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You mean back to the time when I went to the theater, and got ringworm in my scalp? This was the time before medicine has any anti-fungals to take care of something like that, and I had to wear a sailor's cap pulled down over my head as a boy in third grade? Doctors couldn't do anything about it and I lost sections of hair on my scalp, until we put some stuff on it for cows and it caused a massive skin infection that they could treat and which eventually killed the ringworm?
No I don't think I wish to go back to those dark days... in third grade.
You mean those days when neighbors were neighbors. Children respected their elders. When we had real springs and no thunderstorms on a snow day. There was penny candy a child could buy simply by returning soda bottles. Milkmen and paper routes. Real food without questionable additives. Children actually developed their imaginations by listening to radio serials. (Special effects limited only to your imagination). No boom cars! Cars you could really work on. $.20 a gallon gas. Party lines. Barrel sauerkraut and kosher pickles. Stick ball and bottlecap, all you needed was a stick a ball or a bottlecap and a piece of chalk. Fresh food markets selling food that wasn't bagged, canned, dried, or frozen. Music you could dance to and romance to. For those of us who are old enough these were the best times of our lives and I'd go back in a heartbeat.
Yes.... those things I could return to in a moment!
Check my "Status" and you'll see that I would prefer going back to when Lassie and RinTinTin were not yet domesticated.
I'd miss the Internet and be upset all the time by smokers polluting the air around me with their unfiltered cancer sticks costing only 25 cents a pack, but count me in for that time travel back to the Fifties -- if I can't start life in 1747.
i grew up a wasp in the 1950s , the golden age to be a child for white middle class children in america. i had a very stable childhood in a neighborhood made for children( large shady lawns, adjoining woods, nearby fields ) with a nurturing family who always seemed to have abundant time for me. even as an aging adult i continue to marvel at the very good things- values,wisdom, common sense, and most significantly, unconditional love- that i received from them and which still stand me in good stead today.
i was a very fortunate child and no one knows better than i that this was not the experience of all, or even many. i will always be grateful to the parents, aunts and uncles with whom i lived and who made this childhood and these memories possible for me.
but, i don't believe, even if possible, there is returning; we know too much and no longer have a child's innocence. for me, my memories are enough.
i grew up a wasp in the 1950s , the golden age to be a child for white middle class children in america. i had a very stable childhood in a neighborhood made for children( large shady lawns, adjoining woods, nearby fields ) with a nurturing family who always seemed to have abundant time for me. even as an aging adult i continue to marvel at the very good things- values,wisdom, common sense, and most significantly, unconditional love- that i received from them and which still stand me in good stead today.
i was a very fortunate child and no one knows better than i that this was not the experience of all, or even many. i will always be grateful to the parents, aunts and uncles with whom i lived and who made this childhood and these memories possible for me.
but, i don't believe, even if possible, there is returning; we know too much and no longer have a child's innocence. for me, my memories are enough.
catsy girl
Well said. It appears to me that most who are saying they would like to go back are thinking of their childhoods and not the decades.
Sure I wouldn't mind being a child again in the 50's but not an adult in the 50's, 60's or even some of the 70's.
I think most of us who would like to "go back" are thinking about how cheap things were in the 50's-60's-70's! And, like already mentioned, I could work on my own vehicle......Pep Boys & Chief Auto Parts got a lot of business from me! But, would I rather type out a purchase order on a typwriter or keep inventory on 3 x 5 cards.......absolutely NOT!! Give me a computer for both!
I remember wearing Penny Loafers to school (with a penny in each). I remember my dad taking a thermos of coffee and lunch pail to work and wearing a shirt with one of those "pocket savers" for pens/pencils in the shirt pocket.
But, with the technology that I've learned to use/love in today's society, could I really go back.........no! Do I miss Lassie and Rin Tin Tin......yes!
Here's a funny thing: Wife and I were in Michigan a few years ago for business. We decided to drive to Lincoln Park where she was raised. While driving down the main street, she said "up ahead is the theater I use to go to and had my first date at". As we got closer to the theater, I could see it and said to her "honey, I don't think you want to know what your theater has turned into!" She looked over and said "oh my gosh, it's a porno theater!" Yep, it was a Triple X theater now. Wow, how things can change thru the years!!
Well said. It appears to me that most who are saying they would like to go back are thinking of their childhoods and not the decades.
Sure I wouldn't mind being a child again in the 50's but not an adult in the 50's, 60's or even some of the 70's.
Same here. Knowing what I know NOW about the narrowmindedness of the times--racial discrimination, McCarthyism, things like that, I wouldn't want to live back in those days again.
Also, the constant fear of polio once I got old enough to understand and be afraid of it. We were not allowed to be in crowds or go to the town pool in the summer for fear of it.
Even as a child in the '50s I was disturbed at how women were treated because, as a girl, I knew that I would get the same treatment some day.
But to be an innocent kid in those days? YES! Riding our bikes and climbing the apple tree, walking to the corner store for an ice cream soda, dressing up in our mother's old clothes, collecting comic books, playing kickball in somebody's backyard, piling the entire family into the '57 Chevy to go to the beach-- and it wasn't all built up with condos, having the neighbor lady come over to can vegetables with my mother, baking chocolate chip cookies and brownies (now people seem to BUY them pre-made). Kids behaving in school and me being glad when the bad kids got yelled at --and they couldn't get away with disrupting the class. Not having to worry about chemicals in the food or water. Mickey Mouse Club. Getting all excited about buying a hula hoop. Playing endlessly outside no matter what the weather--running under the hose in summer, jumping in the leaves in the fall, building a snow house in winter (and taking food out and eating inside it), catching grasshoppers and keeping them in jars with holes punched in the covers, picking wild blueberries with a big coffee can on a string hung around your neck, rolling down hills, sliding down hills on sleds, sitting out on the back steps, hiding on the front porch, cutting out paper dolls,
getting all dressed up to go downtown to the stores, (yes, spending all day in Woolworth's or Kresge's), drinking lemonade (kids didn't usually drink soda), making an apron in "home-ec", playing kids' card games, playing cat's cradle with a piece of string--my English gram taught me how, my friend's Irish gram taught her how, seeing Gene Autry and his horse, Champion IN PERSON.
Where does it end? Being an innocent kid in the '50s!
...getting all dressed up to go downtown to the stores, (yes, spending all day in Woolworth's or Kresge's), drinking lemonade (kids didn't usually drink soda), making an apron in "home-ec", playing kids' card games, playing cat's cradle with a piece of string--my English gram taught me how, my friend's Irish gram taught her how, seeing Gene Autry and his horse, Champion IN PERSON.
Where does it end? Being an innocent kid in the '50s!
Getting dressed up to go out to a restaurant, to church, to fly in an airplane, seeing Hopalong Cassidy and his horse, Topper, in person, seeing Andy Divine (Jingles) on an almost weekly basis while grocery shopping and him sharing caramel corn with me, same with John Wayne, minus the caramel corn, and going on his boat, the Wild Goose, having Roy Rogers and Dale Evans and their children as summer neighbors and getting to know them...there was nothing like the old westerns in a young boy's life. Oh, and not to leave out Little Oscar and the Wienermobile visiting our store about once a year. And who could forget the miniature loaves of Wonder bread - Helps build strong bodies 12 ways!
Societally, those times were less than politically correct but perhaps that's a part of what made them so magical for children. We didn't have that pressure. We didn't need it. We had the bomb!
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