Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Not Pioneer Stock...or feet

I've decided I would never have made a good pioneer. I can't handle heat very well. Trecking across the plains in the blazing sun, wearing three layers of clothing and long sleeves with a bonnet would have done me in. Let alone the shoes! I would have been one of those will calused soles of at least an inch thick walking the whole trail without shoes. ugh.
And the cooking? Every meal a dutch oven surprise? Wouldn't have happened after the first two months. Then I would have been telling everyone to make sure the buffalo meat got dried, cause I wouldn't be cooking anymore. My favorite summer meal is pasta salad and lemonade. How often do you think they had lemonade?
Let alone the winters...tramping through snow with no shoes and nothing but blankets would have done me in as well. I guess I'm a wimp all the way around.
Then let's talk about city life. Getting to Salt Lake, they didn't have real civilization until they'd been there for about 10 years. And then, the outside world didn't really invade until the rail road made it through. I've got this problem with mail, see, I like to get it all the time. I would have felt sooo isolated--I was born in the city.
I figure that's okay though...Pioneers would probably have been way confused and frustrated with our lifestyle. I mean, a cell phone? Why would you want to have contact with your children while they were in the forest relieving themselves? ewe! Let alone a car--that would have been way beyond their comprehension. Let's see how they would have done changing a tire in the middle of a snowstorm without an overpass to protect them from the snow or slush flung by passing cars... Or working at a job they didn't necessarily like for 8 hours a day, with an hour commute in rush hour to get home and sit in front of a television which showed 'reality' shows and how other people had more money than they did.
Let's face it, everyone had more money than the pioneers. That would have been no reality show, it would have been life.
I don't know. It just amazes me how these people had the strength and fortitude to make that journey and live during the time period they lived in. Makes you wonder what we could do if we put our minds to it. What kind of inner strengths do we have? What kind of feats could we pull off?
Interesting to think about, isn't it? Have a good one!

2 comments:

Karlene said...

I volunteered to go on the trek this year and DIE the first day. I thought it would be a helpful experience to some of the kids there, and also a true representation of what would have happened to me had I been a pioneer. No one took me up on the offer. That's probably a good thing because in this heat I really would die. (ack!)

G. Parker said...

Oh for sure!!! (grin) I like the idea of being one of the ones to die...I'll have to remember that. ;)

Wow... really??

so - I didn't realize it has been that long since my last post.  I think I kind of gave up on it, knowing I don't have many follower...