Sunday, July 3, 2011

A Little Sunday nostalgia

Every once in a while I tend to get a little nostalgic on Sundays, I often long for the Sundays of my childhood. I grew up in a community where people did not work on Sunday, not ever. Some didn't work for religious reasons and for some it was just an age old tradition. Not only did they not go to their regular paying jobs they did not work at home either. They did not mow their lawn, clean their house, or cook and certainly certainly did not wash their underpants on Sunday like I do. Sundays were lazy and relaxing, it was the day where you enjoyed the fruits of your weekly labors. It was a picnic from sun up to sun down, the best food was stored and saved for Sunday, because you did not cook you ate cold cuts (that means bologna) and fresh homemade bread and butter, and peanut butter and jam...and get this! Cookies, squares, pies and dainties...yup, cookies on the table as part of the meal. It was great, but I must say the day didn't always start off great..nope. Sunday was the day that mother wanted to dress us up (3 farmhands or Tom boys if you will) in pretty Sunday dresses, now this is a story in it’s self but just to give you a quick picture imagine trying to dress a wild alley cat in your little doll clothes....don’t forget the tights. I may be exaggerating a bit but it was not pleasant but after a few hours all parties involved got over it and we went on with “having Sunday”. Just because we were wearing dresses didn't mean we couldn’t scrabble through barb wire fences, climb trees and chase horses, or play baseball, although at the end of Sunday our tight looked like wild dogs had gotten a hold of them. Poor mother, all she wanted was little ladies for one day a week. She deserves a metal for the afford she put in. All in all, Sundays were great, reading books, playing cards, putting together a jigsaw puzzle, cross stitch pillow cases (just kidding) cousins would come over, or we might even go to the river, skip rocks, maybe fish, mom and dad would always have a nap, during this time we’d eat more cookies. There was no work, just fun and relaxing........and this is the Sunday that I miss, I want Sunday fun and relaxing, I want there to be food in the fridge and clean underpants in the drawers. I don’t want to race around like a mad person and still end up going to bed Sunday night with the house looking a mess. I am busy thinking and planning how I can organize my life so that I could sit in my backyard admiring my garden and reading War and Peace (have never had time to read this book) eating bread and butter, marmalade, jam jams and pie......and, here’s the biggy...be at peace about it. Not sitting there thinking “oh, I should have mowed the lawn; I should quickly do one load of laundry...etc”. So how do I get there? Is it even possible now in the 20th century to sit and relax for a whole day without doing any work? Am I even realistic by wanting this? I believe I am and I believe it can happen because I also believe that that is how it was meant to be. So where do I begin? It has more to do with me than anything else.....I need to get it together and get organized. So, grab your needle work and cross stitch and come on by my house and we will have ourselves an old fashion Sunday the way it 
was supposed to be. We'll sit here, on my new benches.