Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Now and then

Sometimes memories from childhood are belatedly realized to be hilarious.  These memories are always my favorites.

My young friends and I were quite cultured.  Our favorite movies were Shakespeare and Jane Austen adaptations and we read books like A Tale of Two Cities and Crime and Punishment at astonishingly young ages.  So, it was quite in character for us to find repeatedly belting out the opening song from Much Ado About Nothing to be acceptable middle school slumber party entertainment. 

After a riveting reenactment of an Anne Frank rescue, eating loads of delicious health food and jumping on one of those nice big trampolines, I vividly remember all of us laying in Macala's pop-up camper, set up in their barn, singing the following:

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh nor more;
Men were deceivers ever;
One foot in sea and one on shore,
To one thing constant never;
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny;
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey nonny, nonny.

AND THEN VERSE TWO

Sing no more ditties, sing no mo,
Or dumps so dull and heavy;
The fraud of men was ever so,
Since summer first was leavy.
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny,
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey, nonny, nonny.

Evidently we were unreasonably disillusioned children. I say unreasonably because at that same slumber party I also recall an extensive conversation regarding nicknames for 'men' we 'liked'.  And by 'liked' I mean 'saw around town on a somewhat reliable basis'.

Kids' silliness is, without a doubt, one of the best things in life.

3 comments:

  1. "Kids' silliness," as well as being one of the Best Things...is the thing that gets me through being an "adult."

    Great post!

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