I love my computer..BUT...

I love the computer....It has finally gotten me to write down my thoughts.  I love the fact that I am able to contact and visit with old friends on Face Book, people who I have lost contact with.  I love cell phones, no longer worrying about family and friends on the road.  I enjoy the Television and air conditioning.  All these things that make life easier are wonderful, BUT.... They have changed the way we live our lives.

Years ago before we had all these advantages we lead less complicated lives.  We had to go to libraries to look up information.  Who knew who we would happen to run into on our trek for knowledge?  Now we grab our iphone or our lap top and search on line.  Easy knowledge at our finger tips...BUT  no social interchange.  We socialize, but not face to face.  Face to face you can read the other person's reaction.  My grandson has friends on line that he has never met.  They play games and talk to each other.  He has friends that come over occasionally.  most of their play is in side and on line.  As a child we walked home from school and decided to play at either your own house or that of a friend.  Sometimes several friends got together to play hide and seek, or red rover, or mother may I.  Sometimes we would explore the fields near by.  An empty lot could become a jungle to explore, and drainage ditch a flowing stream with adventure awaiting around the corner.  We used our imaginations and lived our own fantasy world.  Hot summer days were spent enjoying and exploring the out doors.  We played in the dirt, and made pies of mud. We climbed in the trees, looking down on things that normally we would have had to look up to see. We tired to dig to China.  Mostly we hit water.  Our town was below sea level.  But the thrill of thinking was that we might just do it.  In the evenings we would take jars with holes punched in the lid to run outside and hunt for fireflies.  Other times we would lay down on the grass, smelling of the new mowed lawn, and gaze up into the heavens and marvel at all the stars in the sky.  A parent would point out the Big Dipper.or Orion's Belt.  They would make up stories about how the moon was made of cheese or say look up there can you see the man in the moon.  And behold there shining down at you from the full moon was that very man in the moon's face.

Without air conditioning we did things to avoid the heat of the day.  We had screen porches.  My grandparents home had three porches a front open porch, a screened back porch where we ate our meals during the summer hot months and a screened  in sleeping porch next to the bed rooms.  Even though we had television when I was growing up it was very limited and they replayed the programs in the summer.  To escape the heat we would go out and sit on the front porch in the evenings.  This was a time to sit and talk and to visit with the neighbors.  People would take walks after dinner and often stopped to pay a visit.  The ice cream trucks would come by sometimes and we could buy pop cycles or ice cream cones.  Neighbors were much closer to each other as they had time to visit.  The children played together as long as their parents would let them stay out.  When bed time came they were tired and hopefully the house had cooled down some allowing them to sleep well.

As a child there were no computers, and when I was very young no television.  There were radio programs for children on Saturday mornings.  Our entertainments came from reading or listening to stories.  We entertained ourselves using our imaginations.  We girls played with our dolls and stuffed toys. My brother played with toy soldiers or his cowboys and Indians.  Small metal cars and trucks rode the lines in the oriental carpets.  houses and forts were constructed among card tables and chairs sometimes covered in old sheets.  Three was an old magnolia tree whose roots were raised in a way that made the walls for small rooms.  Seed pods, leaves and flowers made food for our dolls.

Attics and basements were a fascination for our fertile imaginations.  Who knew who or what lurched there.  Boxes and trunks of old clothes, even confederate money.  All fueled our imaginations.