Posted on 09/12/2020 4:32:04 AM PDT by sodpoodle
First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank - while they were pregnant.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.
Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, and, when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps, not helmets, on our heads.
As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no airbags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.
Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.
We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.
We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren't overweight.
WHY?
Because we were always outside playing...that's why!
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 and, we were OKAY.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride them down the hill, Only to find out that we forgot about brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We did not Have Play Stations, Nintendo and X-boxes. There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVDs, no surround-sound or CDs, No cell phones, no personal computers, no internet and no chat rooms. WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and lost teeth, and there were no lawsuits from those accidents.
We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping-pong paddles, or just a bare hand, and no one would call child services to report abuse.
We ate worms, and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, 22 rifles for our 12th, rode horses, made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and although we were told it would happen - we did not put out very many eyes.
We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house 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.
Imagine that!!
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of... they actually sided with the law!
These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors ever.
The past 60 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas.
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.
If you are one of those born between 1925 &1955, CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ?
~~~~~~~ The quote of-the month by Jay Leno:
"With hurricanes, tornadoes, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of coronavirus and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"
At the age of 10 we would ride our bikes (in a group) to the Yorktown Battlefield to play. That was 23 miles from home and nobody every got hurt, kidnapped, or in trouble.
“At the age of 10 we would ride our bikes (in a group) to the Yorktown Battlefield to play. That was 23 miles from home and nobody every got hurt, kidnapped, or in trouble.”
Which is probably why none of us was ever overweight.
My Parents were born in 1920 - their families were wrecked by the depression. They never got over it. My Aunts and Uncles and my Parents lived like 1929 was around the corner. They all had good paying factory jobs in the 50’s and 60’s until they retired, but to them they were always the poor kids growing up in the 1930’s.
Remember the coal man delivering the coal to the basement chute and dad shoveling coal into the furnace? Should we get the hard coal which was more expensive, gave more heat, and lasted longer or the soft coal which was cheaper, always the question.
Dad built the first TV in our neighborhood. B&W of course. I helped in the last stages of tuning it, he was tuning a pot behind the set and I was watching to tell him when the picture was clear. He kept saying, “How’s that?” and when I said nothing, he’s make another adjustment. At one point. I yelled, “Stop! There’s a good picture with a monkey eating a banana in a palm tree in color”. I didn’t know that it was supposed to be B&W. He laughed and said, “Very funny, son”.
Then he turned the pot again and there was Abbot an Costello doing a routine, all thoughts of what I had seen were forgotten ... until 65 years later when I read in Popular Science or Scientific American that way back then Johnson & Johnson had been experimenting with broadcasting color over B&W sets. The scene they were broadcasting featured the above description. The Johnson & Johnson lab was a mile from our home. I was not crazy and saw something probably no one alive saw outside of Johnson & Johnson.
I was thinking about my old Shogun Warrior just yesterday.
I rode me bike from the Northside of Chicago to Navy Pier and back, on a regular basis, and thought nothing of it. NOW I thank God I am out of Chicago.
Raydeen and Great Mazinga were my favorites.
Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.
—
Lead paint chips were tasty as were the tubs of library paste! Not to mention crawling around poking those funny looking holes in the wall which always seemed to make us cry and bring mommy running, her saying, “Don’t put your fingers into the electrical outlet.”
Or running around the front yard head down watching my feet move until I hit a tree and mom watching from the kitchen window doing the dishes called the doctor who rushed over to revive unconscious me ... twice and into the same tree both times.
Growing up in the 1930s, we didnt have TV or computers, but there was Jack Armstrong and the Long Ranger on the radio for kids.
The old Italian guy scissor sharpener push cart slowly going down the street with the ding-ding bell.
The Good Humor truck...
High dives...
Senior prom...slow dancing cheek to cheek..
“I really MISS those days.
I hardly ever see kids riding bikes, playing stick-ball or shooting hoops outside anymore.”
____________________
So true. I raised my kids in a small river town. They played outside all of the time with the neighbor kids. I thought at the time it was like Mayberry. Whenever they get together now the conversation quickly turns to their childhood in that town. Great memories. This was the 1980’s. By the way they didn’t have bedrooms stuffed with plastic toys like so many today.
No, silly!
We had a Westinghouse:)!
I still call copy paper...typing paper. The clerk looks at me funny....What is typing paper he asks?
That said, I did have one friend in third grade whose last words reportedly were "I can make it." as he tried to cross a busy intersection. It was very sad. That said, accidents happen all the time. It is worse to raise want Nasim Taleb calls "fragile children".
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Benjamin Franklin.
I'm not sure this actually applies in this situation, but it always sounds good... :)
Wow, now that's really eating "high on the hog." I use to love moose brand limburger with a thick slice of Bermuda onion. Put a hamburger on that and it's to die for.. :)
Mosquito spray truck, water and DDT, kids running behind it getting cool, no one dying, and very few mosquitos.
But after Rachel Carson used her book to get DDT made illegal, I have seen too much malaria in Africa which could have been cheaply and safely dealt with. She and her supporters have killed millions upon millions and I think she wanted to. She was a budding eugenicist in the mode of Hitler and Sanger.
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