The Friday Five: Looking Back

[smallhobbit]

It's presidents' day in the US, so in honour of the long weekend thefridayfive posed these questions, which I am answering although not in the US!

1. Have you ever been the president of anything?
No, although I am Treasurer and Trustee of Gloucestershire Bundles, a charity which is needed even more these days.

2. What do you think is the most important leadership trait?
Ability to listen to all sides, keep the differing views together as far as possible and still get things done.

3. What time period did you find the most interesting to learn about in history class?
I didn't like history at school, but now find it fascinating.  Over the last few years I've taken several free online courses on history, with an emphasis on European history and how everything connects, but also events worldwide.  The more I learn, the more there is to find out.

4. What's something you think about doing, but you haven't gotten back into in several years?
Drawing/artwork.  A few years ago J gave me a box of hard pastels which I enjoy drawing with, but don't seem to have the time.

5. If you could add one more random holiday to February, what would it be?
Stay Indoors and Keep Warm and Dry Day

Comments

[delphi]

That's a really great point. The lack of information about people was probably what had me uninterested in history class but reading a lot of historical fiction as a kid. I remember lots of timelines and maps from class, sometimes architecture and economics, but little about individual figures and almost nothing about how regular people lived.

I feel like a lot of Canadians of my generation retained a lot more historical knowledge from Heritage Minutes (a series of one-minute documentaries that used to play during commercial breaks on television), and while part of that is the medium, I think another big part was having human narratives to hang the times and places on.

[shaddyr]

Oh man, I remember when the Heritage Minutes first came out. They were such cool little snippets that made historical facts feel real.

[delphi]

🍁❤️