Traditions
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“The times they are a changing.” “Because of our traditions we have kept our balance for many, many years,” from the opening scene of the musical Fiddle on the Roof. These are both ideas about traditions from our musical heritage that addresses many thoughts in ways we can understand. So, is it progress or are we losing our balance?
People look for something to blame when we notice that a custom we’ve followed for years has become obsolete. At one time the seeds of cultural destruction was attributed to comic books, then it became television, now it is technology and the many devices attached to the medium. Wonder what it will be in the future when technology goes the way of all things. Will human beings be chipped to have information streaming into our brains at birth like we chip our pets in case they become lost?
Do you remember the following:
Having the preacher and his wife to dinner on Sunday after church? They were always served the best pieces of the chicken. I know once I wonder if the preacher’s wife knew how to cook.
How about taking a trip and picking up postcards to send to everyone back home. I have one from my grandmother from Paris, France. The only thing that is on it is my address. No one in the family knew she’d even left home.
Later she explained to me that she addressed and stamped all her cards while waiting for the tour bus and started writing messages. When the bus came she dropped the cards in the mail box not realizing she’d not put a message on mine. Today we send photos of travel jaunts over Facebook.
Letters. It is a thrill to get one. Texting “iLuvU” just doesn’t hack it. The love letters John Adams wrote to Abigail can still be read. While a virus would have destroy those treasures before the Revolutionary War was over.
When summer comes do kids have watermelon seed spitting contests? Do they even sell watermelons with seeds in them?
Did you play softball in the middle of the street using a fire hydrant as third base?
How about roller skating or boarding on the smoothest sidewalks in town, which were usually around the courthouse square?
A fun custom in country towns was “Up town on Saturday night,” peering into the store windows to see who was there. The first televison in my hometown was in the window of a furniture store. Everyone fought for a chance to watch that funny little screen bounce around with frequent lines and jiggles.
Then the thrill of them all — a driver’s license and the keys to the family car. The downside was that you had to take your siblings with you when you went, “cruising.”
