When my youngest daughter, Andreya, was 10 years old, she was busy as an online student with Northstar Christian Academy. She was (and still is) an excellent student and a quick learner. I remember in those days how I was in wonder over her ability to do well studying online. That required more discipline than most 10-year-olds had, I was so proud of her efforts. When I watched her work I would think, what was I doing at her age? I think we had the four-color Bic© pens (red, blue, green, and black) that were marks of being uber-cool back in my day. Also, I remember a folder called the Trapper Keeper©. Only the coolest of the cool kids, the uber-cool, had these folders in their lockers.
I was definitely not one of the uber-cool kids.
Hidden lunches
Coming from a Finnish immigrant family background, we thrived on frugal living and rarely wasted precious resources on multi-color pens and fancy folders. At the time, being a first-generation Finn, I appreciated both sides of the coin. I knew Mom and Dad hated waste. So, I managed to hide my brown-bag lunches of Finnish Rye bread with cucumbers and ham (a delicacy for me today) from the cool kids. They had metal lunchboxes and thermoses filled with Spaghetti-Os©. How I envied those Spaghetti-Os© of the uber-cool.
I successfully hid my lunch most of the time and remained generally unscathed from the mocking of any of my peers. It wasn’t my lunch that got me into trouble with the uber-cool kids. It was my simple #2 pencil, blue pen, and plain paper folder that gave them a reason to make fun of me. Why couldn’t I fit in and carry the newest and shiniest?
Courage to ask for the uber-cool
One evening, at dinner, I gathered the courage to ask for the coveted Bic© pen and Trapper Keeper© folder. Prepared for the worst, I steeled my nerves for the expected lecture of why we can’t buy such things. Instead, of a lecture, I was met with gentle explanations. Explanations of why, in the middle of the school year, we just couldn’t afford to purchase new school supplies. Everything that was listed in the supply list had already been purchased, we couldn’t do anything this year…but…maybe next year.
While I was disappointed, I left the table without a word. I knew that any pleading would be met with sternness as my parents were “old school.” Once they said their mind, that was it and I knew it.
Plain supplies making me the uber-coolest
On the bus as I made my way to school the next day, with my plain supplies in tow, I envied all of the other kids with their brightly-colored backpacks, lunch boxes and multi-colored pens. I felt the heat rise to my cheeks when my friend Barbara once again asked why my things were so “old fashioned.” I changed the subject.
The weeks rocked on. By the second half of the year, due to the many problems these pens and folders were causing among the students, the school came out with a new set of guidelines. These guidelines required students to return to plain pens, pencils and folders. Suddenly, I was the uber-cool one without even trying. The day this was announced in school, a collective, and painful, sigh was heard throughout the campus.
A lecture in simplicity
Later on that evening after the fateful announcement at school, I explained what had happened to my parents. I clearly didn’t think things through. When they heard my news, they proceeded to lecture me on about the importance of keeping things simple for what felt like (to my 10-year-old ears) an eternity. My ears only perked up when they praised me for not resisting their decision months earlier to not purchase the envied supplies.
Looking at my daughter now as she prepares to go into 11th grade, I value the simplicity our life here in Africa gives us. She sometimes bucks the system and wishes for a fancy gaming system or cool jacket. She would also like to be one of the uber-cool ones. But, she generally goes with the flow.
Thanks, Äiti and Isä (Mom and Dad) for keeping it simple. In today’s life of quarantines, closed airports, and political upheaval, appreciating a simple life has meant more to me than I can say.
I didn’t need the pens or folders anyway.
