Why am I Writing My Memoir?

When I graduated from Central Piedmont Community College in 1972, the commencement speech was given by Dr. Lionel Newsom, President of Johnson C. Smith University. I still remember the theme of his speech which could be summarized in one word: “Change”.

He told the graduating class that there were few things he could tell us with any certainty, but of one thing he was sure—ten years from that day, our lives would be different from the lives we knew then; and in twenty years, our lives would be different still.

He urged us as college graduates to continue our studies in the years ahead in order to keep up with the ongoing changes in the world around us. I have found his words to be right on target. Now, fifty years after that graduation day, the world I live in is drastically changed from the world of 1972.

We are living in a new millennium, and technology has outpaced anything we could have imagined in the early 1970s.

TECHNOLOGY

Computer technology alone has created a whole new realm of experience, a world in which the average person can access any information in a matter of seconds. Entire volumes can be downloaded to a device small enough to hold in one’s hand and brought to the screen for reading with a single click on a keyboard.

Information technology has created the potential for the dictated, spoken word to be instantly transformed into manuscript, eliminating the need for shorthand or Dictaphone transcription (and a lot of paying jobs).

AI (Artificial Intelligence) abounds and threatens to replace human workers in many capacities. In fact, this is already a widespread reality.

From remote-controlled floor vacuum cleaners to computerized weather predictions to advanced cancer research, Artificial Intelligence is re-defining the way work is done in every arena.

Thousands of songs can be downloaded into a device so tiny it is not even noticeable and can be listened to anywhere, anytime. Cell phones have made it possible for us to never be out of touch with family, friends, or business associates.

With the advent of ‘blue tooth’, we can carry on a phone conversation while jogging or walking and look like we are talking to ourselves! The first time I saw a person walking along a trail in the neighborhood park carrying on a conversation with no one in sight, I was taken aback. You see, although I have attempted to keep up with the newest thing, technology has gotten way ahead of me and I can't catch up.

Meetings and conferences can be held with multiple members all in different locations, simply by tapping into a computer system meeting room. I wrote the previous sentence some years ago; so let me add that the conferencing functions have blossomed and exploded during the past 2-3 years due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The miracles of modern technology were not known or even thought of during most of the years and decades I will be writing about. I remember simpler, less complicated times. I will do my best to tell about them.

WHY AM I WRITING MY MEMOIR, AGAIN?

Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist of the New York Times, Russell Baker, wrote in his book entitled “Growing Up”, “We all come from the past, and children ought to know what it was that went into their making, to know that life is a braided cord of humanity stretching up from time long gone, and that it cannot be defined by the span of a single journey from diaper to shroud”.

At that point, he had been telling about visiting his 81-year-old mother in a nursing home and trying to make some small connection with her through the haze of her progressing dementia. Remembering some of the patterns of the relationship he had with his mother in his growing-up years, he told about seeing those same patterns repeated, in reverse, between himself and his own children.

These patterns are centered upon a parent’s desire to share the knowledge of his or her past life with the children, and the children’s indifference to receiving that knowledge. Baker commented, “Children rarely want to know who their parents were before they were parents, and when age finally stirs their curiosity there is no parent left to tell them”. His book “Growing Up” was designed to do just that; and so is my memoir in the making.

Just over a decade ago, both my parents departed this life, and already I cannot count the times I have thought of something I would like to discuss with them or questions I wish I could ask them. That being impossible, I have made attempts to talk to those few precious contemporaries of theirs who were still living, trying to glean some nuggets of their shared past that I did not get from Mom and Dad. Almost all of the members of “The Greatest Generation” are gone now.

Someday, I know, progressing age and dementia may rob me of many of the precious memories I have disclosed in my writing, or even make it impossible to achieve any degree of chronology. So, for my children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and future, unborn generations, I write what I remember about my life for posterity.

As I write, I hope to remember times and incidents that are still hidden in my subconscious memory. I am writing to…..

Learn Something

What I want to do is look back and discover what, like King Arthur, I can learn. Near the end of the movie, Camelot, which was filmed in the mid-to-late 1960’s, Arthur asked Merlin, “What is the best thing for being sad?”

“The best thing for being sad”, replied the wise old man, “is to learn something”.

If nothing else comes from contemplating and writing about my life thus far, I will feel like I have succeeded if I can learn something. I find myself somewhat late in the game, but the final inning has not been played. The time I have left can lead to a better ending if I make a new beginning today in ways that I can.

Now, I will begin looking back.

More to come….