Child in the Sixties & Seventies
A couple of posts ago, I mentioned being a child in the sixties. Well just today a dear friend of mine reminded me about some of the things we had to do back then (1972) compared to today's average 10 year old (2012).
First you have to understand we had no cell or smartphones, internet, personal computers, or digital anything. No music downloads, CD's, DVD's, Dish Network, cable TV, or VCR's. By '72 I think we finally got an ABC station giving us 4 TV stations to pick up by the rabbit ears (ask your Grandparents). Also, if I remember right, we got our first color TV around '72, a 19" portable Sears Brand TV.
But before you sit there and think, "God, what did you do all day?" In the afternoons and summers we played...outside. I know it sounds crazy, but our parents your Grand & Great-grand parents let us outside. We all had bikes and after breakfast we hit the door not to be seen till dinner time. I was blessed to have grown up on a dead end street with just traffic going to our houses, which wasn't much. So we took that street over played police chase on our bikes, drag raced, and even a game of baseball or tag.
Now, I'm going to sit here and tell you we walked 10 miles in the snow in our bare feet just to get to school and we lived it. That's something your grandparents can't even say. Besides I grew up in South Georgia, what snow? But I will say this. With all the stuff that kids, way younger than my own now have, I hope we are not taking away that one thing every child needs, their imagination.
So even though they maybe locked away in their rooms, I hope they still have a little of that imagination still with them that made me and maybe even you. Imagination that made me, a fireman, a policeman, a cowboy, a spaceman, a monster, & even a writer.
First you have to understand we had no cell or smartphones, internet, personal computers, or digital anything. No music downloads, CD's, DVD's, Dish Network, cable TV, or VCR's. By '72 I think we finally got an ABC station giving us 4 TV stations to pick up by the rabbit ears (ask your Grandparents). Also, if I remember right, we got our first color TV around '72, a 19" portable Sears Brand TV.
But before you sit there and think, "God, what did you do all day?" In the afternoons and summers we played...outside. I know it sounds crazy, but our parents your Grand & Great-grand parents let us outside. We all had bikes and after breakfast we hit the door not to be seen till dinner time. I was blessed to have grown up on a dead end street with just traffic going to our houses, which wasn't much. So we took that street over played police chase on our bikes, drag raced, and even a game of baseball or tag.
Now, I'm going to sit here and tell you we walked 10 miles in the snow in our bare feet just to get to school and we lived it. That's something your grandparents can't even say. Besides I grew up in South Georgia, what snow? But I will say this. With all the stuff that kids, way younger than my own now have, I hope we are not taking away that one thing every child needs, their imagination.
So even though they maybe locked away in their rooms, I hope they still have a little of that imagination still with them that made me and maybe even you. Imagination that made me, a fireman, a policeman, a cowboy, a spaceman, a monster, & even a writer.
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