As those of us born somewhat before and during the second world war reflect on our eight or more decades of life, some may be tempted or urged by others to write their memoirs. Personally, I’ve always resisted the idea, mostly because I didn’t think the details of my life would be of that much interest to others.
However, I have thought that it might be worth writing about how the times in which we have lived may have contributed to shaping the people we became... how we experienced and were affected by the events, people, literature, movies, plays, art and music … yes, especially the music, the madeleine of remembrances of things past, certainly for our generation.
Bob Dylan’s: My Back Pages
So, what I propose is not a me-moir then, but rather a we-moir, a “crowd-sourced” exploration of the factors that may have influenced the lives of our war-baby cohort.
And I invite you, my war-baby contemporaries, to join me in constructing this we-moir by sharing our personal reflections on the past 80 or so years of our lives: our experiences as children, what we were told, what we read, what we learned in school and from living our lives, as well as what we may have forgotten, but recall from time to time under the influence of some tune or other madeleine.
Each of us will have encountered many of the same influences, but we will each have been affected in different ways, sometimes very different. So, I believe that it is critically important that we hear from and pay attention to the experiences of people from a wide variety of backgrounds--- different ethnicities, races, gender identities, ages, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, religion, geography, etc.
To participate, just send me digital versions of anything you may have written about your life, especially remembrances and experiences that you believe may have helped to shape you and make you who you are.
These recollections may come from any and all periods of your life; and what you send may include scanned photos or documents and links to writings, photos, music, videos, etc. that you think capture some aspect of our times that may have affected you, personally. All materials should be available free online. For the purposes of this we-moir project, my email address is phkelman@gmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment