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 I
was going to lay a bunch of stuff 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 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 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 library and look it up ourselves, in the
card catalog!!
There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a
pen! 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 10 cents!
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! Nowhere was
safe!
There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! 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 mess 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 then the tape would come undone rendering it
useless. Cause, hey, that's how we rolled, Baby! Dig?
We didn't have fancy junk like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and
somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it!
There weren't any cell phones either. If you left the house, you just
didn't make a call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch
with your "friends". OH MY!!! Think of the horror... not being in touch
with someone 24/7!!! And then there's TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You
kids have no idea how annoying you are.
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 parents, your boss, your
sweetheart, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to
pick it up and take your chances, mister!
We didn't have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with
high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like
'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your screen 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 out of luck when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off
your behind and walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!!
Oh, no! What's the world coming to?!?!
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 stove! Imagine that!
And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no!
No electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside or said
you were bored... you were doing chores!
And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung
on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the
last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the
dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first
place!
See! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have it too
easy. You're spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes
back in 1980 or any time before!
Regards,
Little Diva & The Over 30 Crowd
