Notes on the Kitchen Table: Families Offer Messages of Hope for Generations to Come - Hardcover

 
9780385490610: Notes on the Kitchen Table: Families Offer Messages of Hope for Generations to Come
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0385490615 ISBN 13: 9780385490610
Verlag: Bantam Dell Pub Group, 1998

Inhaltsangabe

A collection of answers to the question, "If you had to write one note for future generations to read, what would you say?" includes advice on the importance of hard work and lifelong learning, respect for nature, and spiritual belief.

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Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Bob Greene is a syndicated columnist for the Chicago Tribune; his column appears in more than two hundred newspapers in the United States, Canada, and Japan.  For nine years, his "American Beat" was the lead column in Esquire magazine.  As a broadcast journalist, he has served as contributing correspondent for ABC News Nightline.  In addition to To Our Children's Children, his national bestsellers include Hang Time: Days and Dreams with Michael Jordan, Be True to Your School, and Good Morning, Merry Sunshine.

D.G. Fulford is a freelance journalist and award-winning former columnist for the Los Angeles Daily News and the New York Times News Service.  Greene and Fulford are brother and sister.

D. G. Fulford is a former columnist for the Los Angeles Daily News and the New York Times News Service.

Aus dem Klappentext

"If you had to write a note--one note--and leave it propped against the sugar bowl on your kitchen table for future generations to read, what would you say in that note?"

This simple question appeared at the end of To Our Children's Children, a book that made writing a personal or family history as easy as writing a letter, and went on to become a contemporary classic.

Notes on the Kitchen Table is a heartwarming collection of the answers that poured in to authors Bob Greene and his sister, D. G. Fulford, from all over the country. They record the importance of kindness and hard work ("Keep your feet dry!"--Harold Meyer, Fargo, North Dakota), of spiritual belief and respect for nature, of honesty and integrity and lifelong learning ("Take time to sit and dream."--Dorothy O'Malley, Merrillville, Indiana). They praise risk-taking and acknowledge adversity and imperfection ("If you can't be thankful for what you have, be thankful for what you've escaped."--Alma Maisel, Martinsburg, West Virginia). They are words carried as tattered relics in wallets, or attached with reverence to refrigerator doors.

Rich with anecdotes and thumbnail profiles of many contributors, Notes on the Kitchen Table is a gift of love--plainspoken, generous, and resonant with the true meaning of family.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Firstly

The voices that come from the hearts of families can be  wondrous.

When we wrote To Our Children's Children, our intention was a simple  one. The book was a collection of over one thousand questions, meant to be  small, precise and evocative, offering readers a way to tell family stories  through the pleasurable act of remembering.

The idea behind the book was that recording a personal history can be as easy  as writing a letter. With the questions in the book providing a starting point,  we wanted families to sit down and tell the stories of their own  lives--to pass down those stories to generations to come. Hundreds of  thousands of families have done just that--have used the book to pass  along family treasures made of words.

At the end of the book, we asked an additional question:

If you had to write a note--one note--and leave it propped against  the sugar bowl on your kitchen table for future generations to read, what would  you say in that note?

Families took the time to answer that question, and put those answers in the  mail to us. Notes arrived on engraved stationery, on lined notebook paper, on  cards decorated with flowers and pictures of kittens. Some were typed, some  were handwritten, some were sent by sons or granddaughters or  in-laws.

Some were written in classes held at senior centers or continuing education  facilities.

Some were written in bed.

Some at the kitchen table.

These notes came from all over the country and straight from the senders'  hearts; from men and women to children they love and to grandchildren not yet  born. These were echoes consciously preserved, meant to sound anew in the  future. They were messages from a world of hope, of kept promises and back  screen doors.

People of all generations took the time to record the importance of kindness  and hard work, of spiritual belief and respect for nature, of honesty and  integrity and lifelong learning. They praised risk-taking and acknowledged  adversity and imperfection. They spoke of a need for tolerance and forgiveness,  both for oneself and for others. They quoted their own parents and  grandparents; they quoted George Washington Carver and William  Blake.

They gave of themselves, to their children and to their children's  children--and to all of us. They provided abundant evidence of the  enduring strength of family love, both for those lucky enough to have it, and  for those aspiring to build such a foundation themselves.

This book is the result of their notes on the kitchen table. The words of the  men and women who wrote notes are here, as are brief stories about many of  their lives--amplification of the events that have shaped them and their  families. We received far too many notes for us to publish all of them in this  volume; in addition to the notes we were able to include, we have tried to  summarize some of the spirit behind the notes. The messages both said and  unsaid.

They are, we have found and truly believe, the values that families live by and  wish to pass along.


  Foreword

If you should be the one to read,
This note upon the table,
Come in, sit down, rest awhile,
Slowly sip a cup of coffee or tea,
Or perhaps you prefer a Pepsi,
Relax, think happy thoughts, and smile,
As you ponder here awhile,
Think of your blessings,
Counting them one by one,
And, when you are rested, refreshed and able,
Give yourself a hug from me,
Then as you leave, please close the door,
Knowing it was for you especially,
I left this note upon the table.
Signed with love, from me.

Bernice Whitlock, Atalissa, Iowa

Bernice Whitlock is a farmer's daughter, born in Iowa. She was widowed  at age sixty-nine after fifty years of marriage. She remarried seven years after that. She wrote this poem on the day before her seventy-fourth birthday. She has three children and six grandchildren.


Inheritance

To our family's future generations:

This is a letter to my future, from your past. If I could know you,  impart some things to you, these would be my thoughts:

I'd want you to know that you were loved, you future generations, even before  you were born.

That you were considered in the way our family lives its lives now, in the  choices we make and in our attempts to preserve a family history and to keep  our extended family strongly connected. We've traced our genealogy to the year  1760 in Syria. How lucky you are to have this recorded history to explore! I  hope you will do so with the same sense of discovery and awe that I have felt.  Even as I write this, I am picturing how full and beautifully varied our family  tree will be as you add your name.

Some say that the world is in decline and that there will be nothing left of  the environment or civilized society in the future. For some reason, I've never  felt that at all. It's true that much is wrong with the world, but in everything there is hope. Three months ago I had a nearly fatal car accident; today my front yard is an explosion of daffodils and a new baby was born into our family two weeks ago. I'm not afraid for you. God is obviously at work.

Love,

Victoria Louise Tamoush
Tujunga, California


Victoria Tamoush is forty-one and has four nieces and nephews.

"I didn't know if I was going to live," she says. "I started thinking about  all these meetings I couldn't attend, all these committees. And I thought about  someday quitting them completely, either because I was too tired to go anymore,  or by dying. And I thought I would stop someday and none of it would have  mattered. I thought what would matter is saying something to future  generations. I thought one day one of them would pick up a photograph and say,  "Here's our relation, Aunt Vicky,' and wonder what I was like. I used to wonder  that all the time about pictures of my own family. Generations ago, my  relatives were nonliterate. They couldn't have left a note for me."



  

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Verlag
Bantam Dell Pub Group
Erscheinungsdatum
1998
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0385490615
ISBN 13 
9780385490610
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
176
Herausgeber
Greene Bob, Fulford D. G.
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar

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