I come from an era of Elvis, of Yuri Gagarin, of cups and saucers, of when we still polished our shoes, of the Morris Minor, Vesta curries, of Teddy boys, and 'bouffant' hair.
We stood still and removed our hats as a hearse went by, we had a shilling pocket money each week for sweets (if we were lucky), and we had a dressing-up box.
We had gloves on strings that were threaded through our sleeves, we had fathers who went to work with a folded newspaper an umbrella and a neatly folded mackintosh over his left arm, we went for long tedious walks on Sundays.
Aeroplanes still had propellers, some cars still had starting handles, and there were no yellow lines on the roads.
We had teachers who would thrash us for not being able to translate 'Cotta's army advanced from the South' into Latin, we would be thrown into the deep end of a pool to teach us how to swim, and we were made to write 'I must not ask to be excused' 500 times if we needed to have a pee during lessons.
We ate spotted dick, rice pudding with jam, and frogspawn.
We all knew the difference between a man and a woman, we didn't use the F word every few seconds, and we didn't eat 'take-away' meals every night.
We didn't have allergies, we didn't spend all day on the phone, and we didn't grunt when spoken to.
We also had to visit a shop to buy things, buy stamps to send letters, and use a road map to find directions. We had no TV's, no CD players, no GPS, and no Laptops.
Life was hard.
But we also had freedom as children, we walked or took the bus to school, no queues of cars dropping kids off, out playing with friends without adults watching our every move and "protecting" us all the time. And we were allowed to fail, there was no "every kid must get a gold star so that they don't feel left out" nonsense.
ReplyDeleteI had a small red second-hand bike when I was very young, and I'd spend hours cycling around or going fishing. I thought nothing of it.
DeleteJust yesterday I was talking on the phone with a childhood friend I hadn't seen in over sixty years, and we were both wondering how we walked such distances from home to school. There were no buses in our small town and no parent had a car.
ReplyDeleteI was about 5 when I first started school and would travel miles on a bus by myself to get there and back.
Delete"of when we still polished our shoes".... I wear Crocs for both comfort [corns] and convenience... I have two smart pairs; both black... and the makers of Crocs do a polishing kit!! [No... I haven't bought one, a regular wipe with a damp sponge keeps them clean.
ReplyDeleteSo, some people must still polish shoes to make it worthwhile to make and release a polishing kit!
"We ate spotted dick, rice pudding with jam, and frogspawn." I have a now shortdated, bottle of slimy-skimmed milk to use and I haven't had tapioca for yonks... (and that packet may be beyond it's "keeping" date... so will require extra soaking in the milk.... but I will be having frogspawn for puddin'.................
after all, all the frogs are at it!!
Most people these days seem to wear 'trainers', which need no polishing. I wear suede which doesn't need polishing either. Don't eat the frogspawn, it will make you ill.
DeleteI love tapioca.... as a milk pudding.... but I notice that here, the packet talks about adding 4tbs to a soup, or even worse... a consommé.... they really would look like frogspawn in a light broth consommé.... totally off putting [except for certain mentality 5&6yr olds!!]
DeleteWe didn't visit a shop! For the first 7yrs of my life I lived a few miles from even a village, and we had a weekly van, one of those you could walk into, with side shelves lined with tins, bottles and packets. The butcher and fishmonger came in their own vans.
ReplyDeleteWe had those in France, we had vans selling food, wine, hardware, and even clothes. These days they've all gone; everyone has a car or two.
DeleteMy parents had to budget for my sixpenny bus fare to school each day. I tucked the coin inside my glove so that I wouldn't lose it on the way to the bus stop.
ReplyDeleteHere, the local parents are complaining that their children are expected to pay to travel to school by bus. Oh, Horror!
People complain about anything these days; we live in a 'complain society'.
DeleteYes, Cro, and you are the leader of the pack.
DeleteU
And by saying that Ursula, so are you!!
DeleteJohn, considering your future as a counsellor you'd be well advised to tone it down a bit. You have "banned" me from your blog; so why - consistently, not to say relentlessly - do you use other bloggers' comment boxes to get at me? It's not a good look.
DeleteAnyway, Cro would be the first one to admit that he has many gripes with society as is now. Hence my "leader of the pack" comment. Hot tip of the day: Engage brain before jumping in both feet first.
U
Don’t play the counsellor role with me !Ursula’, I’ve just challenged you…and challenging is part of communication ,
DeleteAs for banning you
I’ve left your last recent comment intact
Get your facts right
Oh how most of your list, and the comments, resonate with my early years!
ReplyDeleteThe only difference was that my father dropped me off in the morning (on his way to work) - I suspect just to make sure I went!
As a "day" girl I was lucky to live near enough to go home to lunch, so spared the horrors of the school kitchens and never had to force down rice pudding or frogspawn!
I wouldn't eat those either; or the spotted dick. They put me off for life.
DeleteI caught the school bus in the morning.It was tuppence.School was about 2 miles away. The bus was double decker and in the winter, when it snowed , we all had to get off so it could get to the top of Willowcroft Hill, then get back on at the top. I walked home at dinner and back again.Then home at 4 o'clock. Shoes taken off and polished every night. School uniform also hung up after school too.We put our " playing" clothes on then. Didn't everyone? haha.
ReplyDeleteStrict at Spondon House.I once went to school in a grey pleated skirt because my navy school one wasn't quite dry. The headmistress spotted me and called me out.I got a telling off and sent home ! Red face or what.
ReplyDeleteI rather like the idea of strict school uniforms, it stops the fashion parades that I see outside of many schools.
DeleteI echo everything Will said in his comment. I think we didn't have allergies as everything was just more natural and not mass produced. We did have black snot in Manchester all Winter due to all the houses spewing out black smoke from their coal fires ... my brothers school jumper sleeve used to bear the evidence.
ReplyDeleteYuk. We didn't have that soot problem in leafy Surrey, but I do remember my aunt in Shropshire saying that she often had to re-do her washing because of black spots covering everything.
DeleteI think we're all of a certain age here Cro! I can certainly remember all those lovely times and I feel really sorry for kids these days who are not interested in doing anything other than sitting for hours on their tablets or sending nasty messages to each other on Snapchat or whatever. We definitely had the best times in our day!
ReplyDeleteWe keep saying that to ourselves. We know young people who hardly ever speak, they just communicate with their phones, and occasionally grunt. That's it.
DeleteI remember all of those things fondly { well, most of them } I don't ever remember feeling deprived and we were not ' rolling in it ' .... my mum worked as well as my dad { my dad was very clever with his money ! } Plus, my dad played in a band in the evenings and the weekends to make a bit more money ! In the school holidays and at the weekend, I would meet my friend { who I still see now } at around 8.00 am and we would be out all day on our second hand bikes or on our roller skates. We had such a good childhood. I remember once in the depths of winter we put our wellies on and went down to the brook and stamped our way along breaking the ice ! I must have enjoyed it as I remember it clearly. I was listening to a psychiatrist yesterday who was saying that , if you meet a friend say in the pub and you get your phone out and put it on the table, you are telling your ' friend ' that your phone is more important than they are ! { sorry for the long comment ! } XXXX
ReplyDeleteI don't visit my local very often, but when I do there are invariably people there who ignore each other in favour of their phones. I find it really strange.
DeleteWhat an alien way of life when it's written out like that. That's the era I grew up in but my father didn't go to work with an umbrella and mackintosh. In the sunny colonies he wore shorts and long socks in the summertime.
ReplyDeleteWe, here on a greek island, still stand when a hearse drives slowly by. And I learnt my multiplication tables by writing the darn things out 100 times every time I got a sum wrong. I still remember 9x6 though! and all the rest.
You could call a doctor out at any hour and he'd quickly turn up at your home.
We rode our bikes miles on main roads with out mishap. We had a dress code at school that you had to follow or get dire punishments.
Days of yore
I'd forgotten about the doctor. Yes, after a short phone call he'd be there almost at once. Nothing was too much for him day or night.
DeleteWas it you who wrote that Monty Python sketch?
ReplyDeleteThe Yorkshiremen? No that was YP (below).
DeleteWho was this Cotta fellow and why did he have an army? Maybe Cotta was a woman or, thinking about it further, they could have been transgender. Was Cotta's first name Terra...or maybe Panna?
ReplyDeleteI have no idea who Cotta was, but he was always advancing with a load of Elephants, and several cohorts, across the mountains towards the North. I suppose I should make enquiries.
DeleteI suppose that was one way to get out of mowing the lawn and trimming the hedge.
DeleteOr of making pottery at the family business.
DeleteCro - how you brought back memories! Frogspawn - I used to love it and when we had it for school dinner (no massive line of choices in those days) I used to get numerous helpings as so many girls hated it. And Latin - my memory box in my brain can do little but decline mensa these days but hopefully it has helped me with guessing what obscure words mean.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I even tasted Frogspawn, it simply looked so awful. It didn't look edible to me at all.
DeleteWhen I went up to my senior school I became my intake year's Classics Scholar. I was as amazed as everyone else.
I am old enough to remember my dad had a car that had a crank. We had a pot boiler in the kitchen where mum would wash us. It was the warmest room in the house until we got central heating. Afternoon post, where we might get a letter that was posted that morning, and we had a train line that went past our back garden and we would wave to the guard as it went by.
ReplyDeleteMy mother had an Austin 10 that had a crank handle. But I think it also started with a key. I'd forgotten 'afternoon post', these days we're lucky to have them deliver once!
DeleteCars a better than they were, used wisely - computers make it easier and faster to access useful information, my father was a farmer - so he never left for work the way you describe,
ReplyDeleteI always liked cars that I was capable of working on. Plugs, distributor, petrol and oil, and I could cope. These days I can't do anything other than the petrol and oil.
DeleteLife was less complex and simpler. Probably healthier for everyone. Children played outside. Adults and youth were not staring at their phones and ignoring their surroundings, including people in the same room. Today, parents of youth state the world is not safe and supervision is required. Children playing outside, biking, skating, and exploring woodlands is mostly unheard of. I like the technology advancement but not to the exclusion of what used to be considered everyday life.
ReplyDeleteThere's a lot to be said for modern life, but there's an awful lot wrong with it too.
DeleteOH, THOSE WERE THE GOOD OL' DAYS. We have come so far backward it makes me sick.
ReplyDeleteI embrace today's good things, and ignore all the others!
DeleteMake me a good list for tomorrow or soon so I don't feel so awful.
DeleteIt might take some while.
DeleteI come from a similar era though there were NO teacher thrashings and in my opinion life was easy. I remember Vesta Curries and wish they were still available. Quick and easy dinners for one.
ReplyDelete