Childhood is a faraway land...
October 19 2011, 9:42 PM
TIf you have children, there will come a time when the memories you have of
being a child will match up with their current age. You might think: oh, I
remember what it was like to be 6 or 9 or 12! You may, but it is a
different place than the place your children live in. When I was young I
drank lots of coffee and I watched lots of TV and I feared lots of things,
none of which my son (or daughter) has ever worried about. But they also
have limitations that I never did. There are a lot of differences that will
never be bridged. There are a lot a lot of similarities we still have in common. When I speak
to them, I pull out my old maps of that terrain and try to dust off my
notes detailing shortcuts, pitfalls, and sticky parts best avoided and pass
them on. I try to pass them on. Sometimes they jot them down, but mostly I
suspect they think that they live in a place-time different from one I ever
lived in. They don't, but they will not discover that for sometime when
they have become adults. Then they will look at the map of the places that
they have been, and they will discover that the ground they have covered is
similar to the ground I have crossed over. In the meantime, we adults will wave our lights and beckon them on. For
childhood is a faraway land that is more difficult to cross than we imagine
when we are young, and we can use all the help we can grab. As always, thanks for reading this.
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Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.
being a child will match up with their current age. You might think: oh, I
remember what it was like to be 6 or 9 or 12! You may, but it is a
different place than the place your children live in. When I was young I
drank lots of coffee and I watched lots of TV and I feared lots of things,
none of which my son (or daughter) has ever worried about. But they also
have limitations that I never did. There are a lot of differences that will
never be bridged. There are a lot a lot of similarities we still have in common. When I speak
to them, I pull out my old maps of that terrain and try to dust off my
notes detailing shortcuts, pitfalls, and sticky parts best avoided and pass
them on. I try to pass them on. Sometimes they jot them down, but mostly I
suspect they think that they live in a place-time different from one I ever
lived in. They don't, but they will not discover that for sometime when
they have become adults. Then they will look at the map of the places that
they have been, and they will discover that the ground they have covered is
similar to the ground I have crossed over. In the meantime, we adults will wave our lights and beckon them on. For
childhood is a faraway land that is more difficult to cross than we imagine
when we are young, and we can use all the help we can grab. As always, thanks for reading this.
-----------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.
147 views and 2 responses
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Oct 21 2011, 3:33 PMJoanne MacDonald responded:I suspect that your children's experience of childhood (and my children's) is VASTLY different from what ours was. Just think how much things have changed! I think that in many ways, it is a much more difficult world for children today compared to when we were kids. I suspect also that WHERE you grow up, has as much (if not more) influence on the kind of adult you become.
Kids who grow up in large cities are probably a lot more sophisticated in terms of what they are exposed to, compared to kids who grow up in rural areas or small towns. I'd be curious to know if anyone has done a study on this. Are kids who are raised in cities generally more successful or happy than those raised in the country? I suppose ideally, they should get the best of both worlds! :) -
Oct 23 2011, 6:36 PMBernie Michalik responded:I am not sure. I know growing up in Glace Bay, the town itself seemed vast to me. I recall when I could go up the street at night, and thinking: wow, I am along way (800 yards!) from home. Later when I got older, being able to drive around the town and then out to Sydney seemed like a big deal. To go all the way to Halifax for a high school basketball tournament was amazing. Each and every trip, the world seemed bigger and then seemed smaller. Eventually I got to NYC and then everything seemed smaller.
Much has to do how we think of the world at the time.