Garrison, I connected with several things which you brought up in your article today.
The greatest pleasure and fun in life to me is learning and understanding things, figuring things out. Going off to college was one of the most important things which happened to me. I think that everyone should leave home and go off to college. In a perfect world, everyone would get a Bachelors degree in an art or a science (a real subject). Then they would study to be a lawyer, doctor, plumber, electrician, or whatever. Many people are afraid that they are going to learn too much; or study something that does not produce a pay check. College is not the same as trade school. A crying need in the world and in America is for people who read and think and think critically. I know that most people don't agree but it would be great to have a plumber who reads history or philosophy in his/her spare time. It doesn't hurt to learn or know too much.
The Summer after graduating from high school, I worked in a factory to get money to fund college. I grew up in a very rural area of the South. Two things in particular which really stand
out from going to college were that I had never heard or seen a live performance of a symphony orchestrate or a live performance of "Messiah." It was fascinating to see and hear both. Another thing was the college library. I could always spend a few hours roaming around looking for books and magazine articles on my current topics of interest. I still do the same thing but often do it on Wikipedia or a Google search.
Sooner or later most people will have to be on their own and make decisions for themselves. The sooner we start being on our own; the better. A good place to start is when we leave high school and go off to college.
The girl with the dog on a leash called to mind my habit of speaking to people. When I was growing up and was walking down the street and met someone, I would always speak to them. Say good morning or wish them a nice day. But I have learned to not do that, particularly if I am in the city. Some people recoil in horror if I say good morning and a few act as if I am a sexual pervert.
I don't have time to write about it, but America is becoming like Afghanistan. People say that Afghanistan is a corrupt country with warlords and religious fanatics. But we are headed in that direction with our divisive politics and dysfunctional federal government. We have our military-industrial complex, medical-industrial complex, student loan complex, Agricultural subsidy complex, etc. All of these industries which feed off the federal government and then lobby congress for more.
It is a good idea to be around young people. That would be the downside to being in a nursing home; everyone would probably be my age or older. I am sure they would be nice, dear people but I would not want to spend all of my time with them.
I was reading some other Substack thing where the author was bordering on catatonia because we seem to be at a civilizational change, and I wondered what he was so upset about. Our model for civilization never made a lick of sense to me...not that I didn't engage with it so I could put focaccia on the table...but I always have been looking for some more intelligent path forward, with a new path diverging from the destruction of the natural environment. Let the youngsters loose; most of them can see our model doesn't work for them, and I wish I could hang. around long enough to see what they do with the mess we bequeathed them. I can think of lots of things; I'm sure they can too.
This contribution, as usual, is thoughtful, and so true! So many of us are "worrying about jobs in which we're "disincentivized to break free!" What an acute observation!
I wonder, when they founded the Hudson's Bay Company or the East India Company, if they ever thought about the folks who would be bundled off to foreign lands, thrown on their own in strange cultures, and having their lives so changed that the thought of returning to jolly old England, or France, wherever, would become locked out of their consciousness?
My father was weaned and nurtured at the teat of General Electric. I wonder if the folks who worked for Thomas Edison in Menlo Park, New Jersey, ever understood that they were the prototypes of "Yes Men?" "Getting a good job and living happily ever after" became so much a part of Twentieth Century culture, I imagine many of us today can't imagine any other way of life.
Your last paragraph, about "The COVID Generation" and the young who will inherit what we've badly botched up brings to mind a book by William Strauss and Neil Howe: "The Fourth Turning." The main thesis is that each generation tries to compensate and correct for the "errors" of the last. For example, around 1900, with companies like General Electric and Standard Oil Company, analysts became increasingly alarmed at the power of corporations which were becoming too big. "Trust Busting" came into vogue. But here we are, more than a century later, and corporate mergers are being approved, right and left. We're moving into the dangerous swamp of monopolies once again. However, there are few people left alive who can warn us "youngins" about the problems they faced, "Way Back Then!"
For the Biblically inclined, there are several passages about "the sins of the father" (Exodus 20:5; 34:7; Numbers 14:18; Deuteronomy 5:9). God warns that He is “a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.” (Got Questions.org) To me that means that when parental generations make bad decisions, progeny can end up bearing the burden for a century or more beyond that. Witness what's going on in Afghanistan today! Or, to return to the corporate theme. Our current generations are so embedded in the corporate culture, that it becomes difficult to imagine any other way of "making a living." Perhaps our future generations would be better off if we encouraged businesses that had living "founders" and whose size was restricted to a level at which the head could know all employees personally. Just a thought!
I am a longtime reader, and I always love your writing, especially when you poke fun at birders or crazy political people (on both sides).
I'd thought I drop in to reasure you that not all young people are mad at the previous generations or deppressed about our future. I'm only 24, and when I look back at the past I see many mistakes, but also see so many triumphs. The world we live today is one that has continued through centuries of progress, and I wouldn't trade it for anytime in the past.
Don't idolize us young people! We will make as many mistakes as our forebears and maybe more! But rest assured we will also overcome the challenges that face us, just as they did. When I'm your age, climate change will be a quaint worry of the past, and more people will be living in even more sumptuous lives than they are now. So don't feel guilty and don't worry. Progress will come through hard work and ambition, as it always has. No deaths required!
A line jumped out at me here: "Fall into the pitfall of becoming social climbers..." I think I have Jean Habbegger, the beauty salon operator in the Methodist church I grew up in, to thank for missing that pitfall myself! I think, as an adult, if I had looked at my maternal parent [EBGV] from the viewpoint of those outside the family, she would have been seen as an "obnoxious SNOB." My father was an engineer with General Electric, with an income that made our family safely "Middle Class." EBVG's father, prior to the Depression, had sold vacuum cleaners, door to door, in New York City. During the Depression he had been the "House-husband" who raised the kids while her mother, my grandmother, worked as a curator at the Bridgeport Public Library. It strikes me that EBVG probably had some sort of inferiority complex related to her upbringing in a "non-male-dominated" family situation. She used to say, once her father got a full time job at the local YMCA, that he was a "Secretary" in that organization. It was only years later that I learned that his actual job function was "swimming pool locker attendant" - the fellow who passes a wire basket to the swimmers to put their street clothes in, then gives them a chit to exchange for their basket when they're through at the pool.
I think that her own sense of social inferiority had a lot to do with the harshness of her opinions about Mrs. Habbegger. The beautician had set up her parlor on the back porch of her house. Her supplementary income probably helped her family significantly. Even as a child in elementary school, I felt it was shameful that EBVG would go to such lengths to disparage another woman, solely because she was doing what she could to help her family out.
We have the gifts we're given - our mental abilities, our educational advantages, our financial foundations during our growing years. To me, it's important to honor folks for what they have been able to do with what we have. My swimming-pool attendant grandfather was a fine grandfather to me - and the only grandfather I had. I'm glad that, for me, he was "Grampa" - without any price-tag attached. I wish we could see each other more as "fellow human beings", and less as the labels in the back of our clothing: Armani or Walmart.
Garrison, I connected with several things which you brought up in your article today.
The greatest pleasure and fun in life to me is learning and understanding things, figuring things out. Going off to college was one of the most important things which happened to me. I think that everyone should leave home and go off to college. In a perfect world, everyone would get a Bachelors degree in an art or a science (a real subject). Then they would study to be a lawyer, doctor, plumber, electrician, or whatever. Many people are afraid that they are going to learn too much; or study something that does not produce a pay check. College is not the same as trade school. A crying need in the world and in America is for people who read and think and think critically. I know that most people don't agree but it would be great to have a plumber who reads history or philosophy in his/her spare time. It doesn't hurt to learn or know too much.
The Summer after graduating from high school, I worked in a factory to get money to fund college. I grew up in a very rural area of the South. Two things in particular which really stand
out from going to college were that I had never heard or seen a live performance of a symphony orchestrate or a live performance of "Messiah." It was fascinating to see and hear both. Another thing was the college library. I could always spend a few hours roaming around looking for books and magazine articles on my current topics of interest. I still do the same thing but often do it on Wikipedia or a Google search.
Sooner or later most people will have to be on their own and make decisions for themselves. The sooner we start being on our own; the better. A good place to start is when we leave high school and go off to college.
The girl with the dog on a leash called to mind my habit of speaking to people. When I was growing up and was walking down the street and met someone, I would always speak to them. Say good morning or wish them a nice day. But I have learned to not do that, particularly if I am in the city. Some people recoil in horror if I say good morning and a few act as if I am a sexual pervert.
I don't have time to write about it, but America is becoming like Afghanistan. People say that Afghanistan is a corrupt country with warlords and religious fanatics. But we are headed in that direction with our divisive politics and dysfunctional federal government. We have our military-industrial complex, medical-industrial complex, student loan complex, Agricultural subsidy complex, etc. All of these industries which feed off the federal government and then lobby congress for more.
It is a good idea to be around young people. That would be the downside to being in a nursing home; everyone would probably be my age or older. I am sure they would be nice, dear people but I would not want to spend all of my time with them.
Best wishes and happy life to all.
Succinct and sweet.
Darned no edit function....
I was reading some other Substack thing where the author was bordering on catatonia because we seem to be at a civilizational change, and I wondered what he was so upset about. Our model for civilization never made a lick of sense to me...not that I didn't engage with it so I could put focaccia on the table...but I always have been looking for some more intelligent path forward, with a new path diverging from the destruction of the natural environment. Let the youngsters loose; most of them can see our model doesn't work for them, and I wish I could hang. around long enough to see what they do with the mess we bequeathed them. I can think of lots of things; I'm sure they can too.
This is a great reminder of who we were and could become again. Thank you!
This contribution, as usual, is thoughtful, and so true! So many of us are "worrying about jobs in which we're "disincentivized to break free!" What an acute observation!
I wonder, when they founded the Hudson's Bay Company or the East India Company, if they ever thought about the folks who would be bundled off to foreign lands, thrown on their own in strange cultures, and having their lives so changed that the thought of returning to jolly old England, or France, wherever, would become locked out of their consciousness?
My father was weaned and nurtured at the teat of General Electric. I wonder if the folks who worked for Thomas Edison in Menlo Park, New Jersey, ever understood that they were the prototypes of "Yes Men?" "Getting a good job and living happily ever after" became so much a part of Twentieth Century culture, I imagine many of us today can't imagine any other way of life.
Your last paragraph, about "The COVID Generation" and the young who will inherit what we've badly botched up brings to mind a book by William Strauss and Neil Howe: "The Fourth Turning." The main thesis is that each generation tries to compensate and correct for the "errors" of the last. For example, around 1900, with companies like General Electric and Standard Oil Company, analysts became increasingly alarmed at the power of corporations which were becoming too big. "Trust Busting" came into vogue. But here we are, more than a century later, and corporate mergers are being approved, right and left. We're moving into the dangerous swamp of monopolies once again. However, there are few people left alive who can warn us "youngins" about the problems they faced, "Way Back Then!"
For the Biblically inclined, there are several passages about "the sins of the father" (Exodus 20:5; 34:7; Numbers 14:18; Deuteronomy 5:9). God warns that He is “a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.” (Got Questions.org) To me that means that when parental generations make bad decisions, progeny can end up bearing the burden for a century or more beyond that. Witness what's going on in Afghanistan today! Or, to return to the corporate theme. Our current generations are so embedded in the corporate culture, that it becomes difficult to imagine any other way of "making a living." Perhaps our future generations would be better off if we encouraged businesses that had living "founders" and whose size was restricted to a level at which the head could know all employees personally. Just a thought!
Hi Mr. Keillor,
I am a longtime reader, and I always love your writing, especially when you poke fun at birders or crazy political people (on both sides).
I'd thought I drop in to reasure you that not all young people are mad at the previous generations or deppressed about our future. I'm only 24, and when I look back at the past I see many mistakes, but also see so many triumphs. The world we live today is one that has continued through centuries of progress, and I wouldn't trade it for anytime in the past.
Don't idolize us young people! We will make as many mistakes as our forebears and maybe more! But rest assured we will also overcome the challenges that face us, just as they did. When I'm your age, climate change will be a quaint worry of the past, and more people will be living in even more sumptuous lives than they are now. So don't feel guilty and don't worry. Progress will come through hard work and ambition, as it always has. No deaths required!
Why add the defining phrase after the word “scullery”? As usual the writing is brilliant.
A line jumped out at me here: "Fall into the pitfall of becoming social climbers..." I think I have Jean Habbegger, the beauty salon operator in the Methodist church I grew up in, to thank for missing that pitfall myself! I think, as an adult, if I had looked at my maternal parent [EBGV] from the viewpoint of those outside the family, she would have been seen as an "obnoxious SNOB." My father was an engineer with General Electric, with an income that made our family safely "Middle Class." EBVG's father, prior to the Depression, had sold vacuum cleaners, door to door, in New York City. During the Depression he had been the "House-husband" who raised the kids while her mother, my grandmother, worked as a curator at the Bridgeport Public Library. It strikes me that EBVG probably had some sort of inferiority complex related to her upbringing in a "non-male-dominated" family situation. She used to say, once her father got a full time job at the local YMCA, that he was a "Secretary" in that organization. It was only years later that I learned that his actual job function was "swimming pool locker attendant" - the fellow who passes a wire basket to the swimmers to put their street clothes in, then gives them a chit to exchange for their basket when they're through at the pool.
I think that her own sense of social inferiority had a lot to do with the harshness of her opinions about Mrs. Habbegger. The beautician had set up her parlor on the back porch of her house. Her supplementary income probably helped her family significantly. Even as a child in elementary school, I felt it was shameful that EBVG would go to such lengths to disparage another woman, solely because she was doing what she could to help her family out.
We have the gifts we're given - our mental abilities, our educational advantages, our financial foundations during our growing years. To me, it's important to honor folks for what they have been able to do with what we have. My swimming-pool attendant grandfather was a fine grandfather to me - and the only grandfather I had. I'm glad that, for me, he was "Grampa" - without any price-tag attached. I wish we could see each other more as "fellow human beings", and less as the labels in the back of our clothing: Armani or Walmart.