To All of You Born Before 1978!!!!!

ccoccocats

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To the kids who survived the 30's 40's 50's 60's and 70's:

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we erode 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 pick up 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, bread and butter and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!

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 O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down tthe hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound, no cell phones, no personal computers, no internet or internet chat rooms..........WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.

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 in us forever.

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!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, 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 are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS! Please pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?
 

marge

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This 40 something totally remembers! Gosh coming home "when the street lights go on" is so univeral for our generation! Yeah and no cell phones, can you imagine? You can't be reached for hours at a time! And only paper mail? I remember in college we had free mail service at this job I had so I used to sit and write tons of letters to my friends the way we now post or send instant messages. And then a week later I would get a response! Just wild to remember that now.
 
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ccoccocats

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Originally Posted by rosiemac

Oh Cheryl how you've brought back some happy memories to this 40+ bird!
You and me both
(Shhhhhh....don't tell no one!)
 

rosiemac

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I'm sitting here thinking, like Marge mentioned how we had no mobile phones or e-mails?!.

Back then when we never had them but we always seemed to manage perfectly well, but now i'm lost without my mobile!!
 

kev

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that puts me in this lot as am 35 - made the 60's by a couple of months..... we had respect for our parents and the law. We came in when we were told and how that is rigfht - as soon as the street lights came on - we were in. Great memories. Kids seem to get things so easy these days and respect is something they have little or none of for their elders... however, I say this with respect to all those in the USA - I have met more kids out there that call you sir and then, my faith in humanity is restored. I will do all I can to bring Chris up the right way and he learns day by day to respect people and their possessions. The day he does something - or if he ever does something wrong that involves the law, then all hell is gonna break loose and he wont sit for a week!!!!!!
Until then - take pride in what we had in those days and what we can only hope our children experience.
 

marge

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Yeah I can't remember a time when you didn't sue everyone. I mean someone sued for their coffee being too hot? It's so weird.

Also people didn't seem as focuses on making big incomes then, a family could live on one income. I knew more poeple who wanted to be school teachers etc. Now you feel it's so rare to find kids who want to be teachers cause of the income.
 

marge

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I do feel lucky to have experienced some of that time too. I mean the music was so much richer than now and life was easier. BUT one must remember the downside of that time too, say for women and minorities.
I try not to romanticize it too too much. But sigh, those were great times. I still tear up when I am go to my old neighborhood.
 

rosiemac

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It's the staying out with your friends all day and not coming back until later that i remember so well.

In the summer holidays i could leave the house with my friends at about 9.30 a.m. and we would walk about 45 minutes to the dene where the river was with a packed lunch and play there all day until about tea time which was 5.p.m. and walk back again, and our parents knew we weren't stupid to wander off or talk to strangers.

They can't really do that now
 

kev

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Question - so where the heck did it all go wrong?????
K
 

marge

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Every parent I talk to wants to do home schooling. I mean that wasn't even a thought back then.
 

jennyr

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Oh I do agree. My students are 18/19 and I think they have missed out on so much and are at the same time far too sophisticated.
 

clixpix

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Originally Posted by kev

Question - so where the heck did it all go wrong?????
K
Did it, though? Didn't our parents talk about "kids today" when we were kids? Didn't their parents before them? We had lots of things our parents didn't have...television, etc, and it didn't ruin us. I'm not ready to say things have gone all wrong just yet, and I look forward to the day when the "kids today" are adults, and are grousing about the "kids today"! 'Twas ever thus.
 

rosiemac

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They did your right, because they could see that we had more than what they had etc.. when they were kids, and i can even hear my mother say "It wasn't like that when we were young!". But as times are changing, "we" can see the difference in the kids today with computers, playstations, branded named trainers etc...that the kids "must" have.

No doubt the kids of today will be saying the same thing to their kids when they grow up.
 

clixpix

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Originally Posted by rosiemac

They did your right, because they could see that we had more than what they had etc.. when they were kids, and i can even hear my mother say "It wasn't like that when we were young!". But as times are changing, "we" can see the difference in the kids today with computers, playstations, branded named trainers etc...that the kids "must" have.

No doubt the kids of today will be saying the same thing to their kids when they grow up.
Right you are! As times change, so do people, so must we all. Time and technology marches on, for better or worse. All we can do is do what we can to preserve the good. For those of us with kids (not me, but some of you
) you raise them as best you can, and do what you can to do good in this world. Call me an optimist, and I'll agree, but I still do have faith in human nature.
 

pat

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I remember that my mom would let me walk numerous blocks from our townhouse apt. in about oh 1961 to the drug store where I could get 2 penny candy and pretzel sticks for a nickel - no worries that I'd be snatched.

I also remember that slide rulers were just coming into use as I was in high school...calculators? what were those??

LOL....I also enjoyed growing up a bit unconventionally...my mom was divorced and raised me by herself, with a career (teacher), bought a house herself etc., so I was raised believing women could do what they set their minds to, though I also saw the kind of dismissive behavior very typical of many men of that era.
 
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