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PEOPLE OVER FORTY SHOULD BE DEAD
EMail | 1/17/2004 | W. Toeppe

Posted on 01/17/2004 6:28:26 AM PST by JesseHousman

People Over 40 Should Be Dead

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 seatbelts 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 street lights 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, video tape 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.

How fortunate we were to grow up as kids before lawyers and burgeoning government regulated our lives, for our own good. How sorry I am for what those years of meddling have done to our children and grandchildren and even sorrier that we all allowed the government and politicians to get away with it!


TOPICS: Editorial; Government; Miscellaneous; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: bureaucracy; childhood; government; lifeinusa; nostalgia; overregulation; youvegotmail
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To: AppyPappy
when I was a kid, we played in a creek a mile from the house and my parents had no idea where we were playing.



we ran in packs when we were kids. the big ones looked out for the little ones---and if they slowed us down we left them home with mom.

the street lights going on, being the signal to get home, must have been universal. we did that too.
241 posted on 01/17/2004 2:05:52 PM PST by Taffini (I like Tony Soprano even though he is a fat boy.)
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To: JesseHousman
Yes, those were the days.
242 posted on 01/17/2004 2:07:06 PM PST by aruanan
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To: JesseHousman; PsyOp
Let's not forget the BB Gun wars, and tennis ball cannons.

Marine Inspector

243 posted on 01/17/2004 2:20:08 PM PST by Marine Inspector (TANCREDO 2004)
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To: Marine Inspector
Let's not forget the BB Gun wars, and tennis ball cannons.

We were strictly admonished not to shoot BBs at each other and we didn't, because it seemed like a good idea not to.

But we did have some almighty Buckeye fights, and dirt-clods were permissible projectiles. And any sort of improvised artillery was always really cool.

244 posted on 01/17/2004 2:25:45 PM PST by Riley
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To: Riley
And then you'd say something at the same instant someone else said it, and you'd both rush to say "Jinx! Tap, tap, Golden Rule, no Black Erasers, no Black Magic". Whoever got that out first won, and the other person had to stay silent until released by the 'jinxer', else he owed him a Coke.
245 posted on 01/17/2004 2:30:02 PM PST by Riley
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To: BSunday
"I wish there was somewhere that I could take my kids shooting out here in Norfolk."

That's what Pennsylvania's for. ;-}

246 posted on 01/17/2004 2:44:02 PM PST by ntnychik
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To: Riley
THen there was something I think called "Mr Wiggle" you put it on the end of the garden hose and then it started going all over the place and you would try to catch it.

247 posted on 01/17/2004 3:31:22 PM PST by missyme
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To: missyme
I remember those things.

I remember Wiffle Ball, and kickball. I nailed a pitch in a kickball game one day. It went straight up and struck a passing seagull.

Nobody who didn't actually witness that ever believed it.
248 posted on 01/17/2004 3:39:23 PM PST by Riley
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To: JesseHousman
Remember when swimming pools had diving boards, high dives even? We would all show off, doing flips, cannon balls, jack-knife dives. Then insurance companies required the pools to take down the diving boards.
I remember riding my bike down a steep hill with my feet on the handle bars, never got hurt.
I remember drinking a couple of tall glasses of whole milk and eating about a dozen of Mom's cookies made with shortening or real butter everyday after school. Never got fat, in fact I was really skinny.
The kids in my neighborhood would go down to the railroad tracks and place pennies on the tracks and rejoice when we retreived our flattened out coins.
249 posted on 01/17/2004 3:55:01 PM PST by k omalley
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To: Riley
That is quite amazing!
It seemed like everyone was kinda making there own toys out of anything you could find back then, that is what I notice about today's kids they cannot use there hands at all unless it's typing on a keyboard or pushing the remote control. My brothers use to make models with glue like Cars, Airplanes they would make there own skateboards. Kids are motor skilled retarded now a days.
250 posted on 01/17/2004 3:59:13 PM PST by missyme
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To: missyme
I remember. Even junk that wasn't good for anything else became raw materials for a treehouse or something.
251 posted on 01/17/2004 4:02:50 PM PST by Riley
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To: Riley
Your right, Treehouse, Wagon, Fort, Pool everything had a use.... we didn't throw everything away after it broke you learned how to fix it or use it some other way.

Every kid I see where I live that has a bicycle with a flat ends up getting a new one cause they will not or cannot fix there flat.. pretty unbeleivable.
252 posted on 01/17/2004 4:14:08 PM PST by missyme
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To: dorben
I never played Pickle, but it rings a bell.
253 posted on 01/17/2004 4:47:48 PM PST by Consort
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To: missyme
You are right, the neighbor kids come to us to fix their bicycles
254 posted on 01/17/2004 4:53:44 PM PST by navygal
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To: navygal
I remember eight track tapes and wish I still had mine
255 posted on 01/17/2004 4:55:23 PM PST by navygal
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To: JesseHousman
Kids used to play outside and ride all over town on their bikes. Now they stay inside and play video games, but part of the reason for this is that in most places we have to worry that someone might do something bad to our kids. When I was a kid the probability of this happening was not considered high enough that kids even had to be warned about it. We never locked our door. We used to sled down the hill into the woods head first and no one ever suggested a helmet.
256 posted on 01/17/2004 6:23:51 PM PST by wideminded
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To: JesseHousman
All the fun stuff, but I also remember the chores.

I had animals, and I had to take care of them, feed, water, exersize, clean up after, how ever often it needed to be done. I had to get up early to feed the horses, milk the goats (thank goodness we didn't have milk cows, I did get to sleep a bit in the AM).

When I got home from school when I was older I also had house chores, and when I was about 14 my stay at home mom got a job and I got to do the shopping and cook dinner every night, and then clean up afterwards. We got to watch an hour of TV a day, and sometimes we'd forget to.

And I still found time to ride my horses a few hours a day, or 12 or so on weekends. I gave riding lessons and broke horses for money for extra stuff... you know, grain, brushes, and tack.

My parents were actually quite rich, but I didn't know it.

I had the best childhood ever, and look back longingly at the past as a well loved memory quilt.

Thanks for the memories Jesse.
257 posted on 01/17/2004 7:24:24 PM PST by LaraCroft (If the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, do the stupid get stupider?)
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To: missyme
96 Tears was by ?(Question Mark) and the Mysterions, I think. Wonder where they got that name?
258 posted on 01/17/2004 7:59:48 PM PST by LisaMalia (Buckeye Fan since birth!!)
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To: Tim Dr Hook McCracken
You have no discretion...lol.....
259 posted on 01/17/2004 8:43:06 PM PST by WhyisaTexasgirlinPA (PA drivers: so bad they won't let an ambulance change lanes.......)
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To: JesseHousman
One paradox that has always amazed me is the fact the ultra left-wing of the democrat party keeps saying its the over population that is causing all the problems on the earth; poluting the air, etc.

However .. they are constantly harping about everything which causes people to be injured or killed.

The two positions are exactly opposite each other!

Hmmmm? I guess that's why the dems/libs have no core beliefs .. they can't decide if people should live or die.
260 posted on 01/17/2004 8:50:57 PM PST by CyberAnt ("America is the GREATEST NATION on the face of the earth")
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