When I started college, I learned there are certain kinds of folk knowledge that I am missing. Let me explain. After spending most of my life in a place like this:
I found myself living in a place like this:
My first experience living in a place with snow was... amusing, to say the least. Let's just say there are certain things that I take for granted. Take the liquidity of water, for instance. One Saturday morning I went out to my car only to find it covered in a layer of snow and ice. I happened to have a glass of water in my hand (I was quite thirsty), so after knocking away the worst of the snow, I thought I'd just melt the remaining layer of ice by pouring water over it. That clear, flowing fountain of water poured from my cup and transmogrified before my eyes into more ice. Oops.
Those who dwell in a winter wonderland a few months out of the year have folk knowledge we desert rats can hardly imagine. The proper way to deal with an iced over car, the knowledge of driving more slowly when the road is fast filling with blankets of snow, the proper technique of shoveling off a driveway, what to wear when temperatures drop below freezing—these are things I had to learn my freshman year.
To put my difficulties into perspective,
I read up on the Inuit, who live in the frigid Arctic. They had to develop ways to survive in temperatures well below those of a comparatively mild Provo winter. Everything from finding food in a place without plants to building shelter in a terrain without trees was knowledge gained and passed down from generation to generation.
It makes me wonder: what knowledge will we pass down to the next generation? We have no skills such as igloo building or ivory carving. We don't have to teach our children where to find game in the summer months or where to find whales in the winter. Skills like blogging are hardly necessary for survival. Will our children learn anything really useful from us? If so, what?
I hope that I will be able to teach my children the value of a well organized music collection on Itunes, the importance of having 100% positive feedback on my ebay account and if there's time maybe how to get a half-gallon's worth of frozen yogurt to fit on a Maverick $0.99 cone. Think thrifty!
ReplyDeleteWell, we still know how to fish. And the boy scouts are still around, so we some basics in other areas as well. They can figure the rest out for themselves, or find a "how to" video on youtube.
ReplyDeleteWowzer. I had a similar experience, moving from San Diego to Indiana. I still don't have good winter shoes, and I'm coming up on my fifth "winter." :P
ReplyDeleteWhat skills will we pass on? I think some of the most important skills are gospel-learning skills--for"celestial survival." Though "survival" now doesn't mean what it did for the Inuits, we do need to know how to "survive" in our world--go to school, get a job, etc.
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ReplyDeleteI love the questions you pose at the end. What will our generation pass on to our children? More than anything, I feel the most important thing we can pass on are our beliefs. In my own life, I have found that the values my mother instilled in me as a child have shaped my life far more than any academic or artistic pursuit. Our world is greatly lacking in morality, and it continually digresses each day.
ReplyDeleteThe task then for our generation, more than any before, is to teach our children what we believe, to give them something to believe in, to teach them our values and allow them to progress as quality human beings, conscious and confident in the choices they will make.
I'm glad to have a post come out that deals with fundamental survival within the elements. We sometimes forget that shelter is pretty primary, as are weather-coping skills. When I lived in Quebec, I found out that people learned to drive safely, daily on roads covered in inches of ice. That was a real survival skill, let me tell you.
ReplyDeleteObviously blogging is not a survival skill, but I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss our modern technologies' role in such basics. How would you survive without a cell phone? I dare say that it is as vital to most adults in our society as any fishing pole was to an Inuit.
I was interested by the article about the Inuits, and how after WWII Inuit culture began to change because of an increased presence of Europeans. In some cases, Inuits were forced to live in towns and to attend western-style schools. It's easy to romanticize lost lore, like ice fishing. But trading old ways for food and medicine has been a pretty good bargain for many traditional peoples.