Voting AmericanTo Those of Us Born 1925 – 1970 :
TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE
1930s, ’40s, ’50s, ’60s and ’70s!!
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 air bags, 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 drankKool-Aid Soda 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 we forgot the 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 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, 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 50 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 1925-1970, 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, Tornados, Fires out of Control, Mud Slides, Flooding, Severe Thunderstorms tearing up the Country from one end to another, and with the threat of Bird Flu and Terrorist Attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?”
For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us…go ahead and move on to Obama’s World
Besides, your probably a Socialist from both the false left and the false right.
http://votingamerican.wordpress.com/2013/08/03/before-there-were-liberals-we-were-all-americans/
Awesome post, Digs. God, I sure miss those days. TRUE freedom!
Although I grew up in the 80’s I remember when not everyone made the team. I was one of them. Sure I was disappointed, but life goes on. Plus I was never a big sports fan anyways. I was always a bookworm and favored things that helped me to grow stronger in the mind than the body. I also remember when we didn’t have to wear helmets to ride a bike and laughed at the fact that some idiot decided to make it illegal to ride one without a helmet, but everyone just shrugged it off, like everything else. And look where it got us. Big Brother Tyranny. So sad.
Ya know what NC, I realy miss those days too. A simple life is a honest life, and I like a simple honest life. Ya ever notice how people could laugh and have a good ttime back in the day and had very little, but now it is almost like people are walking around with a P.O.ed attitude all of the time. Back then it was kind of like how honest and all ya know – now days it seems like it is all about what kind of car ya drive, how much money ya got, how nice of clothes that ya can afford, etc. etc. I mean just look at what people have become and how bought off these sheeple/people have become. I think that it is damned sickening. Glad ya liked this article NC – it is like a blast from the past 🙂 and I realy miss ths past that I remember back in the 60`s. we were honest, simple and uncomplicated. Yes NC we were and still are trustworthy. Kepp smiling buddy 🙂
By the way, Spanky was my favorite. I always thought he was a cool little dude.
“Ya ever notice how people could laugh and have a good ttime back in the day and had very little, but now it is almost like people are walking around with a P.O.ed attitude all of the time.”
Boy, ain’t that the truth, Digs.
Of course when you have the most corrupt mafia since Al Capone in the White House and unemployment is at 30% if not more, I guess you can’t blame them for being P.O.ed all the time. I’m one of those P.O.ed individuals.
Oh yea NC, I know exactly what you are sayin`. I hold my bad temper a lot in society. I wish people would act as they want to be treated ya know NC – kind of a dream of mine 🙂 . Sometimes I think that people can actually see that old “jugular vein” just a pumpin` if you know what I mean. Anyway, on that note NC and people it is time tyo call it a nite I guess. GOODNITE YA ALL and I hope to see you all tomorrow 🙂
I was one who didnt make the team either, but i got real good with my marlin 22, and would rush the biggest shore breaks with my boogie board.
Yes digger, “Those were the days, my friend”. Technology has actually stolen the youth from our children and it most certainly has not made the world “better”. Now the “perps” are paid government “peeping Toms” creeping into everyone’s business under the guise on “National Security”.
I saw a cartoon that depicted teenagers all walking off a cliff while texting. It really hit home, sad to say.
I thank God that my two kids (Millennials) got to grow up out here in the rural remote (and even had other kids to play with at various times, besides each other) and were homeschooled…many of the experiences in the article (esp. the bike riding without a helmet and climbing trees) were experiences my kids got to have (except the bike riding…none of that on rocky dirt roads in the mountains here)…the video games and such didn’t happen until they were about 12 and 13. thanks for the post.
I was 5 years old when President Kennedy was shot. Guess what I was doing all that day? Playing football with my friends. No adult supervision what so ever. That’s just the way it was. How many times did my dad say “go out and play”. Does anyone remember in the 1960’s when your friend would come over your house for a bike ride and “call you”? My friend would call “Joey…Joey”. Sort of like he was singing. We didn’t ring doorbells back then for some reason. Some neighbors knocked once on the door and let themselves in. Mrs Graydon (Mabel) would do that and start a conversation with my dad. The next thing she would say is “got any ice coffee?”
Does anyone remember riding your bike real fast and just smashing into the bushes and small tree’s? You had to be at least 10 years old for that one because it was dangerous, but we didn’t care. You would sort of leap forward over the handle bars and go crashing into the bushes. The bikes had banana seats , chopper forks, and a sissy bar. Remember that!
Oh Joe in JT, I fondly remember my youth growing up in a small town in the Midwest going out and playing football or baseball, checking out the creek to catch frogs or turtles, building forts or tree houses and having a ton of fun without adult supervision. Apparently, adult supervision is mandatory today which is the reason most kids are unable to effectively problem solve as they have never been on their own or given a chance to resolve issues on their own. As a kid, I do recall resorting to fist fights to resolve issues but one usually learns there are easier ways square things up. Today’s society over protects our children, depriving them of lessons that cannot be learned any other way.
“My friend would call “Joey…Joey”. Sort of like he was singing.”
Yep. I remember I had to hear that almost every day from my friend’s parent across the street as she was shouting down the street from the front door of her house almost as if she was singing. “Michael…..Michael.” lol
Remember when we could ride in the back of an open pickup truck? Oh that was so much fun! I think fun has now been outlawed.
No having fun people!! 🙁
. . .
Though I was born in the mid-’70s, I was really relating to the points your post made. Hearkening back to a simpler time when people did for themselves.
For someone who purports to be aware of the false dichotomy driving so much of today’s discourse, I don’t understand why you felt it necessary at the end to conflate any person’s lack of belief in some mythological deity with an implied concurrence that our present state of affairs (“Obama’s World”) is an ideal, or at least an improvement.
It belies your very premise, implying Obama is something other than a tool of the same oligarchy that gave us Bush before him.
If *you’re* (<–see that syntax?) serious about waking people up and throwing off the manacles, you'll want to reconsider alienating the people who identify as atheist or agnostic or just non-religious, because a large percentage of free-thinkers (read: not sheep) fall under that umbrella.
Oh, brother….(rolling my eyes) Really? That’s your biggest problem? Chill out, dude.