Rememberies

November 10, 1483: Martin Luther's birthday.

November 10, 1975: The Edmund Fitzgerald sank.
These two incidents are completely unrelated, and I remember neither of them; however, it is good to reflect on their historicity.

Another anniversary is the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. I do remember this event fairly well, as well as its historical impact on the world. I met a German once who had photographs of the Wall coming down, as he lived in Berlin in 1989. The pictures were exactly like the magazine pictures, postcards, and news footage we saw in America. I pondered what it would be like to be at such an historical event.

There are pieces of the Berlin Wall everywhere these days. In the years after 1989, pieces were packaged and sold on the streets of Berlin. I purchased one when I was over there. Larger sections of the wall were sent around the world. A major section can be seen at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California. Then there are these sections in Las Vegas. It is a tale of irony and sarcasm. The formidable wall which once meant death to those who attempted to cross it and symbolized the divide between communism and capitalism is now reduced to this.

There's a lesson in there somewhere. . .

Those Were The Days

Rating: NSS
I’m not close to retirement age yet, but I still find myself bugging my students with “back-in-the-day” reminisces. Of course, they remind me of my age sometime. Just try singing “California Girls” to a bunch of 5th and 6th graders. A plethora of blank looks (and not because of my singing, mind you).
The other day Radio Heartland’s blog “Trial Balloon” had a post on TV and its humble beginnings. I don’t remember when television was new, but I vaguely remember getting a color set. I remember having 5 channels from which to choose—ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, and one independent. Most of the time the independent station and ABC came in clearest. The other three, not so much.
This got me reminiscing some more about the time I was in elementary school. Lutheran Schools have and have not changed a whole lot over the past 20(!) years. The school I went to is now down to about 5% of the student population it was in my day. Still, the education was good, and my teachers taught me much more about the Lutheran faith than I realized they were.
Technology has changed, but the struggle for Lutheran schools to keep up hasn’t changed. Our school had purchased two computers—Apple 2Es—and put them on carts so that they could be rolled around to classrooms. We could use them during free time. Our favorite game was “Oregon Trail.” The point of the game was to get from Independence, MO, to Oregon without dying or starving. There were no graphics; a player actually had to read the screen to figure out their progress. To hunt, one had to type the word given. It’s amazing how quickly I learned to type “blam.” Ah, the good old days.I’m not close to retirement age yet, but I still find myself bugging my students with “back-in-the-day” reminisces. Of course, they remind me of my age sometime. Just try singing “California Girls” to a bunch of 5th and 6th graders. A plethora of blank looks (and not because of my singing, mind you).
The other day Radio Heartland’s blog “Trial Balloon” had a post on TV and its humble beginnings. I don’t remember when television was new, but I vaguely remember getting a color set. I remember having 5 channels from which to choose—ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, and one independent. Most of the time the independent station and ABC came in clearest. The other three, not so much.
This got me reminiscing some more about the time I was in elementary school. Lutheran Schools have and have not changed a whole lot over the past 20(!) years. The school I went to is now down to about 5% of the student population it was in my day. Still, the education was good, and my teachers taught me much more about the Lutheran faith than I realized they were.
Technology has changed, but the struggle for Lutheran schools to keep up hasn’t changed. Our school had purchased two computers—Apple 2Es—and put them on carts so that they could be rolled around to classrooms. We could use them during free time. Our favorite game was “Oregon Trail.” The point of the game was to get from Independence, MO, to Oregon without dying or starving. There were no graphics; a player actually had to read the screen to figure out their progress. To hunt, one had to type the word given. It’s amazing how quickly I learned to type “blam.” Ah, the good old days.

Archeological Layers of Self

Rating: CNS
What was I doing? Cleaning—or rather it falls under the broad sub-category of cleaning (sorry, honey). Honestly, I was looking for some of my poetry. I can’t seem to find it when I want it—only when I’m totally not looking for it. Instead, I stumbled across random files from the past. I found high school choir notes and lists, a story written by a college boyfriend (with the names changed to give the thin guise of fiction), and some random thank you notes. Some of the items made me smile—pictures from a conference, some of the items made me frown—the B- that I received on the essay about Hugo Distler, and some items led to confusion—why did I even keep this?
All this brought me to two conclusions: 1) I really need to clean my basement. 2) Only illiterate people should clean basements or attics. There is too much stuff to stop and look at and read to ever accomplish the task of cleaning. I suppose even the illiterate are not immune if pictures are involved. Maybe the best thing to do is never clean the basement or attic. Sounds good to me!