CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL THE PEOPLE WHO WERE BORN IN THE 1940’s, 50’s, 60’s, 70’s and 80’s
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a tin, nuts, eggsand didn’t get tested for diabetes andwe didn’t suffer allergies.
Then after that trauma, our baby cots were covered with bright coloured 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 children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts, car seats or air bags.
Riding in the back of a van ‘loose’ or on the parcel shelf, was always great fun.
We drank water from the garden hosepipe 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 cakes, white bread and real butter and drank pop with sugar in it, 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.
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were OK.
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 SKY, no DVDs, no surround sound, no mobile phones, no text messaging, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms…WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.
We played with worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
Made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although we were told it would happen, we did not poke out any eyes.
We rode bikes or walked to a friend’s house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!
Local teams 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!
This generation has 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!
I was born in the mid 70’s, and all I can say is we were fitter, more active, more friendly and MORE AWARE, as a kid we used to think nothing of wandering of to the local woods for the day. Admittedly we always told our parents where we were going, but this was all the communication we gave them, and off we’d go with a pack of “Robinsons” finest strawberry jam sandwiches. There was also no racism, though I grew up in a prodominetly white village in Bedfordshire, but because we all went to the same school we were all friends and we all went together. We shared pop and food and thought nothing of it, like you also said if we didnt make the team then we didnt play, BIG DEAL, we got on with our lives and didnt mope around, or heavens forbid nowaday, we formed our own team. We ran around with long sticks, pretending to have sword fights, we never once poked each others eyes out.
The most amazing thing though, and one thing the youth of today need to learn (unless your an inner city gang) is that you ALWAYS STAND BY YOUR MATES. We also used to go round the village riding our bikes at break neck speeds, well it was on a Grifter with 3 speeds, with bits of card shoved between our spokes to make that engine noise and wearing no hi-vis clothing and certainly no helmets. We also used to strip things down, just to see how they worked, we used to help our dad’s on a sunday fix the cars then eat our lunch with our hands still covered in oil and grime. After that we used to congregate at whoevers house, and watch the sunday movie or play board games until our parents phoned to tell us sunday dinner was ready, or if we was really lucky we used to get to go to the pub with our dad and have a half a shandy, and a packet of crisps, while sat at the bar.
So to our decades we were born in all I can say is: HERE HERE
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.
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were OK
i was boring mid 80’s, i often think about this and how everything has changed, i wish it was the 80’s/90’s, the world has gone mad with these “make things easy” inventions.
We have xbox and playstation to thank for hardly anything kids on the street, apart from the thugs…who parents cannot afford to buy them one. I often wish we never had mobile phones or half of these inventions for lazy people, im glad of the internet to a degree though but as with everything there is always a bad side on something good, never a good thing on something bad
Me and a mate used to go out on our bikes on a Saturday and often go over to Llangollen over 25 miles away without telling anyone. Nobody knew where we had gone or when we would be back. If we were there we got fed, if not we had to fend for ourselves. My parents didn’t even have a phone at the time, let alone mobiles.
I’m a child of the 80’s and I often think back to my childhood growing up through the 90s and wish that I had been an adult then, it was after 1997 it seemed to start going wrong. Any coincidence there maybe?
