The following words of wisdom came to me in an email forward. However, I have to disagree with some of it since I was born near the end of the window and I did have some of the things growing up that the email says I would not have had. So, I put my personal comments about this email forward in italics.
THOSE BORN 1930-1979
READ TO THE BOTTOM FOR QUOTE OF THE MONTH BY JAY LENO . IF YOU DON’T READ ANYTHING ELSE—VERY WELL STATED
TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1930’s, 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s!! (I can barely get credit for surviving the 70’s. After all, I only experienced the 70’s for a year and a half!)
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant. (Well, ok, maybe everyone reading this survived some of that, but that doesn’t make it right, of course!)
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 child- proof 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. (that is definitely before my time. I’ve never hitchhiked. And the only people I know who have are either deceased or over the age of 50!)
As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats , seat belts or air bags. (Ok, I remember this – every kid I knew whose parents had a station wagon would ride in the back of it for long trips, no seatbelts. I think kids should be buckled up, but I think the whole booster / car seat until they’re 8 years old is just plain ridiculous! Ah, the effects those lobbyists have on Congress is purely amazing, isn’t it?)
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, white bread and real butter and drank Kool-aid made with sugar, but we weren’t overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING! (Well, a few people I went to school with DO have heart problems, but…)
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 OK.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride 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 Playstations, Nintendo ‘s, X-boxes, no video games at all (umm, I beg to differ. My generation had Atari, Intellivision, the Commodore, the Tandy, the original Nintendo, and even some hand-held electronic games), no 150 channels on cable, no video movies (again, not true. I remember the day my family got our VCR. I was worried my big sister would be mad because she was at a sleepover when we got it and the whole event was so exciting. We rushed right out to the video store to rent a video. But all the good ones seemed to be in BETA, not VHS…) or DVD’s, no surround-sound or CD’s (but we had records, casette tapes, and walkmans!), no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or chatrooms…….
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 ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. (Nor did the gum we swallowed stay in our tummies for seven years – hehe)
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 poke 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!! (Nowadays, we’d be lucky to get enough kids to have to turn them away, not that we would, but the point is, many kids are busy playing video games or causing trouble… or their parents are just too busy to let them commit to anything extracurricular)
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law! (Nowadays kids are charged as adults, so parents aren’t often given the option to decide what’s best for their own child!)
These generations have 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!
If YOU are one of them 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.
While you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave (and lucky) their parents were.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn’t it?!
The quote of the month is 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 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 delete this.
For the rest of us…pass this ON!
Ok, I’m not a big fan of passing on email forwards… But this one entertained me, so do with it what you will, and remember that my contributions are the ones in italics, so thanks for reading my commentary!
