Open Writing

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Days of yore

Ah, the good old days. Things were different when I was a kid. We had plenty of things to worry about, but many of the most worrisome of today's health concerns didn't bother us at all.

We used lead paint, inside and out. It was the best white, longest lasting. Paint sellers were proud to advertise how much more white lead their paint had. Red lead was commonly used, as an undercoat.

Asbestos was far and away the best insulation. My brother and I spent several hot and miserable days installing loose-poured asbestos on our attic floor the summer before we started to Purdue. It was being rumored that cigarettes might be the most common cause of lung cancer, but not many believed it.

Smog, caused by using soft coal for almost all heating, was a nuisance. Indianapolis and Pittsburgh claimed to be the two smoggiest cities in the U.S.A.

Baby food hadn't been invented yet when I was a baby. Mom mashed up regular table food for me with a fork. Baby formula? Well, there was mother's milk, cows milk, goat's milk. Or condensed milk, probably the sweetened kind, thinned with well water from our untested shallow well.

Toys - some were dangerous, some less so. Tools, the same.

Pot bellied stoves got red hot in winter. You learned not to touch them. Guns and knives were normal household tools, as were axes, hatchets, sledge hammers and pitchforks.

Bulls and boars and old sows with pigs were part of the background kids grew up with. Even small-town kids were exposed to all these hazards.

Of course, we didn't have nearly so many bureaucrats

Advice not followed

I need to stick with things I know something about.

· Blacksmithing
· Beekeeping
· Hand tools
· Cows, pigs, chickens
· Dogs and cats
· Blue-collar and/or rural folks
· Great Depression
· Midwest
· Monogamy
· Army and college post WWII

This is a note I wrote to myself on July 29th,2002. Good advice to me. But I obviously didn't follow it. I suspect I was trying to write a fiction story or even a book. I'm a little surprised at what I didn't put on the list. If you were making a list of things you feel capable of including as background in your first novel, what would you list? What does that tell you about yourself? Would you take up some other occupation?

Carping

carp-ing (karping).To express or feel dissatisfaction or resentment. v.complain, criticize, grumble, carp, fuss, lament, whine, gripe, bemoan, bewail, groan, cavil, deplore, grouse, pick apart, moan, mutter, squawk, wail, whimper, yammer, crab, beef, bellyache (informal), yawp, squawk, kvetch. To raise unnecessary or trivial objections. v.quibble, criticize, carp, cavil, find fault, niggle, nit-pick, pettifog, pick to pieces.

This is from my Thesaurus program. Good old word. Under used these days, in my opinion. Sounds as if it could be applied frequently to describe what is, for many, their primary means of expressing themselves on any topic, idea, or characterization of an idea. Especially used, almost to the exclusion of any other mode of communication, by politicians or members of the national press.

I am already about ready to turn off, or skip over, anything to do with national politics. A straightforward presentation of ideas is almost unheard of in the pre-pre-campaign process we are being subjected to now. Carping is not informative, except as a clue to the mendacity and paucity of ideas in the minds of the candidates and their handlers.

I don't know about you, but I feel insulted that they think I will swallow their guff and never notice that they either cannot, or perhaps dare not, tell me what they would hope to do if elected. I have been voting for nearly sixty years now, and my hope is to find the least worst of a selection of candidates who, for less than obvious reasons, are spending relatively large sums of other peoples' money to represent all the people fairly, honestly, and competently.