Life was hard......

[newcastle]

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious sh*t about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking Twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... barefoot... BOTH ways Blah,Blah, Blah
And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of sh*t like that on my 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 forty, 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 F*CKING UTOPIA!
And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it!
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 bloody library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalogue!!
There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pencil!
Then you 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!
Stamps were 5 pence!
Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick the **** out of us! Nowhere was safe!
There were no MP3' s! 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 would usually talk over the beginning and f*ck it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished and the tape would come undone. Cause - that's how we rolled, get it?
We didn't have fancy crap 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 fancy Caller ID either!
When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mum, 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, mister!
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'. Your guy was 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! Just like LIFE!
You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel!
NO REMOTES!!!
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 BRATS!!
And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the cooker! Imagine that!
That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled. You little a*seholes wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1970 or before!
Regards,
Grumpy Ole F*cker

[Horus]

As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick the **** out of us! Nowhere was safe!

I love that one so very true

[Dusak]

And yet, reading those thoughts, every one a memory to me, I had an utterly fantastic childhood, one that I would of not wanted to miss. The youth of today may have it a lot better materialistic ways but will never experience the pleasures of my childhood and youthful years. And even though the odd slice across the back of the head was compulsory punishment in most households, love and care was also there in abundance for most, now a lot of parents worry in case their kids are taking TOO MANY drugs.

[Horus]

Like you Dusak I had a great chilhood, went without a lot of things in the material sense, but that was made up for in love and care plus using our own imagination when we played. There was nothing and I mean nothing that we could not turn into something we could have fun with or turn into an advenrure. We played out most of the day an dfelt perfectly safe, but of course we always had the usual mums warning of not taking sweets from strangers or getting into a car which usually went over our heads.

[carrie]

Difference then Horus was that people knew you, everyone in my local neighbourhood knew me and my mum and dad, I couldn't get away with much because someone would always tell. I had a happy childhood, lots of long walks with my parents, visiting my aunt on the farm and helping with the harvest, all the aunts, uncles and cousins in attendance, hard work then dancing to Mantovani and his orchestra in the evening. Being the only girl in our extended family I was spoilt rotten, but still one look from my Mum kept me in line.
I don't envy today's children they will never know the pleasure that can be found in a cardboard box. You could make a theatre a fort a shop out of them. Kids today don't need to use their imagination.

[newcastle]

I sometimes marvel at being around now to compare the life experienced by today's kids with what I endured in the 50's and 60's :

Being driven around in a dodgy motor with no seat belts.

Breathing the exhaled air of two heavy-smoking parents.

Being fed on a diet which would horrify modern nutritionists.

Being encouraged to play with things which were potentially lethal.

Often left to the tender ministrations of my elder siblings....who resented being enforced baby-sitters and let me know in no uncertain terms.

Being compelled to suffer the attentions of the school dentist who I'm sure was trained at Auschwitz.

Being woken at 5am on Sundays to dress in the ancient costume of an RC altar boy before being chased round the churchyard, after the service, by a priest with dubious intentions.

Having to invent sins for confession....not too venal and not repetitions of those I'd confessed the previous week.

Today's kids have a lot to be thankful for

[Zooropa]

Children are products of their parents, i cant help thinking that we have reaped what we have sown to a degree.