Memories

Edith's new friend and her son's mother in law from Australia sent this to her, and she (Edith) sent this to me. I love it. And yes I remember all these things. I had to remember the word exchange between the English- Australian version and ours like lolli is candy and petrol is gas and sand shoes are thongs ( for the feet!)

This kind of fun is a challenge to bring back to the modern age. When you hand a child a hula hoop he wants to know what it does. "A dance," you tell the child, "But you have to be in it." The child climbs over one side. "When does it start?" Asks the child. It's worth the smile and the laugh.

Today, gym uniforms look a lot like real clothes. I remember that and how easy it was to turn - and I mean turn the dial on the TV. Today, I can't turn on a TV set without help - too many buttons that all look the same. I remember 28 cent gasoline, do you? My favorite car has always been a 28 Ford. My favorite program was Wagon Train - any body remember? My favorite cartoon was Bugs Bunny - I can relate to Bugs - who do you relate to? And I thought that a million dollars could easily be spent on penny candy. Oh the thinks that we thunk!

I live a lot like that today, however, and I think a lot of people my age do if they can. I still have a flour grinder - dispenser in the kitchen that I use every day. I still bake most days even with my heavy schedule. It only takes ten minutes to peal enough apples for a pie or make cookies or pop a cake in the oven. I'd rather walk than take the car; a car always seems so big to drag down the street. I would rather ride a horse than get into an airplane. Restaurants are for lunch not dinner, and I still don't have heat in my bedroom unless you plug it in. These are the things that make older people smile.

Why do people with a few years on them like to remember the past? Because it was easier to live as a thoughtful person. There was time to be alone, to have long periods of quiet and time to think about things, to read, to learn about life, to discuss topics of importance. The rush rush of "going" was not as in your face backed by the constant drone of TV telling you every thought. TV didn't use have a monopoly on every idea and every subject. TV used to be entertainment; now it's philosophy and theology on a dull lifeless screen. Why does yesteryear seem better? Because the interior man matters and that is a difficult thing to manage in a crowd that is never quiet.

Last night Anne read Anne Sexton. Sexton laments being a homemaker. I sighed. Home is where the heart is; is that lamentable or is the truth that the home is the seat of creativity and self development?

Anyway, for those of you who remember these memories, have a ball. And post your memories.

DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN...?

All the girls had ugly gym uniforms?

It took five minutes for the TV warm up?

Nearly everyone's Mum was at home when the kids got home from school?

Nobody owned a purebred dog?

You'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny?

Your Mom wore stockings that came in two pieces?

All your male teachers wore ties and female teachers had their hair done every day and wore high heels?

You got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and petrol pumped, without asking, all for free, every time?

Cereals had free toys hidden inside the box?

It was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents?

They threatened to keep kids back a year if they failed. . .and they did?

When a 57 Holden was everyone's dream car?

No one ever asked where the car keys were because they were always in the car, in the ignition, and the doors were never locked?

Lying on your back in the grass with your friends and saying things like, "That cloud looks like a ."

Playing footy with no adults to help kids with the rules of the game?

Stuff from the shop came without safety caps and hermetic seals because no one had yet tried to poison a perfect stranger?

And with all our progress, don't you just wish, just once, you could slip back in time and savour the slower pace, and share it with the children of today?

When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited the student at home?

Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it wasn't because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc.

Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat!

But we survived because their love was greater than the threat.

Send this on to someone who can still remember Nancy Drew, Laurel and Hardy, The Famous Five Secret Seven, Biggles, the Lone Ranger, Phantom, Roy and Dale and Trigger.

As well as summers filled with bike rides, cricket games, Hula Hoops, monkey bars, jilgying, visits to the beach and "conversation" lollies.

Didn't that feel good, just to go back and say, "Yeah, I remember that"?

I am sharing this with you today because it ended with a double dare to pass it on. To remember what a double dare is, read on.

And remember that the perfect age is somewhere between old enough to know better and too young to care. How many of these do you remember?

Lolly cigarettes, pogo sticks, marbles, Home milk delivery in glass bottles with aluminium tops Newsreels before the movie, Sandshoes, Telephone numbers with letter prefixes....(ABD 601).
45 RPM records, Hi-Fi's, Metal ice cubes trays with levers, Mimeograph paper, Cork pop guns Drive ins, Valiants, Washtub wringers, Reel-To-Reel tape recorders, houses made of cards, Mechano Sets, THAT awful pink slab of bubble gum, Penny lollies, 35 cent a gallon petro?

Do you remember a time when... Decisions were made by going "eeny-meeny-miney-moe"? "Race issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest?

It wasn't odd to have two or three "Best Friends"?

The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was "boy or girl bugs"?

Having a weapon in school meant being caught with a ging?

Saturday morning cartoons weren't 30-minute commercials for action figures?

Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down was cause for giggles?

The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team?

Playing cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle?

Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin?

Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?

If you can remember most or all of these, then you have lived!!!!!!!