AS I SEE IT...

Evoking the Past

The Good Life

What is your definition of “The Good Life”?

I figure the first thing most people think about when defining the Good Life is - money. Money enough to pay all the bills, money enough to buy the latest and greatest things, money enough to drive a new car, and money enough to never have to worry about not having enough money. Ah, the Good Life.

When I was a child, every morning I would gather eggs from my grandmother’s chicken coop. In the afternoon, I’d pick vegetables from her garden. Everyday I’d watch as my grandmother would turn nature’s bounty into delicious meals. I do remember thinking she needed new forks. Her forks were sharp. Yes, sharp. Never before, and not since, have I encountered such sharp utensils.

Everything my grandmother owned seemed old and worn, like her, but as a child I didn’t consider her ways fugal. I remember everyone’s grandmother seemed to be just like mine.

I remember her old wringer type washing machine. There were no clothes dryers. We hung everything on the clothes line. I remember the fresh clean smell of the line dried bed sheets. There is a wonderful crispness to line dried bed sheets.

In my grandmother’s time, there was a sense of self sufficiency - a do-it-yourself type attitude. My grandmother never had a dishwasher. I don’t think she ever served anything on paper plates. I don’t even think paper towels, or disposable plastic forks even existed. Yet, I remember picnics by the lake. There were not any fancy plastic ice chests either, but somehow we managed.

Today, in the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, I’m feeling a sense of loss. Not merely a sense of loss of material possessions, but a loss of independence, and a loss of self-sufficiency. It has become painfully obvious that somehow we have become too dependant on government, and other organized entities to provide basic necessities – shelter, food and water. Why shouldn’t we be dependant on government? We pay taxes. We have elections whereby we vote our community leaders into various government positions.

For too many years, we have watched televised disasters, one after the other, in other countries. Collectively we have donated millions upon millions of dollars to non-profit agencies, like the Red Cross, to care and feed disaster victims. Our government has created agency after agency to address human needs in this country and others. All across America, for decades, private faith based groups have contributed immeasurable time, supplies, and assistance to various peoples.

Today, I am thinking about that Chinese Proverb, “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime.”

Today, I am thinking about what it truly means to be self-sufficient, and feeling totally inadequate.

As a child:
I don’t remember acid rain.
There were no genetically altered crops.
Mad cow disease did not exist.
AIDS was a dietetic candy.

Etc…

For all of our technological advancements, what has mankind gained?

Seems today, there are more drugs to treat sicknesses that never existed before. I often wonder if these diseases were discovered, or created.

Seems today, people are more vulnerable than ever before.

I don’t think I’m just being paranoid. It is with mixed feelings, nostalgia if you will, I find myself longing for life as it was many yesterday’s ago – a more independent, self sufficient time, when people actually had time to hang their laundry on a clothes line, cooked fried chicken at home, and didn’t watch so much television.