Kamis, 24 Maret 2011

When but a wee one, and actually probably into my pre-teen years, I hunted around in the yard for "things", meaning flowers, worms, rocks, tree bark, or bugs. You name it. I found it. I dragged it into the house. Other stuff fits into the "things" category I'm certain but it's bugs that brought all those adventures back to mind.

The yard was huge, or so I thought. Now it seems decidedly small. It was easy then to spend a day crawling around close to the ground looking for other forms of life. Bugs were fascinating. Therefore, I had a bug jar.

You had one too, didn't you? Mine rose from the stash of items my mom had stored reminding her and now me of my explorative childhood. Inside was a note telling what it was "First Bug Jar" Outside was just as telling for it was a Peter Pan peanut butter jar bearing a metal lid with yellow paint and red lettering delcaring "Mothers love it." Stabbed into the lid were the humanitarian breathing slots my dad made, using his ever-present pocket knife, to keep the captives alive.

Funny, one simple item from the past brings for the evening's fresh air smells, the hops of grasshoppers and chirping of crickets, the burning trash in the barrel, marshmallow roasts. Dogs in the neighborhood barked when my hunt extended beyond the yard and a pal or two joined me. Squirrels were often canvassing the same land as we were, and would chatter. That bug jar held many a firefly or lightning bug for I was interested in watching them glow not in smearing their glow across another surface to see how long it would last. By having a bug jar a child had reason to be outside. It was the science of life or the life of science; educational and imaginative.


Just wondering; me in jeans and my teddy
 What do kids do now? Are they allowed to get dirty outside? Do they observe?

I fear our senses are all becoming dulled by the invasion of foreign materials - the plastics, the polyesters, the stuff that lasts forever.

It'd be so much nicer to have a bug jar with a firefly and appreciate what we've been given to observe for only a short while. Then it would be the memories that last forever. I'm not just saying it would be the bug jars but the memory of what went into getting one made, a parent-child memory as well as the independence of a child on her own, not aware that big people were watching her as closely as she was watching the world around her.

Do people take the time to do this anymore?

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