The problem with the ‘good old days’ is sometimes they weren’t as good as we remember them and rose tinted glasses tend to distort as well as colour our perception of the way things were. Compared to the present day it could be said the good old days had a lot going for them but usually what people remember are their own good old days, personalised memories worn and warmed by the passing of time. While wonderful and comforting those selective memories tend to create a false impression that the past was idyllic and trouble free.
Were the good old days less stressful and did life move at a much slower pace, arguably so, but again it all depends on who you talk to and the personal challenges they had to contend with. Some of my good old days were a childhood of poverty and destitution, living in a rat infested squat, becoming a carer at the age of ten with the responsibility of buying drugs for my mother who had serious issues with substance abuse, but it’s fair to say some good old days would have been totally different to mine and idyllic by comparison.
Trying to relive or recapture the past often leads to failure and disappointment. The past is there to be learnt from so we can create a better future, but we must ensure we are dealing with the reality of the present moment and not what people perceive the problems and solutions to be based on unrealistic and inaccurate comparisons of the past. The present isn’t perfect but it’s all we have to work with and the challenges we have to face as a community require us to deal with them here and now, and in doing so face a future we want to move towards not just for ourselves but for generations to come.
This town has a great heritage and it’s only right we do everything we can to preserve it but honouring and acknowledging our history is not the same as wanting to live in the past or be like it was in the good old days. Times may change but we have to ensure that ‘old fashioned’ values such as duty, commitment and personal responsibility aren’t lost, so together we can create a future to set a new standard of good old days for generations to come.
Cllr Phillip Hawkins
