The Chapter of Laughter

Who doesn't remember the full abandon of laughter we had as children. We would laugh until we cried or our stomachs hurt and sometimes we would laugh so hard we could wet our pants.  In our innocence it didn't take much to set us off; an adult falling, false teeth in a glass of water, an aunt whose wig was on crooked. How about singing at the top of our lungs when we went on school bus trips. Such innocuous things filled our day with humor. We had not embraced serious yet. The weight of the world, the financial pressures, the politics of working, were all vacant from our lives and we took our fun where we could find it.
Why do many people say that childhood is the best part of your life? It's because we dealt in such simple pleasures. Finding a shiny rock on the beach, making a sandcastle, stepping in the puddles, eating a package of M&M's, running in the yard and the whole of our world a virtual playground. Fast forward to our adult life. Do we step in the puddles, do we laugh easily and frequently, do we cast our eyes on the world around us, look up at the stars, taste the snow? As adults our life usually morphs into routines, responsibilities, serous conversations. Is it possible to catch the youthful exuberance of our childhood. I say yes.
Here is my own personal check list of how to recapture some of the unbridled passion of youth.

1. Put children in your life and see through their eyes the wonder around them.
2. Dance, even if it by yourself, and feel the rhythm and energy invoked by music.
3. Lay on the grass and look at the clouds. Conjure names to match the shapes.
4. Look up at the night sky and don't just go from the car to the house.
5. Visually enrich your life by going to beautiful parks, waterfalls, river banks and wherever your legs allow. It fills you up.
6. Keep happy people around you and never, never, get into discussions about your aches and pains. (Easier said than done).
7. Find a hobby that matches your passion with no end goal in site. Just do it for the pleasure of doing it. No benchmarks, no perfection quest, do it just for the joy of doing it.
8. Try to see the humor in everyday situations; not finding your keys, or even your car in a parking lot, brushing your teeth with hemorrhoid paste instead of toothpaste because you didn't wear your glasses. The list goes on and on so there are plenty of opportunities for humor.
9. Invite people to your home and cultivate your friendships. Remember your best buddies when you were young. Friends and family keep us going.
10. Whenever you can, perform a random act of kindness. Remember when you gave your mom a special gift and you felt so happy at her joy. A dollar slipped to a kid in the grocery line, an unneeded gift or recycled toy placed in your car ready for the right opportunity. 

Everyone can make their own list, customized to their springs of joy. We don't have to give it up just because were near the end chapter. It can once again be a  Chapter of Laughter.

Saturday Morning TV

Every Saturday we would all sit around the square, squat TV placed reverently  against  the living room wall. This was when our favorite shows came on; The Three Stooges, Lone Ranger with Tonto, Micky Mouse, plus lots of cartoons . One favorite was Felix the Cat, but there was great debate over which show would win out. Popeye was popular with the brothers as they imagined how strong and powerful they could become if they ate spinach. Tom and Jerry appealed to those of us who liked trickery and practical jokes. My least favorite was The Three Stooges because my brothers would try to imitate their antics which did no harm on the TV screen but translated poorly on the sibling victims. We were glued to the tube as a world of make believe and fantasy descended upon us. It was theater and our seats were ringside on the floor. When fights would break out over which show could be watched our dear grandmother would ask us to take turns. There was no immediate gratification in that so usually the most persuasive, i.e., the strongest won the battle. No mention of who brother D. was.
Then there were the commercials; funny, serious, ridiculous and blessedly short.
Sardo, a bath oil showed a lady stepping into a tub full of warm, silky water and exclaimed Sardo, take me away." To this day I use that expression. There was Superman touting Sugar Smacks, and so, so, many Coca Cola commercials that the refrain of "that refreshing new feeling' buzzed in your head long afterwards. Skippy peanut butter, Marshmallow Fluff, what home could be without?  Sunbeam bread with a lovely little girl taking a bite of the battered whipped or better described as battered and whipped,store bought bread.  Oatmeal was being replaced by cereals, sugar coated, fortified, emulsified ,mystified as Tony the Tiger and the breakfast of Champions became the focus of our grocery jaunts. Some of the tag lines never went away like: You wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent, Mums the Word, When it Rains it Pours, Coca Cola gives you that Refreshing New Feeling,- - -.  Many commercials were jingles  and worked their way into our lexicon of babble. Halo everybody, Halo or Relief is just a swallow away, or my favorite to dance to,
Hot Digity, Dog Digity, Armour Hot Dogs.  Advertising is all about creating desire and boy did we desire; cereals with prizes, toys with magic rings, and who can forget PF Flyers.
Commercials are still around today, in fact our lives are wall papered with them. The jingles have faded out, but the tunes of those 30 second blurbs live on in our heads and in our memories.

The Days of Mend, Fix and Tinker

Photo by Kieran White

When the guys in the neighborhood got their first car, usually a clunker, they could be seen in their yards with the car hoods up. They learned quickly how to get around the trouble spots and get the car moving. They would invariable have grease under their fingernails fixing pistons, carburetors, brake drums, rotors, hoses and water pumps. It was before electronics and chips made their way into the insides of these four wheeled animals and many of the guys got an early degree in mechanics based on his hands on experience.

It was a time too when appliances lasted forever and in the event they broke down they were fixed not thrown. A Hobart Mixer or Kitchen Aid was passed down from previous generations and on to the next. The Paul Revere pans were another example of built to last, unlike the dozens of Teflon Coated "advances" that found their way to the garbage can. The old pans lasted longer than the families.

There was also a certain pride of ownership that resulted in families taking good care of their possessions. You felt proud that your coat was that old but still looked like new. Shoes were were polished and mended when there was wear left in them. Furniture was waxed and polished in spite of the fact it was far more labor intensive than today. Pride, pride was everywhere.

Recycling was not a buzz word yet, it was a way of life. Clothes were passed to younger siblings, paper bags were kept for reuse, and even the string wrapped around the butcher paper was saved for possible future use. Garbage went into a compost heap. Rain water was collected in rain barrels. Glass jars were washed and kept for storage. Left over food was thrown into a soup. Wasting was a mortal sin. It was a time before large, extra large, and super large.A minimal amount of waste was the mantra of the 50’s household. 

Yes the emphasis in the 50’s was take care of, preserve, mend and fix. It carried over to relationships as well. You didn't throw away friendships and family members because of squabbles or slights, you sought a way to solve or forgive and move forward.
We live in a throw away society now; newer is better, don't fix it, chuck it. Some see this as an improvement but a growing number of our forward thinkers are urging us to go back to preserve, protect, and keep our carbon footprints at a minimal. I must admit I am of that school.

Learning to Dance in the Fourth Grade

We were in the fourth grade and a special teacher was there to teach us to dance. Our first lesson was the box step. We were matched up with young boys or two girls when there were not enough boys to go around. Our arms on his shoulder, his hand at our waist, and then we were off, one, two, three four, one, two, three four, drawing a square on the floor to the time of the music. I remember being embarrassed at how sweaty my palms were, or maybe it was his. His name was Gary; my first dance partner. I was so concentrated on looking at my feet I barely looked up. The teacher kept repeating the numbers and the music matched her cadence in perfect harmony.

Elementary school was more than reading, writing, and arithmetic. We learned social skills, team work, hygiene, and etiquette.  Our teachers were respected and our manners were not perfect but our pranks were innocent in the big scheme. We would pass notes along to our friends, giggle at someone’s’ mistake, and draw doodles on our notebooks.

It’s funny the things that you remember but I remember particular things about Mrs. F.  She was quite plump, with sparse white hair so that you could see her very pink scalp. Her face was very blemished and she would constantly reach into her bottom side draw of the desk and powder her face. To me she looked like a clown. She also was putting lotion on all the time. She spent as much time opening her side drawer as she did teaching. She was a nice teacher, but to my eyes, her ways were strange. She wore glaring red lipstick on her pale face and would check it with her little mirror, again stashed in her side draw. I don’t remember what I learned in fourth grade, aside learning to dance, but I do remember well her funny habits and side drawer booty.