PEOPLE OVER 30
HS
923 Posts
According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who were kids in the 40's, 50's, 60's or even maybe the early 70's probably shouldn't have survived.
Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. (Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.)
As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat. We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors! We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this. We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, videotape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms. We had friends. We went outside and found them. We played dodge ball, and sometimes, the ball would really hurt. We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame but us. Remember accidents?
We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it. We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them. Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.
Some students weren't as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade. Horrors! Tests were not adjusted for any reason. Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected.
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law. Imagine that! This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever.
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. And you're one of them!
Congratulations.
Please pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before lawyers and government regulated our lives, for our own good.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors. x:D
Our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets. (Not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.)
As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat. We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. Horrors! We ate cupcakes, bread and butter, and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were always outside playing.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this. We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then rode down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, videotape movies, surround sound, personal cell phones, personal computers, or Internet chat rooms. We had friends. We went outside and found them. We played dodge ball, and sometimes, the ball would really hurt. We fell out of trees, got cut and broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame but us. Remember accidents?
We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it. We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rang the bell or just walked in and talked to them. Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.
Some students weren't as smart as others, so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade. Horrors! Tests were not adjusted for any reason. Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected.
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law. Imagine that! This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever.
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. And you're one of them!
Congratulations.
Please pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before lawyers and government regulated our lives, for our own good.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors. x:D
Comments
>were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us
>all day. No cell phones. Unthinkable!
When I tell young mothers about this, they are horrified. My brothers and I only came home to sleep. Someone's mother, somewhere, would provide peanut butter sandwiches (no ?'s about peanut allergies) and some kool-aid.
Ahhh, the good old days!
Anne in Ohio
Crazy? Who's crazy, not me myself or I! 8-}
Lawsuits unhead of - accident were that - just accidents.
We always played outside with friends. TV was something you looked at in the evenings with your family. We weren't allowed to sit in front of the TV in the summertime. We had (God Forbid!) chores to do around the house and they better damned well be done when mom got home from work. When you got old enough, you were expected to go out and make your own spending money or work was found for you via your parents. I remember my mom used to frequent a little dress shop on Main Street and I suddenly found myself working there on Saturdays and holidays. (No stores were open on Sundays then).
I grew up with the same friends and we are still friends today. You could just drop in to a friend's house. We spent out time on weekends visiting in each other's homes or riding around the local drivein on Friday and Saturday nights. Kids could run free on the streets and you could let your kids get lost in department stores and not worry that someone had kidnapped them.
I grew up in a small town where locking your doors was unheard of Windows and doors were left open in nice weather and you never even thought about someone coming in to rob you or hurt you.
Remember visiting with my cousins and walking to a little neighborhood grocery store where the owner had snow cones that he gave out to the neighborhood kids when they came in to pick up things for the families.
Dishonesty was frowned upon. Getting arrested was horrible. Sueing someone was unheard of. Having children out of wedlock was a disgrace. Going on welfare was next to death.
Helping your fellow man was expected and given freely, going to church was something you did whether you were at home or at a friend's house on Sunday. Sundays were for visiting other people or just lazing around the house.
We have really lost something in our society and it is very sad that those of us that remember these times know we will never see this again.
Like Rockie, I grew up in a small town and my friends & I just sort of roamed. Took sandwiches for a picnic lunch down by the river, went to the old general store for johnny cakes with blackstrap molasses and (egad!) bought shoestring licorice that we jumped rope with before we ate it!
Ah, the good ole days!
I also remember when my mother was able to discipline my brother and me with a yell or even a whack without worrying about someone calling DSS or the police. And if a neighbor had to yell at us, my mother thanked her and we had h*ll to pay when we got home.
My Nana used to make zapole which is kind of like fried dough except its in a ball shape rather than stretched flat. My brother, cousins and I used to stand on chairs, over the boiling oil, and watch them cook and see if any of them looked like animals, shapes (like looking at clouds).
Its a wonder I'm still alive, yes? But I look back at all those memories with such fondness (except my mother's whacks!)...
I wish my daughter could know the good ole days. I have to watch her like a hawk and hold on tight to her. Isn't that sad? I think I'd trade times with my mom. I think we had more fun.
However, I see the kid in him (that I used to be) as he soars down the hill (sans helmet and elbow pads) on his bike. (both hands securely on the handlebars) He enjoys the outside time of running, swinging for hours, and playing pirate, king, and space avenger, in his tree house.
No, it's not the childhood I had, staying up until 10:00 p.m. catching fireflies in the summer, being disciplined by any parent in the neighborhood, trusting neighbors enough to go into their house and "visit", being afraid of being spanked at school and the worse thing that would happen at home. However, it's the best I can give him in the world today and I'm going to enjoy it with him! (perhaps with elbow pads and knee pads when I use the scooter)
I think the major changes went into play in the late 80's and early 90's. I played with knives and bb guns in the back yard and disected fish I found dead in the river, bought penny candy at the candy store, slid down an aluminum slide into the asphalt playground! (I specifically remember my Cabage Patch doll having black scrapes all over her face from playing with her on the playground) I climbed trees and woundn't come down until it was time to go to bed, played flashlight tag with other kids. We didn't get our first Nintendo until 1989!
Now it's my kids that Im worried about!
As much as I relate to all our sweet reminiscences, I also remember from my childhood, my mother being certain we would contract polio or TB or some other dread disease from swimming in the public pools. I also remember segregation - my grandparent's restaurant had three separate bathrooms- men's, women's and black (though the sign did not call it that) and separate drinking fountains in our town square. I remember not being able to play with "that family" because they weren't the right religion or because the parents were divorced. Even into my teen years, my father tried to forbid my association with, as he termed it, undesirable individuals. I believed my nefarious activity was well-hidden, that is, until the night a cross was burned in our yard.
These memories, though not innocent and sweet, are still part of my childhood.
My kids have fun today too. They swim, hang with their friends, play ball, etc. A couple of things I notice that are different is they want to hang out with the parents. I’m not sure if it’s because we are just so cool to be around or they have no imagination to entertain themselves. When I was a kid hanging out my parents was “un-cool”. Every Sunday the entire family would gather at my grandparent’s house for football games and dinner. Of course us kids would take off to play with the neighborhood kids until we were called for dinner. Then if we were lucky we’d sneak out before it was time to do dishes and we’d disappear until well after dark.
The other thing I noticed is that kids today just don’t have the imagination or creativity we had when we were young. We didn’t have many gadgets to entertain us and of course no cable TV and not every room in the house had a television so it was rare the kids got to choose the show so we had to find entertainment elsewhere.
I’m confident my kids will look back on their childhoods and reminisce as well. They’ll remember trips to Florida, backyard bonfires; roasting marshmallows; family game nights; movie and malt nights; camping; boating, etc.
Life is still good, maybe just a little different because we're looking at it with grownup eyes.
And then when I was around 10 or 11, Nintendo came into our world. I was one of the first on my street to have it. It did change the way kids played. I loved it and I still play it today, but I didn't go out as much and these days it seems like it's all kids do. I was also the first generation to grow up watching cable and MTV. Don't even get me started on that.
When my wife and I have kids, I will make sure that they experience life like a kid should. There has to be a balance. These days, Imagination should be considered an endangered species, by-cracky!!
The thing that surprises me is that kids today hav very few or no chores at all today! Not one of the pleasant memories but definitely something kids need to do.
I live with my BF and his ten year old son. His chore is to take out the garbage and we have a devil of a time to get him to do it. I don't know about you guys but my sister and I were doing the dishes every night, our own laundry, cleaning our bathroom AND taking out the garbage!
I grew up overseas in four different countries so my memories are slightly different than what I have read so far but they are rich with wonder and fascination.
Deez
What a difference 30 years makes . . .
1972: Long hair
2002: Longing for hair
1972: KEG
2002: EKG
1972: Acid rock
2002: Acid reflux
1972: Growing pot
2002: Growing pot belly
1972: Hoping for a BMW
2002: Hoping for a BM
1972: The Grateful Dead
2002: Dr. Kevorkian
1972: Popping pills, smoking joints
2002: Popping joints, needing pills
1972: Killer weed
2002: Weed killer
1972: Disco
2002: Costco
1972: Whatever
2002: Depends
How different will it be for the baby boomers??? And can you imagine the retirement homes of Gen Xers??? PC's for everyone!!!
: )
I also remember going to the soda fountain at the drug store, where they served your drinks in a cone-shaped paper cup stuck in a stainless steel base. Or the dime store, with the creaky wooden floor, where you could buy anything from toys to tatting shuttles.
I can even remember when popsicles went from a nickel to seven cents!