necessarily a better one...
...I am fed up with dividing people into those few who know and the dull masses who don't realize what is useful for them. I have no desire to be one of the elect dragging the masses by force to Utopia. Youth brought up in affluence, masquerading in beggars' clothing and revolutionary ideas, commands less of my repect than hardworking lumberjacks, miners, bus drivers, [and] bricklayers, whose mentality arouses scorn in the young. Perhaps this is the much-ridiculed mentality of the Bible-reading American entrenched in self-righteousness; and yet the fact that America is still a country of the Bible has, and will continue to have, lasting consequences. No matter how deeply religious beliefs have been eroded, the King James Version is the heart of the language, it determined its literary development, and the work of Whitman, Melville, and their successors constantly refers us back to it. The Bible is the common property of believers, agnostics, atheists. Anyone who knows from experience, as I do, how important certain of the less obvious human virtues can be will not frivolously call a certain heavy decency and unselfishness plain stupidity, even if they are accompanied by mental limitations. Nor will he shrug off the clash of goodness and wickedness which originates in the Bible. In spite of arguments to the contrary, in spite of the paradox of brutal and cruel deeds producing unintended good results, or perhaps just becasue of that paradox, America is the legitimate heir to Judeo-Christian civilization, summoned to the technical works which that civilization, alone among all others, has rendered possible. Therefore, it was just and beautiful that the American astronauts flying over the surface of the moon addressed the inhabitants of Earth with an old message, the beginning of the Book of Genesis.
I hope that wasn't too long. It's taken form Milosz's book, Visions for San Francisco Bay, and was written in 1969. As a Prof at Berkeley, Milosz had a front row seat at the "cultural revolution," and this, combined with his personal history inspired the book. Visions, along with C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity, kept me sane in college.
About seven years ago, Hubby and I were in the grocery store. Because he's so tall, he's eye level with the top shelves. He said "Jiffy Pop!"....I thought I heard him wrong, being distracted with things like shopping for food and said "WHAT?" He sayd "JIFFY POP!"
He grabbed it off the top shelf. By then everyone was watching him. He was thrilled. Kept saying he didn't think you could buy that anymore. He was acting like he'd found a winning lottery ticket.
He took it out into the woods the next day - it was very cold and he and his crew built bonfires to warm up with. He said he was going to make Jiffy Pop for them. They didn't believe him, until he pulled it out of his truck and popped it.
I have a feeling it tastes better than all the microwave kinds you can buy today.
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