THAT WAS THEN, THIS IS NOW

A friend of mine sent me an email today which I found to be excellent - and so true!! I had to just share this - I have taken editorial liberties in places and added my own two cents - but I couldn't resist.

GROWING UP WITHOUT A CELL PHONE

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning....Uphill... Barefoot... BOTH ways...yadda, yadda, yadda. (Actually I DID have to walk to school (more than a mile and UPHILL but that is beside the point)

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way I was ever going to lay a bunch of garbage like that on my kids or grandkids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that I'm over the ripe old age of forty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a dang Utopia! And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it!

For example:

1) When I was a kid we didn't have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog! Do you know the "Dewey Decimal System"? (I do!! for all the good it does me now - however, I can get in and out of a library with what I want in no time at all!) If we want to know a phone number, we looked it up in the phone book! If we wanted a recipe - we looked it up in a cookbook or called "Aunt Marge" or "Gramma Jean" on the telephone and wrote it down!

2) There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents. When we traveled we sent postcards with a photo resembling the place in which were went - the post card usually arrived AFTER we were already home, but there was no snapping a photo with our phone camera, emailing to friends/family and/or posting it to FaceBook for another photo sharing website for all to see!

3) Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents spanked us or smacked our mouths for using the "F" word. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to discipline the same! Nowhere was safe! Not even school! Yes, that's right! Paddles with present in MOST classrooms and used at least once a week!

4) There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to ccall the radio station and IF you got through 'beg' the DJ to play your favorite song and then wait around all day on the happenstance that he would so you could tape it off the radio. The DJ would usually talk over the beginning and mess it all up! In the small town I lived in we had a "Record Store" - place that sold record albums and 45 records. They had "listening rooms" where you could go inside, close the door and 'listen' to an album before you bought it!

5) There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our cars. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey, that's how we rolled, Baby! Ya dig? IF (big IF) you were lucky and your parents could afford it, you might have your own "stereo" in your room which would off course include a LP turn table and a tape or cassette deck.

6) We didn't have fancy phone features like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it! If they wanted to talk to you, they'd keep trying! Then there was the proverbial "Party Line" - where in a effort to save money you would 'share' the same phone line with another family. Some times you'd pick up the phone and you'd have to wait for them to finish before you could use it.

7) Speaking of phones - there were NO CELL PHONES! If you left the house or office, you actually had to be out of touch with your "friends" until you got to another destination with a phone! OH MY GOD! (said in my best "Valley Girl" voice) Think of the horror... not being in touch with someone 24/7! There were pay phones on most street corners and in lobbies of hotels, restaurants and the like - you only needed a DIME to make a call! I remember when it went up to 25cents! You always kept a spare quarter tucked away in the glove box or your wallet hidden pocket 'just in case'. I won't even touch the subject of "TEXTING" also known as the "Zombie walk" - hahaha!

8) We didn't have Caller ID. When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances!

9) There were no PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! When I was in school there was "Pinball" machines - later came "Pong" which could be set up in "black and white" on your TV - where a 'cursor' of sorts and two lines that resembled 'paddles' would bounce back and forth across the screen like tennis. We had the Atari 2600 with games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'.. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen.. Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

10) Now for the subject of television. If you wanted to know what was on TV, you had to use a little book called a TV Guide (which you had to BUY at the store or subscribe to by mail) to find out what was going to be on TV. Channel surfing?? NOT!! There were NO REMOTES!! You had to get off your sorry buttocks and walk over to the TV to change the channel! Here's the biggie - I still remember "black and white only" TV - and rabbit ears! There was no HD or surround sound or Pay Per View or subscription on demand channels. 50" in flat screens? NO WAY! We had "console" TV's that weighed a ton and took at least two large men and a hand truck to bring in the house! Then there was the "Station Sign Off" - remember that? If you're under the age of 30, you probably don't! Stations would often show a static picture of the American Flag and play the national anthem - fat chance of seeing that anymore - you might "offend" someone!!

11) While we're on the subject of TV - let's talk about cartoons! There was no CARTOON Network. You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. You had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, heaven forbid! No instant "baby sitter" for mom's - we actually "played" with each other and with toys and used our imagination!! And then of course there is the subject of the cartoons that were aired and I won't even get started on that!

12) Moving on to the kitchen! My early childhood we had no microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that! Later as I was in high school, microwaves came on the scene but again, they were HUGE and took up half the counter space and they were NOT digital. Again, you had to turn a dial and wait! I asked my grandson once "How do you make popcorn?" and he said (so matter of factly) "In the microwave, of course, Gramma" - I just laughed. I said, did you know you can cook it on the stove or in the fire place? and he said "REALLY?" and I said "REALLY!" (so we did).

13) When we weren't in school or in church, we would be told by our parents to "Go outside and play" - and we did! All day! We rode bicycles, climbed trees and rocks, had make believe stores, schools and even war zones. Pine cones were grenades, mud pies were deserts and large leaves off trees and shrubs were our "money". We built forts, we slept out under the stars on the front lawn in homemade blanket tents and flashlights and we had our transistor radios where we'd stay up listening to stations from Southern California and to music that our folks said was "taboo". There were no electronics to soothe and comfort our boredom....and besides, we all knew that if you went back inside... you were going to be doing chores!

14) Now for the subject of car seats - oh, please! Mom threw us in the back seat and you hung on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last moment, if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place! We didn't have sippy cups and drink holders - you got a drink before you left and when you got to where you were going you could get a drink then. Public places had drinking fountains and of course Gramma's house had milk and water - no soda!

15) Bicycles. There were no helmets! No knee pads gloves. We just got on and road. If you fell - well, Bactine and BandAids were our first defense and then right back on the bike we got!

These are just a FEW examples of how EASY kids today have got it - spoiled rotten!

Best Regards,

The Over 40 Crowd