The View From Here: A Child of the 50's

This following 'letter' was sent to me today by a good friend and fellow MMA-crazy, Dorothy.

Back in my chatting days, I would receive these sorts of chain-letters almost daily and, while I read every one, they never really hit home for me. It's been quite a while now - almost 6 years, in fact - since I was in a Yahoo chat room and, as I have already confessed, I don't understand Facebook and am a reluctant Twitter-person.

So, when Dorothy's note hit The Man's e-mailbox this morning and he then passed it on to me, it was like reading a familiar note.  Only this time ... well, this time I felt a bit old in reading it. 'Old' because everything in the letter rang so completely true. And without doubt, it all applies most definitely to me.

Enjoy.

*************

To those of us born 1925 - 1960 :

First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints. 

We had no childproof lids on our medicine bottles, locks on our doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes we had baseball caps, not helmets, on our heads.

As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags; cars with bald tires and sometimes with no brakes. 

Riding in the back of a pick-up truck on a warm day was always a special treat. 

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. 

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter, and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren't overweight. 

Why? Because we were always outside playing ... that's why! 

We would leave home in the morning and play all day ... as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. 

*No one* was able to reach us all day ... and ... we were okay.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride them down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem. 

We did not have Play Stations, Nintendos and X-boxes. There were no video games, only 3 channels on the television and certainly no cable tv, no videos or DVDs, no surround-sound or CD's, no cell phones, no personal computers, no internet and no chat rooms. 

We did have friends ... and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth. Those were called "accidents" and no lawsuits which followed them. 

We ate worms and made mud pies made from dirt and the worms did not live in us forever. 

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls and old, rusty tin cans and, although we were told it would happen, not everyone's eyes were poked out. 

We rode bikes free-handed and walked to our friends' houses and knocked on their doors or rang the bells ... or just walked in and talked to them. 

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. 

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of: they actually sided with the law.

The1925-1960 generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors *ever*. The past 50 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility ... and we learned how to deal with it all.

If you were born between 1925-1960: congratulations! 

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good. While you are at it, forward it to your kids, so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ?