This week's edition of Flashback Friday discusses something that we can't wear, listen to, eat, drink, drive, watch, etc. It's something intangible, but it is definitely becoming a thing of the past. I'm talking about summer naps.
The tradition of summer naps originated from our ancestors who worked out in the garden or fields all day long. They would start at the crack of dawn, have a big breakfast and work until noon when they would come in for dinner, the biggest meal of the day. After eating awesome food like fried chicken and biscuits, they would of course be ready to crash for a couple of hours. They sure as heck didn't want to be working outside during the hottest part of the day, so they would take a nap for an hour or two. Our grandparents who witnessed this firsthand passed on the tradition to us. I remember my grandmother making me take a nap in the summertime at about 1:00. It was in deed the hottest part of the day, so she said nobody had any business running around outside when it was so hot. She would fix a pallet on the floor in the hallway underneath the attic fan, and with the windows opened and the doors in the house closed, a pretty good breeze would come through. I would sleep for an hour or so, and then get up and go back outside to play until Mom and Dad got home from work and we we had supper. The daily naps were an unspoken rule.
Now with almost every home having central air conditioning, we don't really need to make the kids of today stop what they're doing at 1:00 in the afternoon and take a nap. However, I sure wish upper management would consider it. But I digress. As I said, naps are a thing of the past, but I wish they would make a comeback with the younger, moody generation. This brings me to something my Grandma would tell people when I was being a bit cranky - she would tell them in an almost whisper "She didn't get her nap out." Yep, I sure wish we had afternoon naptime at work. There's a lot of people acting like they didn't get their nap out.
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