SUPPER TIME

HATTIESBURG AMERICAN PUBLISHED  SEPT 17,2012



Supper time a birthright
11:00 PM, Sep 17, 2012 |
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ON NUBBIN RIDGE and throughout the South, mammas yelling, "Supper time" always excited our ears. You see, supper time was our legacy. It was our birthright and central to our being.
It was special. It was a time the family came together; a time for holding court; a time for the wee ones to voice their complaints; to tell who was doing what to whom.
My mamma, after working all day, until dark, in the fields, would come home, fire up the wood-burning stove and cook our supper. Supper time was one of our great joys.
The variety of food was limited and the amount meager, yet it was a banquet for us hungry children. Sometimes we ate by a coal oil lamp, other times with a small lighted splinter placed in a frying pan.
Yet memories which have never left my heart and mind are the side shadow images which jumped around the dimly lit kitchen walls, all created by my daddy's hands. It is extraordinary what stays with you and how much leaves you before sundown.
I remember well how we children amused ourselves while waiting for supper. It was amazing how fast the blind bat could fly and avoid being hit by salvos of thrown rocks; more amazing, the bats would chase the rocks almost to the ground, apparently thinking they were food.
These values are no longer self-evident. In fact they no longer exist. Supper time went out with TV trays, fast food and family restaurants.
The parents, in general, permit their obese children to have their "Supper time" sitting in front of the HDTV soaking up open sex and blood-spatter violence, all while devouring super-sized Big Macs, chased down with 20-ounce Cokes.
Sadly, today's children know nothing about supper time. Instead, they are self-centered and mind-driven on becoming adults, using Hollywood-based people as their role models. Furthermore these ideas are supported by their parents.
The children are more concerned with lipstick, designer clothes and beauty contests rather than their ABC's and supper time.
This country doesn't need another 5-cent cigar; it needs more tree houses, rag dolls and Sears overalls but most of all, we need "Supper time."
Jack Knight is a retired Los Angeles City School math and computer science teacher. Reach him at knight3230@att.net.