For those of us going on 50

[djsroknrol]

Here's something I'd like to share...There are some really good points in this. Enjoy the trip down memory lane.

My Mom used to cut chicken, chop eggs and spread mayo on the same cutting board with the same knife and no bleach, but we didn't seem to get food poisoning.

My Mom used to defrost hamburger on the counter AND I used to eat it raw
sometimes, too. Our school sandwiches were wrapped in wax paper in a brown
paper bag, not in icepack coolers, but I can't remember getting e.coli.

Almost all of us would have rather gone swimming in the lake instead of
a pristine pool (talk about boring), no beach closures then.

The term cell phone would have conjured up a phone in a jail cell, and a
pager was the school PA system.

We all took gym, not PE... and risked permanent injury with a pair of
high top Ked's (only worn in gym) instead of having cross-training athletic shoes with air cushion soles and built in light reflectors. I can't recall any injuries but they must
have happened because they tell us how much safer we are now..

Flunking gym was not an option... even for stupid kids! I guess PE must be much harder than gym.

Speaking of school, we all said prayers and sang the national anthem, and staying in detention after school caught all sorts of negative attention.

We must have had horribly damaged psyches. What an archaic health system we had then. Remember school nurses? Ours wore a hat and everything.

I thought that I was supposed to accomplish something before I was allowed to be proud of myself.

I just can't recall how bored we were without computers, Play Station, Nintendo, X-box or 270 digital TV cable stations.

Oh yeah... and where was the Benadryl and sterilization kit when I got that bee sting? I could have been killed!

We played 'king of the hill' on piles of gravel left on vacant construction sites, and when we got hurt, Mom pulled out the 48-cent bottle of Mercurochrome (kids liked it better because it didn't sting like iodine did) and then we got our butt spanked.

Now it's a trip to the emergency room, followed by a 10-day dose of a $49 bottle of antibiotics, and then Mom calls the attorney to sue the contractor for leaving a horribly vicious pile of gravel where it was such a threat.

We didn't act up at the neighbor's house either because if we did, we got our butt spanked there and then we got butt spanked again when we got home.

I recall Donny Reynolds from next door coming over and doing his tricks on the front stoop, just before he fell off. Little did his Mom know that she could have owned our house. Instead, she picked him up and swatted him for being such a goof. It was a neighborhood run amuck.

To top it off, not a single person I knew had ever been told that they were from a dysfunctional family. How could we possibly have known that?

We needed to get into group therapy and anger management classes? We
were obviously so duped by so many societal ills, that we didn't even notice that the entire country wasn't taking Prozac! How did we ever survive?

LOVE TO ALL OF US WHO SHARED THIS ERA, AND TO ALL WHO DIDN'T- SORRY FOR WHAT YOU MISSED. I WOULDN'T TRADE IT FOR ANYTHING.

[richbarna]

My youth was spent growing on a "considered" rough housing estate in the 70's and 80's.

There were single parent families, school gangs, exams that you had to study for and food that would make a hygenist cry.

We swam in rivers and lakes that were full of leaches and filth. If you crossed the line a smack was in order and never questioned. My school had the cane, and the teachers needed a degree in crowd control not education.

Sex education was learned in the bushes of the local common and various "hidden on top of the wardrobe" porn films.

Teachers and neighbours were not sued for giving a child a clip round the ear for an obvious wrong, we didn't have child psychologists at the school, nor a list of rules and regulations to protect us from serious injury (we had that old thing called common sense).

We respected our elders, we fought for what we believed in, we fought eachother. We gave respect to those who respected us in return.

We used our imaginations to invent games (I too played king of the hill). We climbed and fell off trees, quarries. We rode our BMX bikes down slides and vertical drops.

We played war with fir-cones and sometimes air-pistols, using cardboard under our clothes as body armour.

We experimented with alcohol and various drugs, tried different fashions and different types of music. We had international friends of all colours and races, and were never offended by obviously non malicious insults pertaining to colour, race etc. We argued, fought and made up.

We now live in a world of overprotected babies, every move, thought or expression is analized by "therapists".

Kids should be guided but left to be kids. They need to feel a bit of pain, use their common sense and be able to learn by their mistakes.

After all of my experiences as a child, I have not become a drug addict, criminal or alcoholic. I would change my youth for nothing. They were great times. I feel very sorry for the youth today.

I am a father of one daughter and another on the way. My family and friends constantly praise me for the way that my daughter is being brought up, she shows respect, is popular with friends, but most of all is happy. I only had to explain the why's and why nots of different situations/dangers. Otherwise I let her make her own decisions whether errors will be commited or not.

Kids are machines of decision making if they are allowed to do so, they are inventive, creative and artistic if not oppressed. They are human sponges to the knowledge in the world around them.

Let them be.

My daughters will grow up as human BEings not human Doings.

[insane_alien]

i'm nowhere near 50 (i'm 18 but i can remember doing most of the stuff you described about your childhood in mine(and for a few of them i still do them).

I still eat raw mea occasionally, i eat pizza thats been lying in a box on my floorr for a week or two. i occasionally fall off buildings. i've only been to hospital twice because of injury an once because i was ill. (1 possibly fracture skull from falling out a tree and landing on my head at age 5, i was fine. 1 definitely dislocated leg from a snowblading accident. that was a fun one. an once because i had picked up some virus that was making me hallucinate and puke all over the place.)

there are someplaces where that way of life still exists.

[djsroknrol]

My youth was spent growing on a "considered" rough housing estate in the 70's and 80's.

There were single parent families, school gangs, exams that you had to study for and food that would make a hygenist cry.

We swam in rivers and lakes that were full of leaches and filth. If you crossed the line a smack was in order and never questioned. My school had the cane, and the teachers needed a degree in crowd control not education.

Sex education was learned in the bushes of the local common and various "hidden on top of the wardrobe" porn films.

Teachers and neighbours were not sued for giving a child a clip round the ear for an obvious wrong, we didn't have child psychologists at the school, nor a list of rules and regulations to protect us from serious injury (we had that old thing called common sense).

We respected our elders, we fought for what we believed in, we fought eachother. We gave respect to those who respected us in return.

We used our imaginations to invent games (I too played king of the hill). We climbed and fell off trees, quarries. We rode our BMX bikes down slides and vertical drops.

We played war with fir-cones and sometimes air-pistols, using cardboard under our clothes as body armour.

We experimented with alcohol and various drugs, tried different fashions and different types of music. We had international friends of all colours and races, and were never offended by obviously non malicious insults pertaining to colour, race etc. We argued, fought and made up.

We now live in a world of overprotected babies, every move, thought or expression is analized by "therapists".

Kids should be guided but left to be kids. They need to feel a bit of pain, use their common sense and be able to learn by their mistakes.

After all of my experiences as a child, I have not become a drug addict, criminal or alcoholic. I would change my youth for nothing. They were great times. I feel very sorry for the youth today.

I am a father of one daughter and another on the way. My family and friends constantly praise me for the way that my daughter is being brought up, she shows respect, is popular with friends, but most of all is happy. I only had to explain the why's and why nots of different situations/dangers. Otherwise I let her make her own decisions whether errors will be commited or not.

Kids are machines of decision making if they are allowed to do so, they are inventive, creative and artistic if not oppressed. They are human sponges to the knowledge in the world around them.

Let them be.

My daughters will grow up as human BEings not human Doings.

A very nice add-on sir...

sex-ed was learned by playing "Doctor" in my circles (gasp)..
IMHO, children are being raised in to much of a coddling and sterile environment these days...

You're right...let them be...my .02...

[cstudent]

I'm 47. Some of the things we did as kids for fun was:

Build go-karts and race them down the hill.
Play army in the woods.
Find vines and swing on them like Tarzan.
Damn up the creek and go swimming.
Good 'ol riding bicycles.
Play baseball or touch football in the backyard.

The most hi-tech piece of equipment I had was a cheap record player in my room.

[Rumor]

Remember when being sent to your room was a type of punishment? Now kids seem to have TVs, DVD platers, personal computers, stereos and video games into their rooms . . . It's not a punishment at all.

Your post reminds me of the summers spent playing war games with sticks that we used for guns, or poking through an old junk yard looking for cool bits of stuff, swinging on a rope that was tied to a tree limb that overhung a swimming hole at the creek.

I remember dreading the rainy days when you had to stay indoors and watch whatever was playing on the three channels our TV got.

Ah, those were the days :)

[Biltong (Dee)]

1972. Fur and bell-bottomed jeans were all the rage, and no matter where in the world you lived everyone knew about a country called Vietnam...

Back then my brothers had a go-kart called Murgatroyd they had spent ages getting just so.

I, at 8 yrs of age couldn't really participate much, but I can still remember the thrills and spills they had. We lived at the top of one damn high hill and the crashes used to be so spectacular I remember them to this day.

I haven't seen a hand-built go-cart in years.

So sad.

PS. Remember the playing cards stuck in the bicycle spokes...? Rrrrrrrrrrrr! :-)

[richbarna]

PS. Remember the playing cards stuck in the bicycle spokes...? Rrrrrrrrrrrr! :-)

Oh wow that brings back memories of my mum screaming at me because all her clothes pegs had disappeared (we used to clip the cards to the frame). Worse was still to come when they were to find a deck of cards that only contained 31 cards :-P

[djsroknrol]

I haven't seen a hand-built go-cart in years.

So sad.


OMG..we built one out a grocery store shopping cart...they didn't steer very well with those free wheeling front wheels...A soda pop wooden crate for a seat, and away we went...

Dad was not pleased when we took his gearshift knob from his VW bus to use as our shifter...my butt was sore for days...:-P

[Bezmotivnik]

we built one out a grocery store shopping cart...they didn't steer very well with those free wheeling front wheels...A soda pop wooden crate for a seat, and away we went...

Sounds like Our Gang meets Jackass, doesn't it? :wink:

[djsroknrol]

Sounds like Our Gang meets Jackass, doesn't it? :wink:

(shaking head)...Thinking about it...MTV's jackass was the norm back then...it didn't matter what you did as long as you didn't get hurt too badly..and accomplishing you goal was way too cool to everyone witnessing...I never did a stunt twice...;)

[KiwiNZ]

Ah yes the good old days.

I am going on fifty, did I have a great child hood? hell yeah!!!
Would I trade it for what I have now ? Hell no except maybe this da,,ed wheelchair , but thats another story.

But were the good old days that good? hmmm I wonder.

My kids now grown up say their child hood was great good old days

[Biltong (Dee)]

I think what we miss more than anything else is the innocence of our youth.

Nowadays we have laws for what seems like everything - and lawmen and lawyers aplenty if something goes wrong.

A bike was a bike, not something that looks like a car on two wheels designed by the someone in the aerospace industry.

Back then, if you fell off your bike you yelled for Momma and she kissed it better.

Nowadays, your kid falls off his bike you figure how much you can sue for.

[ahaslam]

I'm 47. Some of the things we did as kids for fun was:

Build go-karts and race them down the hill.
Play army in the woods.
Find vines and swing on them like Tarzan.
Damn up the creek and go swimming.
Good 'ol riding bicycles.
Play baseball or touch football in the backyard.

The most hi-tech piece of equipment I had was a cheap record player in my room.

I'm half your age and things were the same for me.

Tony ;)

[%hMa@?b<C]

I am only fifteen, but still do most of the stuff that you mentioned. I spend most of my free time in the city, or infront of my computer... Although, most of it is spent helping others (this forum, writing GLP'd software)

[rattlerviper]

I grew up on a ranch in nebraska. I remeber walking on the creek in the middle of winter at 9pm at night with a .22 in hand because I was out trapping. We were actually allowed to bring knives to school as long as the blade was not a machette. After scool we would head to the woods with our air rifles and a set of goggles and play war. When we hit sixth grade we could join the Skeet team and bring our shotgun to school, so our classroom had a corner full of shotgun cases where they spent the day.
My son was suspended from school for a week last year. Anyone want to guess what he took to school? A pair of nail clippers with a pointed file on them. And no he did nothing wrong with them other than get caught. The world has changed in a disgusting manner.

Edited to add*and I'm only 31*

[fuscia]

we had better acid, no AIDS and we weren't sick of led zeppelin yet.

[cstudent]

we had better acid, no AIDS and we weren't sick of led zeppelin yet.

Tired of Zep? NO WAY DUDE!

[fuscia]

Tired of Zep? NO WAY DUDE!

throwback!

[Biltong (Dee)]

Seeing Star Wars for the first time, then Empire Strikes back...and being so pissed off cos Han's frozen in carbonite and they hadn't even finished Return of the Jedi yet... :-)

[djsroknrol]

Talking about movies, how about going to see Dr. Zhivago and having an intermission?

[Biltong (Dee)]

God, I'd forgotten about intermission. The place where you dived off to get the popcorn and the Coke in that tiny glass bottle only to arrive back in your seat to watch adverts about cigarette smokers doing it in exotic places?
How about the drive-in? Big cars, rainy nights and crackly speakers attached to the side windows?

[djsroknrol]

God, I'd forgotten about intermission. The place where you dived off to get the popcorn and the Coke in that tiny glass bottle only to arrive back in your seat to watch adverts about cigarette smokers doing it in exotic places?
How about the drive-in? Big cars, rainy nights and crackly speakers attached to the side windows?

Drive-ins were the best...Whenever I get to Las Vegas, they have a great 4-plex drive-in that we like to go to that still does gangbuster business. Remember carloads...real cheap?

[djross95]

Loved the original post! I used to ride in the back of my parents care with my sister (no SUV, no seat belts), and she would lay on the floor and I would lay on the seat when we were tired. Somehow we made it though.....

I'm 50 in 3 months, so this post hit home with me! DR

[djsroknrol]

Loved the original post! I used to ride in the back of my parents care with my sister (no SUV, no seat belts), and she would lay on the floor and I would lay on the seat when we were tired. Somehow we made it though.....

I'm 50 in 3 months, so this post hit home with me! DR

They didn't make a big deal out of you sitting in your parents lap driving with them like they did to Brittney Spears and her kid...we use to ride in the back of our dad's work pickup truck as well(nothing new there).

[RavenOfOdin]

Sure ain't 50 - about half that - but I can see the point about 'world of overprotected babies' that was made by an earlier poster.

Thank God they didn't have Amber Alerts in '84. ;)

[sanderella]

For those of us over 60:

Sweets on the ration, dried milk cans with Ministry of Food on the lables, same dried milk cans threaded through with string and used as stilts, motorbikes and sidecars, bombed-out buildings, mercury oxide streetlamps (they gave out green metallic light), bitterly cold winters that made your bones ache, flocks of people riding bicycles, streets empty of motor cars. :-|

[The Mekon]

For those of us over 60:

Sweets on the ration, dried milk cans with Ministry of Food on the lables, same dried milk cans threaded through with string and used as stilts, motorbikes and sidecars, bombed-out buildings, mercury oxide streetlamps (they gave out green metallic light), bitterly cold winters that made your bones ache, flocks of people riding bicycles, streets empty of motor cars. :-|

I will be 70 in a couple of weeks and well remember growing up in England during WW2. In 1944 I can remember my mother telling me off for looking at the doodlebugs (V1s)flying over our home rather than heading for the air raid shelters. We kids knew that if you could hear the V1's motor putting away you were safe for the time being anyway.

I missed the London BLitz as my spoil sport parents sent me off to Wales for a couple of years.

[rado_london]

I'm 47. Some of the things we did as kids for fun was:

Build go-karts and race them down the hill.
Play army in the woods.
Find vines and swing on them like Tarzan.
Damn up the creek and go swimming.
Good 'ol riding bicycles.
Play baseball or touch football in the backyard.

The most hi-tech piece of equipment I had was a cheap record player in my room.

I am 17 and I did the same things. But this is beccause I was back in bulgaria which wasnt that developed at that time. I am happy it wasnt and I had nice time not CS and FIFA instead of playing hide and seek and football in the school ground. Of course I still have the go kart which I spent 3 years to built and now is used by my cousine its going from generations to generations. Thanks god I met the PC in 2004. Not like some of my friends in 1997 and they missed all that nice time.

[Changeling]

Actually, I've gone over the hill to 51:-$

Anyone remember the game Kick-the-can? Or riding three-speed bicycles without wearing a helmet? Using flexible flyers and flying hell-bent down an ice-covered field? Skating on ponds? Walking 1.5 miles to school without using a daypack to carry your books? Sneaking your first cigarrette out in the woods, along with the Playboy magazine? ;) Getting sprayed with shaving cream on Halloween night? Playing army with pop rifles? I'm sure there's more, but like I said, I'm 51 now:shock:

[djsroknrol]

Walking 1.5 miles to school without using a daypack to carry your books?

Try 2 1/2 miles...;)

[ghettobilly]

Oh wow that brings back memories of my mum screaming at me because all her clothes pegs had disappeared (we used to clip the cards to the frame). Worse was still to come when they were to find a deck of cards that only contained 31 cards :-P

atleast you used playing cards not baseball cards ... my dad was talking too a friend about the old days when they mentioned using baseball cards in spokes for noise i showed them a collectors book of 50`s and 60`s cards they were using. you should have seen the look on there faces

[aysiu]

I'm very glad my teachers couldn't hit me and that my parents didn't hit me. I don't feel I missed out by not being abused physically.

[djsroknrol]

I'm very glad my teachers couldn't hit me and that my parents didn't hit me. I don't feel I missed out by not being abused physically.


Why wasn't I so lucky...The teachers in my school days had the "Board of Education" (paddle) for those who misbehaved...

[cstudent]

Why wasn't I so lucky...The teachers in my school days had the "Board of Education" (paddle) for those who misbehaved...

Same here. In 5th grade we had a teacher who had that written on her paddle. It also had holes drilled through it for added sting. We called her the Fuzz because she walked the halls blowing a whistle when she saw someone doing something they shouldn't be.

I use to get butt whippings a lot. Sometimes with Dad's belt. That hurt like hell. When I got older, in my teens, I use to get his boot up my butt. That hurt like hell too. I did learn to stay out of boot range before I smarted off.

[richbarna]

I'm very glad my teachers couldn't hit me and that my parents didn't hit me. I don't feel I missed out by not being abused physically.

That's the thing, today it is "physically abused", "psychological trauma" and "law suites", back then it was a normal occurrence although not regular.

I remember when kids were tough enough to take a clip round the ear, say sorry and continue with their daily activities.

To me "physically abused" relates to constant maltreatment. I suffered none of that.

I do see teenagers nowadays that are protected with all these modern day rules and regulations who will more than likely tell you to **** off if confronted.

But well done Aysiu for being an obviously well adjusted youth who needed neither. I wish that nowadays there were more like you.

[wordsmythe]

Actually, I've gone over the hill to 51:-$

Anyone remember the game Kick-the-can? Or riding three-speed bicycles without wearing a helmet? Using flexible flyers and flying hell-bent down an ice-covered field? Skating on ponds? Walking 1.5 miles to school without using a daypack to carry your books? Sneaking your first cigarrette out in the woods, along with the Playboy magazine? ;) Getting sprayed with shaving cream on Halloween night? Playing army with pop rifles? I'm sure there's more, but like I said, I'm 51 now:shock:

I did that stuff in the 80's in Chicago, though, if it makes you feel younger.

Did anybody else search "prairies" (Chicago-ism for empty lots) to catch snakes?

[Rumor]

Anyone remember the game Kick-the-can? Or riding three-speed bicycles without wearing a helmet? Using flexible flyers and flying hell-bent down an ice-covered field? Skating on ponds?

Sledding down the hills in winter! We used the flexible flyers, a toboggan and a few of those aluminum saucers that you couldn't steer to save your life.
Skating on the pond or trying to play ice-soccer wearing those green rubber boots and a couple pairs of socks.

But, when the fun was over and you came in and your feet (painfully!!) thawed, you'd get real hot chocolate made with milk on a stove. None of this boiling water and a packet of stuff that's never seen the inside of a cow.

[Biltong (Dee)]

Boiled milk - that sure brings back memories, especially when Mom forgot and it boiled over. The smell...
Nowadays it's 1 minute and ..."ting", remove from microwave.

Talking microwaves, or before they existed..
Remember coming home late in the evenings and finding your dinner plate gently steaming above a pan of simmering water. The gravy was hard round the edges but it was hot, and that was the main thing.

[cstudent]

I remember the whole family had to be home before 6:00pm because supper was at 6:00pm sharp or you went without. Everything was made from scratch. Lot's of meat and potato type meals. Mom was a great cook (as is everyone's mother), but mine definitely was. After my Dad passed away, Mom finally went to work at a "real" job. She became a baker for a local restaurant famous for it's homestyle cooking. She received a few rewards too for her pies.

[Rumor]

Talking microwaves, or before they existed..


I remember the TV ads for the "Radar Range."

And speaking of TV, remember having to adjust the rabbit ears just so or you wouldn't be able to get your program tuned in? Or, worse, having to turn the antenna on your roof just a little bit more to the left . . . no, no! too far! go back a bit! (in the rain)

Cable TV? What was that?

[cstudent]

I remember the TV ads for the "Radar Range."

And speaking of TV, remember having to adjust the rabbit ears just so or you wouldn't be able to get your program tuned in? Or, worse, having to turn the antenna on your roof just a little bit more to the left . . . no, no! too far! go back a bit! (in the rain)

Cable TV? What was that?

And it was FREE TV.

[djsroknrol]

And it was FREE TV.

We didn't get our first color TV til '65...

[Rumor]

We didn't get our first color TV til '65...

The NBC peacock, "In living color!"

[djsroknrol]

The NBC peacock, "In living color!"

Everything was in color...Batman, Time Tunnel, Green Hornet....and Star Trek...:)

[cstudent]

Everything was in color...Batman, Time Tunnel, Green Hornet....and Star Trek...:)

Do you remember a show called "It's About Time"? It was a comedy show about two astronauts that crash landed after a passing into a time warp into cave man times? I remember I use to love that show. I wish they would put it on TVland so I could see if it was actually any good. I also remember liking "My Mother the car" with Jerry Van Dyke. They only made six episodes before they canned it. I saw it again a few years ago. I can see why they cancelled it. Funny what you like as a kid. I also liked Time Tunnel. One of the movie channels plays reruns of it, but I can't remember which one.

[djsroknrol]

Do you remember a show called "It's About Time"? It was a comedy show about two astronauts that crash landed after a passing into a time warp into cave man times? I remember I use to love that show. I wish they would put it on TVland so I could see if it was actually any good. I also remember liking "My Mother the car" with Jerry Van Dyke. They only made six episodes before they canned it. I saw it again a few years ago. I can see why they cancelled it. Funny what you like as a kid. I also liked Time Tunnel. One of the movie channels plays reruns of it, but I can't remember which one.


"It's about time, it's about space, it's about two men in a strange new place"...of course I remember...:)

Was the time tunnel reruns the original series (Irwin Allen) or the remakes?

My mother the car...I was in luv with Ann Southern as a kid growing up...Gale Storm (My little Margie)as well...