Sunday, May 31, 2009

Back When Things Were Simpler

Really, we've gone way wrong somewhere along the way.

Here's a photo of where I was standing at the bus stop last week. As you can see it is absolutely pouring.
Fortunately I did have an umbrella with me.
Unfortunately it was a small umbrella and I was getting soaked.

I'd also missed 2 of the 3 buses that go on this route, meaning at least a 15 minute wait.

As I stood there I watched car after car drive by. Cars with one person driving. And it just made me think of my childhood.

Those were days when no one would drive by you in a rain storm. Like the good Samaritan, people were more inclined to help than to go on by and someone would pull over and offer a ride.

But no one offered me a ride on this day.

Those were also the days when hitch hiking was relatively safe and most of us never locked our doors when we left home. Out at the farm when someone drove down the road, they'd wave as they passed by. If you were walking along, they wouldn't hesitate to stop and offer a ride.

I just thought it was really sad that as a human race we just don't help each other very much any more. We're all too busy and too afraid to stop.

On a positive note, my garden is becoming like a jungle after all this rain. My peonies aren't open yet so the rain didn't wreck them.

Purple is my favourite colour and this is my favourite iris. I get my irises from McMillen's Iris gardens in Norwich near Tillsonburg, Ont.

Have you ever stopped to look inside an iris? It's really so absolutely beautiful. It makes me think of church cathedrals when I see the light shining inside an iris. It's like a holy place.
I wonder, if someone had stopped on that rainy day to offer me a ride, would I have taken it?

5 comments:

melanie said...

Amen.

Kat said...

I love Irises! They are so mysterious. You probably would not have taken the ride, unless you knew the person.
I have hitch hiked a looooong time ago, and would never think of doing that today or want my children or grandchildre to hitch a ride from a stranger!

Barry said...

The sense is that it is not safe to pick up hitchhikers, or to be picked up by passing motorists while hitchhiking. The sensationalizing of rare acts of horror has frightened us all off engaging in acts of kindness, or from accepting that kindness can be offered for no reason other than the pleasure received in helping out.

How sad for us all.

Especially in the pouring rain.

thecrazysheeplady said...

I think that's the thing I like most about my farming neighborhood. We're always stopping and talking on the road, in driveways, sharing produce, helping bale hay, set tobacco or even, um, get called to bail someone out of the hokey pokey ;-D (don't ask - heehee)

Midlife, menopause, mistakes and random stuff... said...

I'm with Barry on this one......... things that are horrid are publicized far too much and it stops us from doing the kinds of things we normally would. The news, movies and 24 hour cable that scream the worst headlines hold us in terror at times. Its really a shame isn't it that it has become this way of late.
Your Irises are gorgeous :)