-
All the
girls had ugly gym uniforms?
-
It took five minutes
for the TV warm up?
-
Nearly everyone's Mom
was at home when the kids got home from school?
-
Nobody owned a
pure-bred dog?
-
When a quarter was a
decent allowance?
-
You'd reach into a
muddy gutter for a penny?
-
Your Mom wore nylons
that came in two pieces?
-
All your male teachers
wore neckties and female teachers had their hair done every day and wore
high heels?
-
You got your
windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, without asking, all for
free, every time? And you didn't pay for air? And, you got trading
stamps to boot?
-
Laundry detergent had
free glasses, dishes or towels hidden inside the box?
-
It was considered a
great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your
parents?
-
They threatened to
keep kids back a grade if they failed .... and they did?
-
When a 57 Chevy was
everyone's dream car .... to cruise, peel out, lay rubber or watch
submarine races, and people went steady?
-
No one ever asked
where the car keys were because they were always in the car, in the
ignition, and the doors were never locked?
-
Lying on your back in
the grass with your friends and saying things like, "That cloud looks
like a ...,"
-
And playing baseball
with no adults to help kids with the rules of the game?
-
Stuff from the store
came without safety caps and hermetic seals because no one had yet tried
to poison a perfect stranger?
-
And with all our
progress, don't you just wish, just once, you could slip back in time
and savor the slower pace, and share it with the children of today?
-
When being sent to the
principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited the
student at home?
Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it
wasn't because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc. Our
parents, relatives and grandparents were a much bigger threat! But
we survived because their love was greater than the threat. (I couldn't
put a thing over on my Aunt Margaret.)
As well as summers filled with bike rides,
baseball games, Hula Hoops, bowling and visits to the pool (mine was
Cypress Hills Pool), and eating Kool-Aid powder with sugar.
Didn't that feel good, just to go back and say,
"Yeah, I remember that"?
Submitted by Dennis Chiocco (Class of
1956)
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