by Paul Big Bear
Dear Friends,
Do you ever look back at growing up, when you do what are the high lights you remember? I have talked often of growing up in the country, swimming, fishing, paddling my small boat. Hiking, camping, and swinging on Tarzan vines, building a tree fort in the woods. No TV or radio reception. When the school year began we moved back to the city (actually the suburbs) where we had TV, a small black and white that sat on a table in the living room and was the center of the room. On the floor was a small throw rug, we had carpeting in the living room and the dining room but the throw rug was where we (the youngsters) sat to watch TV. There was a small radio in the kitchen; this was mostly for Mom to listen to while performing her daily house cleaning chores, dishes, laundry, making the beds, vacuuming, scrubbing the floors, and getting dinner ready.
Music was important in my growing years, on the radio, the turntable, or played and sung live. I had a box full of “little men; military, cowboys and Indians, an assortment of horses, jeeps, tanks, stage coaches all for my little battles. No matter where we were living there were two things that remained constant, eating. Three meals a day, breakfast was cooked and eaten in the kitchen, lunch was eaten there too unless you were in school, dinner was on the table hot when Dad got home from work and you knew what time to be home, hands and face washed and ready to eat. If there was a dessert Mom had more than likely made Jell-O, or on occasion Mom may have made a cake or pie. The other constant was reading, at bedtime Mom would read me the continuing stories of Uncle Wiggly, books, magazines, newspapers, comic books; we read anything available (cereal boxes were read), save your box tops and you could send for special offers all you needed was an envelope and a two cent stamp. Yes reading was very important, I remember the year my parents made the decision to buy an encyclopedia set, the world of reading that opened up. Reading took me to so many wonderful places, put me into adventure after adventure, and introduced me to the heroes of history, men bigger than life who built this country yes reading sparked my imagination.
When I married and started a family, I introduced my sons to books. At bed time I would pull out my guitar and sing to Harry, then his brother Ben when he was born. Music was very important and so were books, I read the stories of “Uncle Wiggly” to my sons along with Mother Goose, I told them stories, made sure that as they learned to read there were lots of books on the book shelves. The book shelf in my office were there ready to be read as they grew, the book shelf in their bedroom was filled with age appropriate books filled with stories to spark their imaginations. I am proud that my boys have grown into fine, educated men. I see young friends starting families with their youngsters and I must say I am sad for them, their reading, music, conversations, socializing comes through their mobile phones. The joy of holding a book in your hands, reading, turning pages, using a book mark, discussing what they are reading at the dinner table. The dinner table is now a booth in a fast food or pizza place or in the car with a meal picked up at the drive through window. Yes I grew up in a different world full of wonder, the excitement of book learning, and imagination. Music, books, movies, advancements in all phases of life are spawned from imagination a future that I sometimes cannot imagine.