Note from an “Over 30 Person.”
NOTE: I was asked today if I could find this posting from last year sometime. I did and decided to re-post it for anyone who may have missed it.
“When I was your age…”
This cute message to the younger generation was sent in by one of my “over 30” Blog readers. A friend suggested that I “Blog it,” so here it is. Oh yeah, I “cleaned it up” just a bit, and added the visuals.
When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning uphill… barefoot… BOTH ways; “Yadda, yadda, yadda.”
And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crapola on kids about how hard I had it, and how easy they’ve got it!
But now that I’m over the ripe old age of thirty, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today. You’ve got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!
And I hate to say it but you kids today don’t know how good you’ve got it!
So EASY!
I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves in the card catalogue!! There was no e-mail!! We had to actually write somebody a letter, with a pen! Then had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!
So EASY to Rock Out
There were no MP3’s or Napsters! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ’d would usually talk over the beginning and screw it all up!
Hard To Imagine
We didn’t have fancy stuff like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that’s it!
And we didn’t have Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn’t know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances!
So Antiquated!
We didn’t have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘asteroids’, we were a little square! You actually had to use your Imagination!!
And there were no multiple levels or screens; it was just one screen forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder, and faster and faster until you died!
NOT!
You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on television! When it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your backside and walk over to the TV to change the channel, and there was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday morning. Do you hear what I’m saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rats!
OMG!
And we didn’t have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove … Imagine that!
You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoiled. You wouldn’t have lasted five minutes way back in 1980!
Regards,
Over 30
November 25th, 2008 at 11:45 am
I guess you have to be older than 30 to remember party lines, where you shared your phone line with other people. When you picked up the phone and heard strangers talking, the polite thing to do was to hang up and wait your turn.
Wow things have really changed, and fast!
November 25th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Remember “full service” gas stations?
Fill ‘er up… check the oil & tire presure… and clean the windows!!!
All for less than 50 cents a gallon!
November 25th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
I remember party lines, my friend had one. They alternated odd/even hours of the day. One time we were talking so long into the other person’s hour that somebody screamed at us to get off the phone. How embarrassing; but, money was tight. In those days some of of the Daddies in the neighborhood didn’t finish high school, let alone go to college. Many were immigrants who ran their own businesses doing the best they could so their children could do well. Many did. A lot of our Mommies didn’t work.
Yeah, kids today have it very easy and many are not only clueless but they hate the whole subject of history. My son won’t watch a movie that is a historical drama, yet I live for those films. To many youth, the past is pointless.
True, there is wonderful technology today that we get to enjoy; but, there was a certain way of life that is missed because we had more personal contact with one another.. Life is a trade off. I for one enjoy both worlds and still prefer to phone rather than text, and appreciate a handwritten letter or card. Especially with pretty stickers all over it. But hey, I love to cook also, and rarely order in or dine out spending the savings on great vacations when possible. Many young people don’t know how to cook. What I wonder is, do they wish they knew how; would they like to learn?
November 25th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Party Lines: That takes me way back. We used to unscrew the receiver end of the phone so as to go undected, and then listen in on the conversations. It didn’t take much to entertain us in those days.
Cook? Me? Never; that’s her job.
November 27th, 2008 at 7:44 am
Ron, Happy Thanksgiving to you, Masae, and your family! Thanks for the fun blog this morning. Savor the day!
May 21st, 2010 at 8:25 am
A few things i can say positive about the spoiled youth- most of them have a great sense of humor, some of them have created empires out of the thin air in record time with their incredible creativity ie facebook and the like. Most of them hate any physical work. I recently moved out of a place in town to move into my first owned property in Kailua, and i put a lot of things out to give away- lumber and other stuff perfect for making things, and absolutely no one took it. I was flabergasted! These lazy spoiled whatevers do not ever get their hands dirty, everything pretty much is electronic. Their life is totally disposible, they cant fix anything pretty much. That is really sad to me. But, like any past generation, the elders always felt this way, times have changed radically, everything we buy is disposible, the only people fixing things are fixing major stuff like cars, homes, appliances. no matter how much we progress with technology and cheap manufacturing, we still have to deal with nature ie floods huricanes etc, and it is always a good idea to have some practical skills that go beyond electronics.