Right now, I honestly can't remember my mom reading much more than "My Book of Bible Stories" to us. She read that quite a bit and we sang "Kingdom Songs". I can remember my mom singing some nursery rhymes and songs like "Here Comes Thumbkin" (a little song to identify the five fingers) to us. The singing and some other little childhood conversations/interviews got recorded on cassette tape. But we also used to watch Sesame Street, Mister Rogers, Reading Rainbow and 3-2-1 Contact on PBS quite often so maybe that rounded things out a bit. Even though my mom read WT stuff for the most part, I think the exercise in itself was valuable. They always suggest that parents read something (anything that won't harm them, even if its the newspaper) with their kids. I think that really sparked my interest in reading, which forms the basis for all other learning. I was very eager to learn reading when I entered the first grade. At the end of my first grade year, standardized testing said I was reading at a 6th grade level. One of my sisters, who was a year younger than me, would come home and show my other sister, who was 2 1/2 years younger than me, everything she did in school. She was reading before she entered school and ended up skipping the 6th or 7th grade. Can't remember exactly which. All that to say, even if the reading is all JW stuff, I think it's better than no reading at all. Some of my classmates weren't particularly interested in learning to read and it hurt them in the long run.
maxwell
JoinedPosts by maxwell
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6
What stories did you read to your kids, were read to you?
by azaria ini have fond memories of reading to my kids each night.
i have a photo at my desk of my son, then 7yrs old, reading to his sister, 3yrs.
in her bed.
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32
Do you think people are good?
by DanTheMan inis there any such thing as good?.
the watchtower taught us that all people outside the org either willingly or unknowingly support satan, and soon will die for doing such.
those are some weird goggles to look at people through.. do you find that wt misanthropy still affects your thinking, and makes you feel that the whole world is bad and hopeless?
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maxwell
I think people are mostly good as long as it doesn't require them to give up some of their own expected freedom or way of life. Whatever they feel entitled to. When I think of what happened to the Jews, American slavery, Jim Crow, it is hard for me to understand how the majority of people some areas would turn a blind eye to or even condone such evil. Still on the whole I think people want their fellow man to be happy. Perhaps that is why we in the early days of the US, we got twisted reasoning saying blacks were less than men or really were more happy as slaves. Some really wanted to believe that they were good and couldn't stomach the idea that they were making a fellowman suffer or treating him unjustly.
As I said above, I think it is conditioned on whether it impedes ones own expected freedom or even desires. So we have government and laws to in some ways prevent ourselves from pursuing our own desires and freedom to the point that they limit someone else's freedom. If you remove law enforcement, you find out what some "good" people are capable of.
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Were You Ever A Deep Thinker? ......Are You Now???
by minimus indo you find yourself thinking about things more in depth than ever before?
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maxwell
In my teens, I did sometimes spend hours thinking about stuff. About what was going on around me and with me. Then I went to college. I had 2 hours in my vehicle alone everyday. Sometimes I would just turn off the radio and be alone with my thoughts. And once, I took a whole day to just think about where I had been, where I am now and where I was going. I took a notebook and tried to map out some life goals and plans. I used some of the stuff from "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" Now I rarely spend hours thinking about anything. The time doesn't come up. But I do think I should probably take a day alone and spend it with my thoughts at some time. Not necessarily deep thinking, but just getting away from all the stimuli around me. There's a nice little bike path called the C and O Canal trail that stretches from DC all the way to Cumberland, MD 184 miles away. One of these days, I going to take a couple of weeks and ride the entire trail alone without a radio, but I might carry my cell phone and keep it off. The first time I do it, I'll probably stay in hotels but one day I want to do it with only camping gear. It's nice to be alone with your thoughts sometimes, even if they aren't necessarily deep.
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Sports and JW's (allowing kids to play)
by confusedjw inwhat are people's experiences here of jw's who let their kids play sports and the consequences for them?.
for instance did you know any kids who played little league or high school football or basketball?.
any canadiens who allowed their children to play hockey at any of the levels?.
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maxwell
I never played any sports. I probably could have made the 6-8th grade basketball team that played in my community. I had my growth spurt earlier than my classmates. Definitely the freshman football team. They always had a shortage of players. The freshman basketball team would have been iffy. The varsity basketball team would have been quite a bit more competitive and by that time my peers had had their growth spurts and I was no longer one of the tallest ones. I did play in the band which I know is frowned on more in some congregations. My high school band wasn't the best in the land, and we only practiced after school twice a week for 2 hours, so it didn't require the time commitment that better bands required or some of the sports teams required. I eventually had "privileges" taken away for being the drum major in the band, although they were returned later.
I knew of one guy who played on a tennis team for another high school. As far as I know he's in "good standing" with the JW today.
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9
Hot Cross Buns
by barry inas it is that time of the year, hot cross buns, easter eggs, bunny rabbits etc.
what is the wt teaching on this.
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maxwell
I never knew Hot Cross Buns were related to Easter until a few years ago. When I was taking piano lessons, one of the song I played was "Hot Cross Buns". My parents never said anything about it.
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A Rural Trend?
by Dan-O ini was talking with one of my brothers recently, and he commented on something he's noticed while travelling.
he noticed that a lot of kingdom halls seem to be popping up in rural areas.
i know that a town in the next county built one outside of town a couple of years ago, and the kh in my own town has a 'for sale' sign on the lawn.
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maxwell
I haven't noticed a trend, but the economic incentive/reasoning makes sense to me as well. I know of one double hall in Maryland that had 6 or 7 congregations attending there at the time I visited, including at least 2 DC congs. The KH is not right on the border. It's a few miles into Maryland near the Capital Beltway, if any are familiar with that.
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Movies and TV Shows You Didn't Watch Because You Were A JW
by minimus inthis week i mentioned how i never saw the movie "ghost" because it was considered "demonistic".
i also volunteered that that i could not watch "bewitched", although "i dream of jeannie" was a conscience matter......any thing you didn't watch because you were a witness?
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maxwell
I'm lost ... what was the reasoning behind "No X-Files"?
Aliens (because Jehovah only created *us*!), ghosts, monsters, voodoo, vampires, werewolves, mind-control, psychics, magic, violence...Exactly. The show centers around unexplained and otherworldly phenomena. Any otherworldly happenings that aren't attributed to God are attributed to Satan and his demons. So it was basically thought of as a demonic show by some. Of course, as you can see, there was not a lot of consistency in judging shows as demonic or not across different communities or even in my own family's house.
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Peak Oil
by DanTheMan in.
i don't know why i read stuff like this, but i just can't seem to stay away from it.. sometimes i really really really wish i could figure out a way to end my life without hurting my family.
i do not want to witness what the next 20 years is going to bring.. http://www.totse.com/en/politics/economic_documents/lifeaftertheoi172879.html
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maxwell
I didn't read the whole article but the notion that we will run out of oil by 2020 seems a little doomsdayish to me. I do believe we are using oil faster than it can be renewed. And yes it can be renewed. It just takes millions of years so in practical terms we call it an non-renewable resource. However, right now, I think oil prices are a little too volatile for the end of oil to be that close. A commentator at the Washington Times (http://www.washingtontimes.com/commentary/20040403-100457-9406r.htm ) contends that if the US opened up its own oil reserves, they could easily scare OPEC into thinking they might flood the market and force oil prices down. I don't know if that is true, but I do think that running out of oil is the least concern of anyone who is actually dealing with it on the market. If it was a valid concern, I think it would be felt now even if it was 15-20 years away. I do try to reduce my consumption by not owning a car, but honestly, the rest of my life is mostly typically American. I use a lot of manufactured goods, plastic and electric power that eventually fall back on the use of oil. Besides that I ride buses and rent cars occasionally. When I travel, sometimes, I use airplanes or diesel powered trains. I don't think the Western World is going to give up it their way of life unless they are forced to do so. There are optimist who believe technology will eventually allow us to either use the energy sources we are using now more efficiently or take advantage of other energy sources.
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Movies and TV Shows You Didn't Watch Because You Were A JW
by minimus inthis week i mentioned how i never saw the movie "ghost" because it was considered "demonistic".
i also volunteered that that i could not watch "bewitched", although "i dream of jeannie" was a conscience matter......any thing you didn't watch because you were a witness?
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maxwell
I was also under the "Bewitched" is bad, "I Dream of Jeanie" is ok rule at home. Now that I think back, I don't see any consistent logic in the rule making either.
I really have no interest in "Bewitched" or "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" or "Angel" type shows now. However one show that I do watch now occasionally is the X-files. That one was off limits before also.
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Samuel Herd Glad the GB changed its mind about blacks!!!
by frankiespeakin in.
i think sam is very grateful for the new light over the years,, because for many years the wt taught that blacks were,, defective,, and made very good slaves.
i think ct russell live pretty close to the mason-dixon line, to ever have a black on his board of directors.
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maxwell
I never heard or felt anything like this while I was a JW, but the freeminds website has several Watchtower quotes that I read shortly after I left.