Take a stroll with me . . . close your eyes and go back - way back . . . . . before the Internet, TVs, CDs, DVDs before semi-automatics and crack, before SEGA or Super Nintendo . . . before school shootings before sex education in schools Way back . . . hot summer afternoons, eating ice cream with a wooden spoon red light, green light, Mother May I - I'm talkin' about hide 'n' seek, sittin' on the porch steps, Simon Says, Kick the Can, lunch boxes with a thermos inside, chocolate milk, penny candy, hopscotch, double dutch, butterscotch, skates with keys, riding bikes with no helmets kickball, dodgeball, jacks, red rover, hula hoops, canasta, old maid, crazy eights, Pit, and Clue wax lips and mustaches Mary Janes and saddle shoes poodle skirts and bobby socks running through the sprinkler, circle pins, bobby pins, the smell of clothes dried outdoors, licking salty lips, sticky fingers eating at the dinner table together when around the corner seemed far away and going to town seemed like going somewhere bedtime, suppertime, summertime, climbing trees, making forts, backyard shows, birthday parties in the yard, lemonade stands, cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians, sittin' on the curb 4th of July picnics jumping down the steps, jumping on the bed going to bed without your supper, pillow fights, slumber parties being seen and not heard company coming Sugar Daddy carmel suckers singing rhymes while jumping rope angel hair at Christmas, paper chains on the Christmas tree popcorn balls and homemade fudge white gloves and Easter hats going to church every Sunday, going to the movies on Saturday afternoon drive-in movies being tickled to death running until you were out of breath laughing so hard your stomach hurt being tired from playing spinning around, getting dizzy and falling down getting the giggles Remember that? Wait! black and white TVs short commercials Johnny Carson in the afternoon Sky King and Penny Rin Tin Tin and Tarzan the three stooges being read to party lines/sharing the phone listening to the radio as a family Zorro, Howdy Doody, and Rootie Kazootie Mr. Potato Head and Cootie Old Mother West Wind books I Love Lucy the first snow harvest moons riding the bus to school the smell of paste silhouettes of Lincoln and Washington saying the Pledge of Allegiance before class the Christmas creche in school singing carols Evening in Paris perfume big bubbly handwriting with heart-dotted 'i's the stroll, sock hops, hotrods American Bandstand cars with radios that had to warm up REMEMBER . . . two types of sneakers for girls and boys and you only wore them in gym class when most kids didn't get an allowance doing chores after school reaching into a muddy gutter for a penny fresh dairy milk in glass bottles 3-cent stamps girls didn't date or kiss until late high school spin the bottle crushes and gossip pictures of teen idols on the bedroom walls Fabian, Frankie Avalon, Dion Rock 'n' Roll when your mom wore nylons that came in 2 pieces male teachers wore suits and neckties female teachers wore dresses and high heels nurses wore uniforms doctors made house calls the worst embarrassment was being picked last war was a card game water balloons were the ultimate weapon baseball cards in the spokes of your bike picking blackberries May Baskets hanging on the front doorknob when you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, gas pumped without asking, and all for free, and you didn't pay for air gas was 12 cents a gallon and you got trading stamps when you got free dishes in a box of soap wringer washers, hanging clothes on the line Saturday night baths Mom's apple pie was homemade Sunday drives with no fear of road rage Burma shave signs you could travel safely with eight people in the car without seatbelts and airbags I'm not finished yet . . . remember lying on your back in the grass playing baseball in the backyard or the street remember bottles before safety caps and hermetic seals because no one would have thought to poison a perfect stranger parents taught kids values right and wrong were two different things Remember when . . . everybody was proud to be just plain ol' American without a hyphenated-handle attached to their name before air rage and road rage before anger management domestic violence The Nelsons and the Cleavers were a lot like your family comic books, the first Mad Magazine, Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, Laurel and Hardy, The Peanut Gallery, The Lone Ranger, The Shadow Knows, Roy and Dale, Trigger and Buttermilk, Hopalong Cassidy Dibs! on something fresh baked cookies with milk after school the sound of a reel mower on Saturday morning the roller rink on Saturday night and you HAD to be home by 10:00 summer bike rides, swimming in the lake Kool-Aid, Orange Crush, homemade rootbeer decisions being made by eenie-meenie-miney-mo mistakes were corrected by simply shouting "do over!" "race issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest "money issues" were handled by the banker in Monopoly the worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was a cold sex education was a 5 minute movie and you were SO embarrassed! homework and report cards were handed out at school; condoms and contraceptives would have been an outrage! Nobody was prettier or sweeter than Mom scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better everybody you knew had only one set of parents taking drugs meant orange-flavored aspirin the doctor came to the house when you were sick getting a foot of snow was a dream come true abilities were discovered because of double-dares older siblings were your worst tormentors and fiercest defenders long summer days, "see you in September" Christmas took so long to get here Remember . . . Moms bringing homemade cookies to school 4-H, Brownies, gays and girls couldn't be Boy Scouts campfires and roasting marshmallows french fries and ketchup Wait! Don't leave yet! Remember when going out to dinner in a real restaurant was a privilege shopping at the dime store for Christmas presents when any parent could discipline any kid, or feed him or send him to bed with no dinner, make him do chores and nobody, not even the kid, thought a thing of it - when they threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed, and did! Everybody you knew, knew how to read Remember . . . alphabet soup before alphabet kids with ADD, ODD and ADHD; kids were called brats when they were then taught how to get along. going to the fair, riding the roller coaster nobody ever locking their doors in houses or cars mood rings and year books fooling around in the halls being sent to the principal's office being in fear of your parent's discipline carhops, popbeads, storybook dolls cherry cokes, white lipstick kids used their imagination and never got bored kids could walk home from the library after dark without fear of being kidnapped, abducted, molested, or murdered parents knew where their children were children knew where their parents were Remember . . . when gay meant happy and you weren't afraid to use the word The closet was a place for hanging clothes not some place you "came out of" the people who got PG in high school had their babies lots of them got married and are still married space was something we looked at and marvelled not a place we filled with junk the moon had a face and Mars didn't Remember when our worst enemy's most violent action was banging his shoe on the table when immigrants learned English so they could get a job and fit in because they were proud to live here Remember when the worst disease you could catch was measles or chicken pox remember when vaccinations were safe Remember a time before AIDS, West Nile virus, Ebola, people coped without Prozac you didn't know anybody in a 12-step program mom didn't spend all day at the mall people went grocery shopping once a month nothing was disposable - everything was useful violence was something you only saw in Westerns never on the 6 o'clock news for the most part people were happy life was simpler and a whole lot safer we didn't have much, but we always had enough we celebrated real heroes Veteran's day and Memorial day the 4th of July was a family affair to celebrate America we were proud of the flag nobody ever thought of burning it we actually were thankful on Thanksgiving we rejoiced at Christmas and Easter as we celebrated America's God Jesus Christ and nobody was offended that we did |
Now, wasn't that refreshing! Remember how simple life used to be? and it wasn't that long ago really - a lot more than the music has died in America So, you tell me, in the last 40 years, what has happened to America? |
This page was last updated on: 11/8/01
I didn't write it, Paul Harvey did |