One of the most marvelous aspects of life is change. Sometimes it is change for the better, sometimes it is change for the worse. But whatever it is, we must accept and try to adapt. So often change is progress, change makes our lives easier and more efficient. Customs of the forties and fifties when I was growing up were quite different than those ascribed to our 21st C youngsters.
From the time we children entered elementary school, I recall being allowed to walk unattended to school with some of my playmates. It was a ten-minute walk in suburbia. We knew how to look both ways before we crossed a street. And we knew that we were to wait for the crossing guard to help us across the busier intersection from my elementary school.
One of the games we loved to play, as we ambled along the cement sidewalks, was “Step on a Crack, you break your mother’s back!” Such a hilariously funny game for little girls in my neighborhood. We weren’t supposed to look down at the sidewalk, but of course you know we did. Such simple, such innocent fun that provided great good giggles.
As a sixth grader in 1949, my mother finally let me have my braids cut and wear my hair down. Oh, I felt so grown up and important. I believe I was the last girl in my class with braids, which made me feel quite immature. In my mind I certainly was NOT!
Mother decided to give me a “Toni home permanent” so that I would have curls. She believed the perm would inspire my natural wave. Although her intent was good, the result was a bit of frizz, which we did not like. Fortunately, it did not last too long. Soon, I watched my big sister make pin curls with bobbie pins; I quickly learned to copy her technique.
In those days we washed our hair at night, affixed the pin curls, wrapped a scarf around our heads and went to bed. In the morning, our hair was dry, and we brushed it out, and all was wonderful. I wore hairbands that mother made of velvet to match our outfits. Oh, did I feel jazzy!
As teenage years arrived, I went to ballroom dancing school and dances at the neighboring boys’ school. The style in the 1950ties was to wear crinolines to make our full skirts stand out. Those petticoats were crunchy, scratchy and stiff, but the effect was pure magic, or so we thought.
Then there were the Merry Widow bras that squeezed in our small waists and pushed up whatever endowment Mother Nature had given us. Can you imagine girls of 2025 wearing such archaic apparel? I can’t…in today’s world, shorter skirts or shorts, plus lower necklines seem the trend. Often, I blink at the skimpy outfits I see adorning the young girls at the mall.
Although some of my friends had TV, my parents staunchly believed there should not be one in our home until I was out of high school. They remained steadfast until my sophomore year, when Dwight Eisenhower ran for President against Adlai Stevenson.
How well I remember watching the election results on NBC. In response to asking my lawyer father why the commentators did not tell us whom they wanted to win, daddy said, “That is not their job. Their job is to report the news, not editorialize it.” BOY, have times changed! And in that respect, don’t we all wish that were still true!
(Can you imagine what President Eisenhower would think about today’s POTUS?)
Not only did our family have one TV, but we also had one telephone line, which all four of us shared. I was allowed to make or receive calls after my homework was finished. If I talked to a friend too long, I would hear mother say, “Enough, Joysie.” How horrified she would be to see today’s adolescents burying their noses in their cell phones.
Lastly, I cannot forget summer fun at drive-in movie theaters. Enormously popular for teens and even families with a car full of children. Teenage boys loved those theaters. Why? A perfect opportunity to “make out” with their girlfriends. I remember having a date with a boy named Bill, the cutest life guard at our pool, who, before the feature began, became rather passionate. As much as I thought I liked him, I was appalled and asked him to take me home. He did, and the next day he rang the doorbell to apologize.
Ah me, those were the days! How hard not to miss them for my grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Life for them feels infinitely more complicated to me. Yes, we talk about change, we embrace change, but as we all know, change is not necessarily positive, especially as it pertains to the lives of our youngest generation.
Do I feel this way because I am an old fossil? Or do I feel this way because I adore my young family, and wish they could stay younger longer…exempt from this world’s trials and temptations?
Perhaps I just need to have faith that they will use their innate intelligence to make the best choices for themselves, and be products of parents who adore them and were raised with values imbued by their parents.
In closing, may I quote an unknown philosopher who said,
“Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad!”
Although these words are not exactly appropriate to this theme, they do make me smile and remind me that the older I get, the less opinionated I should be.
Top Bigstock photo by Schub.Photo
