Passed on from my daughter. My added remarks are in bold.:
TO ALL THE KIDS
WHO SURVIVED the
1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.
Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.
As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, booster seats, seat belts or air bags.
Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat. (As 5 and 6 year olds, we took the canoe out on the lake in the Summer, stayed out all day down where the "catty-nine tails" grew, hunting snapping turtles and picking lillies. No one worried about us and yet there were no such things as life vests or safety equipment. We were all good swimmers.)
We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.
We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank Koolade made with sugar, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. (There were no fences around school playgrounds and we spent hours playing hopscotch, dodge ball, jump rope, basketball, tennis, and daredevil moves on the jungle gyms on gritty blacktopped surfaces that left brushburns and embedded pebbles when we fell. We sucked it up and went back into the game.)
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVD's, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computer's, no Internet or chat rooms....... WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them! (We couldn't wait for the first good snow/ice to go sledding down "suicide hill.")
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no
lawsuits from these accidents. (We walked the plank at new construction sites.)
We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. (As 8 year olds, we sat in the dirt of our friend's parent's garden and pulled up all the carrots and ate them, dirt and all.)
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, (I was 12 and it was a .22 rifle and I was sent to an NRA gun safety course before I could fire it), made up games with sticks and tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes. (We had pea shooter fights through the drainage pipe that ran under the highway.)
We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!
Little League 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 police pretty much ignored us, but if there was interaction it was a threat to tell our parents. That was enough.)
These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL!
If YOU are one of them . . CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good .
And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave (and lucky) their parents were.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't
it?!
The quote of the month is by Jay Leno:
"With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"
For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us....go
ahead and delete this.
For the rest of us.....pass this on.
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