Gee Whiz, What A Life! — Jim Lewis

A note to parents who read these stories (perhaps with your children):



Kids today face an amazing collection of pressures and challenges. They are

bombarded with vast amounts of information, are presented with countless

choices, and are closely surrounded by a society that, in many respects, seems

to be falling apart at the seams. However, far too much is made, in my opinion,

of the particular challenges young people face in different times. Human

experience might come in different packages, yet there is an underlying

continuity. The challenges my father experienced growing up in the forties

and fifties are somehow strangely familiar to that of my own growing up in

the eighties and nineties. I know this, in part, because I have read and

enthusiastically enjoyed these “Boyhood Chronicles”. In them I think that

you too can re-experience with your young son or daughter some of the

challenges that, in accordance with how we respond to them, define the quality

of people we become.



A note for kids who read theses stories:



It might be hard for you to imagine a time when kids your age were not always

instantly connected to friends and random videos (texting, YouTube, etc.).

However, let me suggest to you that it is a time worth remembering. Reading

a book slows things down, so uncomfortably slow for our day when we expect

everything “fast and furious”. Yet in this slowing comes a way of understanding

life that we would miss had we not put down our IPOD's and turned off our

TV's. Unplug from the endless stale stories of celebrities and plug into real

life. That's what I felt as I read these “Boyhood Chronicles”. I trust that you

will feel the same too. Enjoy!



Kirt Lewis (Jim's youngest son)

Assoc. Pastor, American River Community Church,

Carmichael, CA