This can’t be called bragging

Golden!

Michelle has done it again in her post titled, The Value of Doing Stuff. Her post is a tribute to what I call life skills. Baking, sewing, growing vegetables, laying tile, singing, painting. The point she makes is that we praise the ability to buy such things over the ability to do them.

I think she’s right, and it’s our great loss. She recites a long list of her life skills, and then she writes:

This can’t be called bragging since none of these skills is held in high regard anymore. It’s like announcing that I know how to repair a wagon wheel or mend the stays in your corset. Quaint, but not much in demand. In order to fit into this century, I should probably get a full-time job so I can earn some money to pay someone else to make, do, or fix stuff for us. But I probably won’t.

I have several pieces of Mom’s needle point in a back room closet (and some by my first wife, as well). I have one of Mom’s stained glass pieces hanging in the garage. Thinking about this reminds me that I parted with a crocheted blanket Mom gave me. What was I thinking?

Michelle’s message, in my view, is to stop and reflect on what we hold in high regard. Is it money, or is it something with soul? It’s best to recognize the differences while we still have the person who did it, and the thing they did. We ought to reveal our own gifts, too, and learn to express them patiently and diligently. As I deepen my understanding of photography I also become more sensitive to the work other people do.  I have taken pictures since I was 10 years old, and I am now more receptive to learning about it than I have ever been.

Thanks for reminding me to think about this, Michelle.