Little House On The Prairie...

I always watched Little House On the Prairie as a kid and loved it. It always had a heart felt message and lesson to be learned. It wasn’t a “cool” show and I always cried at the 8:40 PM mark.  You could set your watch by it.  My brother counted on it, because then he would crack up laughing as I got a tissue to dry the flowing tears. Now that was good, wholesome television the whole family could watch together and take away something important from it.

Because it was based on a true story, it meant all that much more to me.  How far we have come from those days where life was so much simpler and yet they seemed happier and more fulfilled.  The father went out to work or to find work.  He worked hard.  Then he would come home and take care of his farm.  The mother took care of the children, the laundry, the cooking, and if her husband didn’t have enough time for farming she would even go out and try to do some of it for him.  The girls went to school and came home to help with chores.  Everyone worked.  No one minded or complained about it.

The thing I loved most was how the family unit was so close.  The parents were “partners” in life and worked together to raise their family.  They were devoted to each other and put each other first.  They got up at the crack of dawn together and went to bed early. They discussed parenting, finances, how to help other people.  They took their family to church.  They taught their children to be respectful of others.  Their girls were always polite and well mannered.  They all ate dinner together, spent some quality time talking, laughing, singing and then it was bedtime.  They all said their good nights, hugs and kisses and the girls were tucked in.  

Sometimes, I wish I could trade in everything to live life like they did on the show.  The simplicity appeals to me.  You know what to expect everyday.  You are surrounded by people who love you and who you love. Family came first.  There were no material or technological distractions.  There was just your few personal possessions and your family and friends.  

And, at Christmas time, they would make each other gifts or find a few pennies to buy something special.  Maybe they all got one gift each, and one simple gift was enough.  Maybe it was a scarf, a shirt, a dress, a doll. No matter what it was, they were happy with it and thankful for being together. 

Have we really made progress or set ourselves back?  You tell me.

Simpler Times...

You know before there were computers, and ipads and ipods and iphones and androids, and wii’s and x-boxes, there was other stuff.  When we were kids, back in the prehistoric ages, we played board games for fun.  We had to watch the Wizard of Oz once a year, when it was televised, there were no DVDs.  We had to read real books from the library, there was no world wide web or Kindle to download books our books.  TV dinners had to be warmed up in the oven, there were no microwaves.  You need to use pay phones, there were no cell phones.  You had to know how to read maps, there were no GPS systems.  You had to type all your reports on manual or electric typewriters and if you made a mistake you needed “white-out” to correct it because it wasn’t saved in memory and there was no backspace/delete function.  Life was much simpler back then somehow, even though it sounds harder.

I remember many times when my mother would stop at the 5 & 10 cents store and pick up a tiny item for me, like a little Red Riding Hood doll that was two inches tall.  I made such a fuss over it, you would think she had gotten me something huge, but it only cost a few cents and it made me happy.  My mother would get a kick out of our reactions to these little surprises out of the blue.  One day, when I came home for lunch, she made me delicious lamb chops.  I didn’t know then how lucky I was.  I ate up all my meal and drank my soda and then she said to me, look under your plate.  She had purchased a pack of Beatle cards and hid them under the plate for me to find.  Little things like that meant so much.  I can just imagine if I were to pick up something like that for my kids.  I have always made it a habit of picking up things for them over the years, if I saw something I thought they would enjoy, but their reaction would never rise to the level mine did as a kid.  Today kids have so much more of everything, so only the best gifts get any kind of reaction from them.  I have tried every year to make sure they find something under the tree worthy of a big reaction of surprise.  It isn’t easy.  This year I just may fail.  After a while you run out of ideas and stuff to get.  I usually have most of my shopping done by this time of the year, instead I have bought next to nothing so far.

Even as the girls get older and say they don’t care so much about Christmas and surprises, I know that’s not true. I know we all still have that little kid inside, who wants to open a gift and be blown away.  No one wants to open a package and find socks, underwear or pajamas in it.  Did you ever hear anyone yell out, “Yay, my favorite socks!”

I hope I figure something out soon.  Meanwhile, maybe I better start window shopping online and see if anything jumps out at me.  If not it’s going to be a socks and underwear kind of Christmas!