In My Day

I was chatting with a friend the other day while her kids were playing around the house. While she was chatting to me she kept jumping up and down to see what the kids were up to at such an alarming rate that it started me thinking of how things have changed over the years. As a child I was very much left to get on with life. My mother didn't run around after me like mothers seem to these days.

I survived being born to a mother who smoked and drank while she carried me. She took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a tin, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Once I was born the trauma really started. My baby cot was covered with bright colored lead-based paint. I had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when I rode my bike, I had no helmet.

As a child, I rode in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a van - loose - was always great fun. I drank water from the garden hosepipe and not from a bottle. I shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one actually died from this.

I ate cakes, white bread and real butter and drank pop with sugar in it, but I wasn't overweight because I was always playing out! I would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as I was back when the streetlights came on my mother was ok with it.

No one was able to reach me all day. And I was OK.

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

I didn't have a Playstation, Nintendo, X-box, or any video games at all, no five hundred channels on Cable TV, no DVD or video tape movies, no surround sound, no mobile phone, no text messaging, no personal computer, no Internet or Internet chat rooms...

I HAD FRIENDS and we went outside!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth. We played with worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. Made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although we were told it would happen, we did not poke out any eyes. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!

Local teams 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!

The generations who grew up in this fashion produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever! The past 50 years has seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it!

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