Childhood Memories

Yesterday night, I spent some time stamping. I recently bought three new sets, so that's a lot of stamps to try! Today, after my doctor's appointment, Mom and I shopped for groceries. It was rather crowded due to the impending forecast of a "wintry mix" tonight and tomorrow. Anyway, I bought a few more storage bins and then came home and re-organized my bedroom office. Now with a clean office, I finally feel ready to tackle that Senior paper! It's actually been a busy week, so I haven't gotten any schoolwork accomplished, but I hope to do some before Sunday.

There is a book I've been reading recently. It's titled Jane Austen and Her Times, 1775-1817, authored by G.E. Mitton. I've never read a book related to Jane Austen quite like this one. Sometimes Mitton can be a bit technical in his observations of the 18th century. However, for any Jane Austen fan, it's definitely worth reading! Below is a quote I've been wanting to blog about for some time now:

"The impressions of childhood are invariably deep, and are cut with a clearness and minuteness to which none others of later times attain. Just as a child examines a picture in a storybook with anxious and searching care, while an adult gains only a general impression of the whole, so a child knows the place where it has played in such detail that every bough of the trees, every root of the lilacs, every tiny depression or ditch is familiar. And this Jane must have known the home at Steventon [where she spent much of her childhood]."

I've been pondering this quote for days as I observe Qavah playing and participating in the world around her. Children do pay more attention to the details of Life than adults. And it is fun to watch Qavah with storybooks! I love to read to myself, but reading to Qavah becomes an event in itself. Her comments add personality, texture, and attention to details that I often overlook in my hurriedness to finish the book. It's similar to the feeling you get when a 2-D decorating thought becomes a 3-D reality.

Mitton is correct when he exclaims that children know in detail where they've played. We've lived in our current home for almost eleven years. However, much of my "growing up" and "childhood play" occurred in our former home.

To this day, I still remember those play sites, sounds and feelings with vivid clarity. I remember my favorite indoor and outdoor play locations. On rainy days, Paul Burton and I would use laundry baskets and grownup fur coats to become lemmings. The basket was our home and Mom even let us eat some pieces of lettuce, like real lemming creatures. I also spent many hours with my home-made doll house that actually included two stairways and real lighting!

Outside, we had the coolest backyard with mini woods. On the side of the house opposite the garage we had those bushes that contain red berries. I remember as a little girl making dinner for my "family" out of leaves, sticks, and berries. It was so much fun to let my imagination explore, dream, and create. I also remember thinking as a child that my "play" world was just as serious, if not more so, than Mom's "adult" world!

In our current home, I have "childhood" memories of the creek and now our backyard swing set. I'm thankful to have a little person in the house again, so we can remember the joys of "play". As an "adult," my play includes reading, writing, computers, friends and scrapbooking. However, I often observe Qavah and think to myself, "Her play is more fun than mine!" Thankfully, she's always ready for me to join her world.