"Hey
Dad," one of my kids asked the other day, "What
was your favorite fast food when you were
growing up?"
"We
didn't have fast food when I was growing up," I
informed him. "All the food was slow."
"C'mon, seriously. Where did you eat?"
"It
wa s a place called 'at home,'" I explained.
"Grandma cooked every day and when Grandpa got
home from work, we sat down together at the
dining room table, and if I didn't like what she
put on my plate I was allowed to sit there until
I did like it."
By
this time, the kid was laughing so hard I was
afraid he was going to suffer serious internal
damage, so I didn't tell him the part about how
I had to have permission to leave the table. But
here are some other things I would have told him
about my childhood if I figured his system could
have handled it:
Some
parents NEVER owned their own house, wore Levis
, set foot on a golf course, traveled out of the
country or had a credit card. In their later
years they had something called a revolving
charge card. The card was good only at Sears
Roebuck. Or maybe it was Sears AND Roebuck.
Either way, there is no Roebuck anymore. Maybe
he died.
My
parents never drove me to little league
practice. I ha d a bicycle
that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only had
one speed, (slow). We didn't have a television
in our house until I was 11, but my grandparents
had one before that. It was, of course, black
and white, but they bought a piece of colored
plastic to cover the screen. The top third was
blue, like the sky, and the bottom third was
green, like grass. The middle third was red. It
was perfect for programs that had scenes of fire
trucks riding across someone's lawn on a sunny
day. Some people had a lens taped to the front
of the TV to make the picture look larger.
I was
13 before I tasted my first pizza, it was called
"pizza pie." When I bit into it, I burned the
roof of my mouth and the cheese slid off, swung
down, plastered itself against my chin and
burned that, too. It's ! still t he best pizza I
ever had.
" I
remember this one all to well. But it was the
best pizza ever."
We
didn't have a car until I was 15. Before that,
the only car in our family was my grandfather's
Ford. He called it a "machine."
I
never had a telephone in my room. The only phone
in the house was in the living room and it was
on a party line. Before you could dial, you had
to listen and make sure some people you didn't
know weren't already using the line.
Pizzas were not delivered to our home. But milk
was.
All
newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys
delivered newspapers. I delivered a newspaper,
six days a week. It cost 7 cents a paper, of
which I got to keep 2 cents. I had to get up at
4 AM every morning.. On Saturday, I had to
collect the 42 cents from my customers. My
favorite customers were the ones who gave me 50
cents and told me to keep the change. My least
favorite customers were the ones who seemed to
never be home on collection day.
Movie
stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least,
they did in the movies. Touching someone else's
tongue with yours was called French kissing and
they didn't do that in movies. I don't know what
they did in French movies. French movies were
dirty and we weren't allowed to see them.
If
you grew up in a generation before there was
fast food, you may want to share some of these
memories with your children or grandchildren..
Just don't blame me if they bust a gut laughing.
Growing up isn't what it used to be, is it?
My
Dad is cleaning out my grandmother's house (she
died in December) and he brought me an old Royal
Crown Cola bottle. In the bottle top was a
stopper with a bunch of holes in it. I knew
immediately what it was, but my daughter had no
idea. She thought they had tried to make it a
salt shaker or something. I knew it as the
bottle that sat on the end of the ironing board
to "sprinkle" clothes with
water
because we didn't have steam irons. Man,
I am old.
How
many do you remember?
Head
lights dimmer switches on the floor.
Ignition switches on the dashboard.
Heaters mounted on the inside of the fire wall.
Pant
leg clips for bicycles without chain guards.
Soldering irons you heat on a gas burner.
Using
hand signals for cars without turn signals.
Older
Than Dirt Quiz: Count all the ones that you
remember not the ones you were told about.
Ratings at the bottom.
1.
Blackjack chewing gum
2.
Wax Coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water
3.
Candy cigarettes
4.
Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles
5.
Coffee shops or diners with tableside juke boxes
6.
Home milk delivery in glass bottles with
cardboard stoppers
7! .
Party lines
8.
Newsreels before the movie
9.
P.F. Flyers
10.
Butch wax
11.
Telephone! numbers with a word prefix
(OLive-6933)
12.
Peashooters
13.
Howdy Doody
14.
45 RPM records
15.
S&H Green Stamps
16
Hi-fi's
17! .
Metal ice trays with lever
18.
Mimeograph paper
19
Blue flashbulb
20.
Packards
21.
Roller skate keys
22.
Cork popguns
23.
Drive-ins
24.
Studebakers
25.
Wash tub wringers
If
you remembered 0-5 = You're still young
If
you remembered 6-10 = You are getting older
If
you remembered 11-15 = Don't tell your age,
If
you remembered 16-25 = You're older than dirt!
I
might be older than dirt but those memories are
the best part of my life.
Don't
forget to pass this along!!
Especially to all your really OLD friends !!!!
"Senility Prayer"...God grant me...
The
senility to forget the people I never liked
The
good fortune to run into the ones that I do
And
the eyesight to tell the difference."
Have
a great week!!!!!!