Quote:
Originally Posted by Beeman
You hear so many talk of the "old timers" and hard work. In reality the older generations had a lot more down time and family time. Don't get me wrong, work was physical and time consuming but usually it was a smaller portion of their life. The checkerboard at the country store wasn't for retirees or welfare recipients. All of the drive to tourist attractions and motels weren't for the rich and famous. Sundays were always a day off and in many places Wed. was a half day. Sat. was go to town day.
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I don't know if you are speaking from experience or from listening to the "older generation" ... or reading ... but if you are speaking from experience, you were raised in a very different rural community than I was.
The original 640 acres of the Montana ranch where I grew up was homesteaded by my maternal grandparents. Most of the time my grandfather worked "outside" as a cowboy (40 miles away, horseback) for $40 a month and one day a month off to go home. My grandmother and the two girls did all the work at home, including raising a garden, which involved carrying water from a spring to water the plants, canning the winter food, requiring chopping wood and/or hauling coal for the stove and taking care of the livestock. The nearest neighbor was 2 miles over the hill ... next nearest 3 miles. Nearest store was 18 miles and "town" 60 miles ... transport was with a team and wagon ... in the summer.
All of the years I was home, until I was grown, married and gone, it was rare to have a Sunday off ... my mother and I managed to get to the local church maybe once a month if we weren't haying and cooking for a hay crew or out in the field ourselves.
There were usually three "community" get-togethers. The one in the spring was the day the community school was out ... 8th grade graduation (the biggest graduating class I remember was 3 students!) ... everyone brought a covered dish, there was a "picnic" and usually a baseball/softball game. Midsummer was the 4th of July ... usually at the "local" lake, which was about 20 miles away and again, covered dishes, hotdogs, marshmallows to roast, swimming ... by the time I was a teenager a couple of people had boats and we waterskiied. Sometimes in the late summer there was another one, if there were local kids that were going away to college and/or military service, but not always.
My family ... and most of the ranch families ... managed one full day/night at the local rodeo and fair ... it was a 4-day rodeo, always had a carnival, horse racing and usually some kind of night show.
My father really liked to fish up in the mountains and we almost always managed one 3 or 4 day trip to the mountains, camped out and fished ... it was about a 100 mile drive one way ... and that was usually our only vacation.
My grandparents went to town with the team and wagon twice a year ... spring and late fall.
Up until I was pretty much pre-teen or teenager, we probably went to town once a month during good weather ... there were times in the winter we were home 3 months at a time and picked up the mail at the county road (3 miles away) by horseback. (No 4 wheel drives or snow machines then)
By the time I was a teenager the roads were better and people drove more, but we still didn't go to town more than once or twice a month unless we had to go in for machine parts ... and in winter it was pretty much the same ... we went in if we had to but not otherwise.
There wasn't a lot of neighborhood visiting because neighbors were not close and most of the time everyone was working. You never got "finished" with everything that needed to be done.
and I sure laugh at these kids now days.
