by jphilo | Jan 8, 2016 | Daily Life
This post from 2012 made me smile when I stumbled across it. Because Iowans need as much to smile about as possible in January, I’m passing it along to you on this Fantastic Friday though it reminds all of us that we’re 4 years older and even more ancient in 2016.
Not Just Old. But Ancient.
Yesterday morning, my first thought was not, “Today, I’m gonna feel old.” But thanks to the Girl Scouts – yes, those cute little cookie peddlers who sell sugar highs in a box – for the first time ever, I am feeling a wee bit ancient.
Not just old. Ancient.
The realization was gradual, increasing the longer I listened to Talk of Iowa on the radio. The topic was the 100th Anniversary of Girl Scouts, and the host interviewed some Girl Scout leaders and a couple honest-to-goodness present day Girl Scouts. The girls were about the same age I was during my short career as cookie salesgirl and sash wearer.
And they made me feel not just old. But ancient.
It wasn’t their fault. But, while they talked, I thought about how 1912 was a century ago for the little girls. Just like 1865 was a hundred years ago when I attended Girl Scout meetings after school in 1965. So if and when they watch a show like Downton Abbey, the events portrayed there are as long ago and far away to them as the events chronicled in Gone With the Wind were to me.
And that’s when I started feeling not just old. But ancient.
Not because the Civil War seemed like a long time ago when I was a Girl Scout. And not because 1912 is a long time ago to the girls in the radio interview. And not because 1912 didn’t seem like such a long time ago in my GS days. But because the Civil War probably didn’t seem like such a long time ago to fifty-five-year-old adults in my GS days, but I thought those people were old.
But they didn’t seem just old. They seemed ancient.
Which is how today’s Girl Scouts view everybody old enough to tuck an AARP membership card next to the packet of Metamucil in their wallets, old enough to wear sensible shoes, sport age spots, and wear pants with elastic waistbands.
They view us as not just old. But ancient.
Oh my, the depression is coming on thick and fast. I think there’s only one way to fight this thing. I’m gonna find a Girl Scout, buy a box of Thin Mints, and snarf down the whole box. After all, my mom says old people like me have earned the right to eat whatever they want. And she ought to know.
‘Cause she’s not just old. She’s ancient.
by jphilo | Nov 25, 2013 | Reflections on the Past
Have you tuned into to any of the programs commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the assassination of President Kennedy? Some of them have been fascinating, like the rebroadcast of the story Walter Cronkite put together ten years ago for NPR.
It really is worth a listen.
Many radio programs encouraged listeners to call in and share their memories of November 22, 1963. Iowa Public Radio’s River to River was one of them. I toyed with the idea of calling in and describing my reaction as a seven-year-old second grader. But the idea was squelched by listening to the memories shared by callers who were years younger on that fateful day. They described how sadness pervaded their day and weekend that followed. One woman who was four at the time remembered crying when John-John saluted his father’s coffin.
Compared to those memories, mine seemed…how to put it?
Immature sounds about right. Because I don’t remember much about the day Kennedy was shot, except for Dad not smiling and being quieter than usual when my sister and I got home from school. My most vivid memory is from Saturday morning, when my parents turned the television on after breakfast.
Our television was never on Saturday mornings.
Because our parents were slave drivers. They didn’t allow the watching of Saturday morning cartoons until the house was clean. And since the sibs and I dinked through the chores, we rarely finished before 11:00 AM, and by then the really good cartoons like Alvin and the Chipmunks, The Jetsons, and Mighty Mouse were over. Only the dregs remained: Bugs Bunny (too weird), The Bullwinkle Show (it’s humor too mature), and Dennis the Menace (too boyish).
But the morning after President Kennedy was shot, our television set was on.
My first thought was hot diggity dog, we’re gonna watch cartoons all morning. But I was wrong. Because as Dad explained, there wouldn’t be any cartoons or any other regular programs on any stations all day long because the President had been shot.
But we still had to do Saturday morning chores.
Futhermore, my parents still sent us to school on Monday morning, too. Where Mrs. Eggleston still expected us to do our best coloring in the bird books science project. She still laughed at my stand up comedy routine during show and tell. She still let us use colored chalk on the zoo mural we were making on the the biggest chalkboard in the room. Our second grade class still argued with the other second grade class about which of our teachers had the strangest name: Mrs. Eggleston or Mrs. Bomgaars. We were still expected to be quiet in the halls. We still sang God Bless America in music class.
Maybe that’s why my memories of the day President Kennedy was shot are so dim.
Maybe I don’t remember much about where I was when the President was shot because adults protected me by keeping my little world as normal as they could. Maybe that’s why I remember more about how I felt on that fateful day and in the days that followed. I felt peeved about the Saturday morning cartoon situation. I felt put upon doing chores that morning. But most of all, though a terrible tragedy gripped our nation, I felt safe.
Exactly how a seven-year-old should feel, even after the President has been shot.
Photo Source
by jphilo | Jun 10, 2013 | Current Events
photo source
Our cousins across the pond held a big party last week to celebrate the 60th anniversary of their monarch. Queen Elizabeth. The media was full of the event. Factoids about the queen’s life were everywhere.
But one important fact escaped the media circus. My mother considers Her Royal Majesty as a constant entities in her life. So this weekend, I did a little pictorial research to see why Mom regards HRM as almost a friend. What I discovered confirms a suspicion I have long held. Though Queen Elizabeth was raised in the lap of luxury in an English palace and my mother was raised in poverty on a Minnesota farm during the Great Depression, the two women led parallel lives. Here are a few pictures to prove the point:
Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret in the 1930s
Photo Source
Mom (right) with her sister Ruth during the 1930s
Princess Elizabeth in the 1940s
Photo Source
Mom in the 1940s
The Queen at the 60th Anniversary Celebration wearing fancy hat
Photo Source
Mom at family celebration wearing fancy elf hat
I know.
Parallel lives.
Sends shivers down the spine, doesn’t it?
So I’m praying that some Tuesday in the future, when Mom and I go out for lunch together, she will be at the center of a huge, fawning media circus. ‘Cause in my eyes, her life is every bit as remarkable as Queen Elizabeth’s, and I’d like the world to know it.
by jphilo | Nov 6, 2012 | Current Events
Election Day 2012 is here much to my relief delight. As a citizen of one of this year’s swing states, it didn’t take too much thinking to come up with a list of the top ten positives associated with the long-awaited end to election season.
10. No more robo-calls for Hiram and me from candidates, their spouses, immediate family, extended family, political cohorts, good friends, acquaintances, and pets.
9. No more surveys for Hiram and me of the automated or real-person-on-the-other-end-of-the-line variety.
8. No more robo-calls or surveys for our son who hasn’t lived in this state since 2001.
7. No more robo-calls or surveys for our daughter who hasn’t lived at our house since 2010.
6. No more robo-calls for Jayme, whoever she is, who never lived at our house though the Democratic Party is sure she did.
5. We can watch television again without hearing the same political ads over and over again.
4. No more watching television and feeling like a teacher trying to break up fights between two popular kids who keep calling each other names.
3. In a few more days, news reporters will talk about something other than the election or Frankenstorms powerful enough to push the candidates off the front page for a few days.
2. The sense of equality that comes from standing in the voting line with fellow citizens in our voting precinct. One person, one vote, regardless of gender, color, creed, class, or earning power.
1. When we vote, whoever wins, we’ve participated in the making of history.
What positives get you excited this election day? Leave a comment.
