Monday, September 5, 2016

An Idea from the Heart!

 This post is for those who are still fortunate enough to have mothers and fathers or sisters or brothers or relatives of any kind still with us. If so, you are very lucky, as most of my relatives have passed. This does sound like kind of a sad sort of a Blog entry.
I  would like to relate something to those of you who have the presence of senior family members available to you.

To Begin With:
 I have done a lot of journaling, diaries, writings.  I started late in life and I envy those who have diaries or journals from when they were 10 years old and continued on for years.  I didn't, not until I was retired and older.  I guess I started journaling in my 50s and I am still doing it.  Recollections of the past are a little harder as you age.  My five children will probably have about 12 filled journal books to read, not too interesting but may be a little insight of their mom.

 I bring this up in my blog because just recently I had a wonderful
visit from one of my sons. The fourth of my five children here for a visit. We started talking as we drank our coffee on the back deck.  He was  very interested in my life as a youngster.  He even set up his iPad to record as he interviewed me on different things that occurred during my years before he was even born. It was kind of nice to  answer his questions as a brought back a lot of childhood memories of my mother and father and best friends I had, most of who are no longer here for me  to reminisce with.

 I just wanted  my readers of this blog who may have still the opportunity to do the same as he did, to find out what their parents or their grandparents had to say about their youth and maybe  you will have an insight of them and can hand that down to your children. .

 It was a lovely time I spent answering questions he had, telling him and recording  the good times and the bad times of my youth. It did make me think of why I never ask questions to my parents  or my siblings, who were older than me , about family life back in the 40s, the 50s, 60s with them since I was the youngest of 3 girls. Some one older always knows more than I did growing up.

 I do believe writing journals or diaries about your life when you're maybe 11 years old if great. I wish I had done the same but what child really thinks about doing that especiallly now. I was more into collecting MovieStar autographs back in the 40's and 50's.  That my dear readers is a whole story by itself.

 What has been very popular for awhile now,  are the Ancestry websites.  Researching on websites available  but don't miss out on what is already there for you if you're lucky enough to have some one who witness those times too.  The next generation may not be  interested in blogs or journals or scrapbooking,that are the rage now but back in the 50's and being a parent of 5,  working at a job for 30 plus years made personal time a luxury.

 On Mother's Day a couple years ago I received a beautiful box from same son. Inside it were slips of paper and my first thought was why is he sending me slips of paper.?  I opened up this beautiful box and saw many slips of folded paper, written on that started out with "Thank you Mom  for..." There were a lot of strips of paper folded up , many of the things he wrote brought back memories, to me also. I wish I had done that for my Mother.

 So, if you have a mom or dad that are still with you, I would make a suggestion you try to do the same thing as my son did.  Take time to sit down and ask questions before they are no longer with you.  Then make a thank you box unexpectedly to send to them  or even a thankful box sent to a close friend . Quite an unexpected and wonderful gift:

 THANK YOU PHIL!

2 comments:

  1. First, two beautiful pictures -- header and the box of pink slips.

    More important, a very good post, should be read by many. I've been a diary writer since age 12, first 10 years of them are in the Schlesinger Library at Radcliffe and occasionally used by student writing papers about the period the rest are in a big old trunk. Don't know what will become of them.








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  2. Great post. I never have had a diary. I tried to write a journal but couldn't. It's hard for me to put my deepest thoughts on paper. Maybe I should jot down memories. We raised my oldest grandson (21 now) and he and I talk a lot about just about everything. You have a pretty great relationship with same son.
    xx, Carol

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