Watching the news yesterday...
...I heard everyone saying how, as Jaded commented, "We will always remember what we were doing when the planes struck." It did indeed define a generation. And, it let me know that I am, most assuredly, an old lady.
I remember the old days when we would say, "I remember what I was doing when JFK was shot." Damn. I bet most people who would say that have croaked by now. Don't worry, I'll go soon enough. I remember what I was doing when JFK was shot, not because I remember what a sad moment it was, but because they interrupted Bozo to tell us. Damn, it just occurred to me that Bozo is gone too. Alas...I am old.
When I was a kid, we were entertained so easily. A show with a couple of clowns and kids tossing balls in buckets amazed me for years. "Would she get the ball in the 6th bucket and win the bike?" I had to know. I had to play that game! My mother sent away for tickets to the Bozo show for me but by the time she got them, I was 14 and my mom had a bunch of little kids to take so I never got to go. I did see Bozo and Mr. Ned in a parade once, but I was too afraid to look, even from my perch on my fathers strong shoulders.
Saturday mornings I would rush through my Rice Krispies and then run to the TV and watch Tom and Jerry, Mighty Mouse and The Three Stooges. You know, old people stuff. But, damn, we were entertained. I tried to get my kids to watch a Disney movie once but they all said "NO! We want to watch The Terminator!" Oh well, I tried.
I guess the days are gone when kids could get up, leave the house and disappear until dinner. I would be afraid to let my a kid out of my sight today. What a shame. When I was a kid, I would leave the house and no one knew where the heck I was. We did the craziest things and without any money. I would trick the younger kids by turning mud patties into pennies by getting another kid to distract them while I switched the mud out for coins. I wonder where those little kids are today and what they think of the nutty older kid who did such things.
My friends and I would sit under a tree and make up sign languages that only we understood. We would walk to a field and into a giant pipe that led to the gutters under our neighborhood and shout out to the people walking down the streets. That was good fun for us. I can't imagine a kid having fun with mud and gutters nowadays.
When Elk Grove Village, Illinois still had corn fields, we would run through them, trying to get lost and find hidden treasures that the Indians had left behind. We didn't know that Indians were as easily entertained as we were and didn't have any treasures.
I miss the magic of being a kid, don't you? Believing in Santa and The Easter Bunny, being scared, not by Nightmares on Elm Street, but by the Wizard of Oz and waking up to a freshly fallen blanket of snow. That meant that we were going to have fun that day! We would run to get our coats and mittens on so that we could start making snowballs and walls to hide behind and throw our snowballs from. Life was simple and sweet and we didn't know anything bad could ever happen to us because our parents took care of everything.
My goal in life was to find a dime because with it, I could buy a bottle of soda. Even a nickel would get you a pack of gum. I will never forget the day that gum was no longer a nickel...there I stood with the nickel that I had held onto for hours waiting to go to the store...and it was 7 cents. I didn't have two more pennies and back then, a kid wouldn't have asked for anything they didn't earn. You could have asked, but you wouldn't have gotten it. You would have heard, "What can you do to earn those pennies?" And even then, you had to do more than two cents worth of work to get those pennies from your father.
One day I thought I was getting kidnapped. I was walking down the street and there was a man in the bushes next door. The further I walked down the street, the more he ran from house to house, hiding in the bushes at each place he stopped. I finally ran, crying, to my friends house and said to her father, "There's man trying to kidnap me!" That man was the meter reader and the poor old guy was as frightened as I was when Mr. Olef confronted him. That's about the worst thing that ever happened to me as a kid and it was funny.
Life isn't as easy for kids today, I don't care what anyone says. We didn't have anything to wear except our clothes when we rode our bikes. If we fell, we got hurt...period. But, we didn't live our lives worried about such things, we just got on our bikes and rode off to our next adventure.
I remember one such adventure that got me a bit of attention. For some odd reason, I climbed to the top of a swing set. I couldn't get down to save my life. I sat up there, holding on for dear life, all the other kids telling me to jump. Someone went to my house to tell my mother and she sent the neighbor over with his ladder to climb up and bring me down. I should have known then that life was pretty much a can of worms and that I shouldn't try anything crazy.
But...the first thing I did when I was old enough was to leave home and drive all around the country...trying to find myself I guess. I'm glad that I did it, I had no clue that by the time I got to the other side of the country that I would elope to Reno and have a baby right away. Ever since then, I've been the parent and the one who has to make everything all right.
When I say that I want to go home, I mean back to the house and time that I spent the 60's. I can't ever go back there and that makes me sad. There is no Way Back Machine and very few people who even remember what a Way Back Machine is. Tell me that some of you do...please? Then I won't feel like the oldest human on the planet.
It's these simple things that we fight for when we grow up. We want our own kids to be able to tell the stories to their kids and then to their grandkids. I used to be a grandkid, but now I'm a Grandma and I spoil my grandkids just like mine spoiled me. When Grandma was alive, she sat at the head of the big table. Then, when she died, I moved to the big table. Mother sat at the head and I moved over a spot and my niece took her place at the big table. Then, my mother died and now I'm at the head of the table and realizing that the big table that we all aspire to when we're little is nothing more than a launching pad for death.
Oh well. Maybe there's something truly wonderful in the next world. But, I can't say that my world has been that bad...at least not when I was a kid. We Americans certainly are a lucky lot. I wonder if I wrote a book about my childhood...would it read like an old timey book off history like the Little House Books do now? I fear it might. That's OK, when I get homesick, I have my Gilligan's Island's tapes to watch. It's not that they entertain me today, they just make me feel comfortable, like I'm visiting home for a little while.
OK, back to reality...I have to go to my probation officer today for my monthly meeting. We must keep track of the evil criminals, mustn't we? You can trust that your tax dollars are being well spent on dangerous thugs such as myself.
See ya soon.
Meg
...I heard everyone saying how, as Jaded commented, "We will always remember what we were doing when the planes struck." It did indeed define a generation. And, it let me know that I am, most assuredly, an old lady.
I remember the old days when we would say, "I remember what I was doing when JFK was shot." Damn. I bet most people who would say that have croaked by now. Don't worry, I'll go soon enough. I remember what I was doing when JFK was shot, not because I remember what a sad moment it was, but because they interrupted Bozo to tell us. Damn, it just occurred to me that Bozo is gone too. Alas...I am old.
When I was a kid, we were entertained so easily. A show with a couple of clowns and kids tossing balls in buckets amazed me for years. "Would she get the ball in the 6th bucket and win the bike?" I had to know. I had to play that game! My mother sent away for tickets to the Bozo show for me but by the time she got them, I was 14 and my mom had a bunch of little kids to take so I never got to go. I did see Bozo and Mr. Ned in a parade once, but I was too afraid to look, even from my perch on my fathers strong shoulders.
Saturday mornings I would rush through my Rice Krispies and then run to the TV and watch Tom and Jerry, Mighty Mouse and The Three Stooges. You know, old people stuff. But, damn, we were entertained. I tried to get my kids to watch a Disney movie once but they all said "NO! We want to watch The Terminator!" Oh well, I tried.
I guess the days are gone when kids could get up, leave the house and disappear until dinner. I would be afraid to let my a kid out of my sight today. What a shame. When I was a kid, I would leave the house and no one knew where the heck I was. We did the craziest things and without any money. I would trick the younger kids by turning mud patties into pennies by getting another kid to distract them while I switched the mud out for coins. I wonder where those little kids are today and what they think of the nutty older kid who did such things.
My friends and I would sit under a tree and make up sign languages that only we understood. We would walk to a field and into a giant pipe that led to the gutters under our neighborhood and shout out to the people walking down the streets. That was good fun for us. I can't imagine a kid having fun with mud and gutters nowadays.
When Elk Grove Village, Illinois still had corn fields, we would run through them, trying to get lost and find hidden treasures that the Indians had left behind. We didn't know that Indians were as easily entertained as we were and didn't have any treasures.
I miss the magic of being a kid, don't you? Believing in Santa and The Easter Bunny, being scared, not by Nightmares on Elm Street, but by the Wizard of Oz and waking up to a freshly fallen blanket of snow. That meant that we were going to have fun that day! We would run to get our coats and mittens on so that we could start making snowballs and walls to hide behind and throw our snowballs from. Life was simple and sweet and we didn't know anything bad could ever happen to us because our parents took care of everything.
My goal in life was to find a dime because with it, I could buy a bottle of soda. Even a nickel would get you a pack of gum. I will never forget the day that gum was no longer a nickel...there I stood with the nickel that I had held onto for hours waiting to go to the store...and it was 7 cents. I didn't have two more pennies and back then, a kid wouldn't have asked for anything they didn't earn. You could have asked, but you wouldn't have gotten it. You would have heard, "What can you do to earn those pennies?" And even then, you had to do more than two cents worth of work to get those pennies from your father.
One day I thought I was getting kidnapped. I was walking down the street and there was a man in the bushes next door. The further I walked down the street, the more he ran from house to house, hiding in the bushes at each place he stopped. I finally ran, crying, to my friends house and said to her father, "There's man trying to kidnap me!" That man was the meter reader and the poor old guy was as frightened as I was when Mr. Olef confronted him. That's about the worst thing that ever happened to me as a kid and it was funny.
Life isn't as easy for kids today, I don't care what anyone says. We didn't have anything to wear except our clothes when we rode our bikes. If we fell, we got hurt...period. But, we didn't live our lives worried about such things, we just got on our bikes and rode off to our next adventure.
I remember one such adventure that got me a bit of attention. For some odd reason, I climbed to the top of a swing set. I couldn't get down to save my life. I sat up there, holding on for dear life, all the other kids telling me to jump. Someone went to my house to tell my mother and she sent the neighbor over with his ladder to climb up and bring me down. I should have known then that life was pretty much a can of worms and that I shouldn't try anything crazy.
But...the first thing I did when I was old enough was to leave home and drive all around the country...trying to find myself I guess. I'm glad that I did it, I had no clue that by the time I got to the other side of the country that I would elope to Reno and have a baby right away. Ever since then, I've been the parent and the one who has to make everything all right.
When I say that I want to go home, I mean back to the house and time that I spent the 60's. I can't ever go back there and that makes me sad. There is no Way Back Machine and very few people who even remember what a Way Back Machine is. Tell me that some of you do...please? Then I won't feel like the oldest human on the planet.
It's these simple things that we fight for when we grow up. We want our own kids to be able to tell the stories to their kids and then to their grandkids. I used to be a grandkid, but now I'm a Grandma and I spoil my grandkids just like mine spoiled me. When Grandma was alive, she sat at the head of the big table. Then, when she died, I moved to the big table. Mother sat at the head and I moved over a spot and my niece took her place at the big table. Then, my mother died and now I'm at the head of the table and realizing that the big table that we all aspire to when we're little is nothing more than a launching pad for death.
Oh well. Maybe there's something truly wonderful in the next world. But, I can't say that my world has been that bad...at least not when I was a kid. We Americans certainly are a lucky lot. I wonder if I wrote a book about my childhood...would it read like an old timey book off history like the Little House Books do now? I fear it might. That's OK, when I get homesick, I have my Gilligan's Island's tapes to watch. It's not that they entertain me today, they just make me feel comfortable, like I'm visiting home for a little while.
OK, back to reality...I have to go to my probation officer today for my monthly meeting. We must keep track of the evil criminals, mustn't we? You can trust that your tax dollars are being well spent on dangerous thugs such as myself.
See ya soon.
Meg
posted by Meg Kelso | 7:26 AM
8 Comments:
Boy Meg, You bring back such wonderful memories. I remember my mom telling us to go outside and play, leaving home and not coming home until dark, no one was scared that we were kidnapped, it was just what we did. We did not ask our parents for a ride anywhere, we had our bikes, we rode miles and miles. We did not have Nintendo or Playstation and we certinally did not sit on our butts all day long watching the TV, our parents would not have it. I also remember Tom and Jerry and it is wonderful that my 4 year old granddaugher loves them as much as I did when I was young. She would much rather watch Tom and Jerry then to watch Sponge Bob. I remember going to friends houses and their parents being just like ours, they could punish you just as fast as your own parents. And I remember going to Grandma and Grandpa's every single holiday, everyone was there, no excuses...we just went and had family time. Oh how I wish we could get some of those values back and instill them in our own children. Sometimes, I want a way back machine too.
Absolutely! My mother kicked us out in the morning and we dared not come home until hours later. When I did, I had to knock on my own door to get in! And, if we had called the cops when we were spanked, the cops would have spanked us too. Yep, all the mothers were allowed to smack all the kids and no one questioned it. Hell, you dare not tell your own parents, you might get smacked again.
You wanna hear something sad? I woke up one Easter and couldn't find an egg. I woke up my mother and said, "Mom, the Easter Bunny didn't come!" She jumped up and said, "Shit...Margaret, help me hide these egss!" Oh, how devastating that was! Not to only find out that there was no Easter Bunny, but to actually BE the Easter Bunny that moment! Oh well. I survived it.
By the way...I also know who lives in a pineapple under the sea!
Meg
Oh Lord, yes...all of that brings back such wonderful memories. I lived for Saturday morning cartoons. Bugs Bunny Road Runner show; Yosimite "fickin frackn" Sam was my favorite character! Now Mel Blanc is gone, and therefore so are all his characters; in fact I can't tell you the last time I saw a Bugs Bunny cartoon...or the Pink Panther!
Now we have Spongebob...I just love Spongebob! :):):)
I stood in the shower, rinsing my hair and thinking of cartoons that I used to watch. You've mentioned some, I also remember and loved, Tweety Bird, Yogi Bear, Woody Woodpecker, Laurel and Hardy, Abbot and Costello...OK, so thery're not all cartoons. But I knew them all by heart for seeing them so much. Oh! How could I forget the Flinstones! The first show that I saw in color! It was beautiful.
Alas, the magic is on a new group of kids. I envy them.
Meg
Oh, and Spnge Bob ended a drought of decent cartoons...the last cartoon that I enjoyed was The Tick...and before that I was 11.
Every so often they come up with a good one!
Meg
Oh hell, girl...we're old enough to remember Underdog..."there's no need to fear, Underdog is here" and Mighty Mouse, Bullwinkle, Tom & Jerry...and even though not a cartoon, but characters none-the-less...Bozo, Captain Kangaroo...and who would have thought that Mr. Rogers was a Navy Seal!? I still love to watch Little Bear every now and then...it's so sweet and comforting. I used to do a mean Woody Woodpecker laugh...drove my mother up the wall! :)
Yes, those were the good ole days! LOL Our poor kids are watching some freaky cartoons nowadays...have you seen some of the things on Yugioh and Avatar and Naruto? What about Pokemon...what's up with that shit? The Japanese Anime cartoons are taking over!
OH I KNOW! That's what I meant when I said that Sponge Bob ended a drought. I don't get those cartoons at all! I can still crack up at Road Runner and Bugs Bunny...those were made to make daults and kids laugh, life was THAT innocent!
And when my father told me that Mr. Rogers was a war hero...I WAS BLOWN AWAY! Can you imagine him taking prisoners..."Come on now, let's all be neighbors." as he points his assaulat rifle at them?
I love it!
Meg
I LOVED GARFIELD GOOSE!!!!!! And the GRAND....PRIZE...GAME!!!! And how about Ray Rayner! Did you know that he was Oliver O. Oliver? Hey girl, you're dating yourself with such talk!
I love it!
Meg
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