Memory Lane
 
Close your eyes.....And go back in time.... 
Before the Internet or the MAC, Before semi automatics and crack 
Before SEGA or Super Nintendo...  
Way back........ 
THEN

NOW

 
I'm talking about hide and seek at dusk.Kick the can, under the corner street lamp
  
The Good Humor man......
  
Red light, green light.  
The corner store and ice cream cone on a warm summer night,  
chocolate or vanilla or strawberry or maybe butter pecan.
 
Hopscotch, butterscotch, doubledutch, jacks, kickball, dodgeball.
 
Mother May I?,  
Red Rover and Roly Poly
  
 
Running through the sprinkler  
The smell of the sun and licking salty lips....
 
Wax lips and mustaches.... 
 A cherry coke 
from the fountain at the corner drug store
  
Wait...... 
Watching Saturday Morning cartoons .. short commercials  
Fat Albert, Road Runner, He-Man,  
The Three Stooges, and Bugs,  
Or staying up for Gunsmoke 
Or back further, listening to Superman on the radio 
When around the corner seemed far away
  
And going downtown seemed like going somewhere,especially the Saturday movie matinee
  
 
 
Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, 
Zorro
 
Climbing trees,scraped knees and elbows
  
Building igloos out of snow banks,  
Walking to school, no matter what the weather.
 
Running till you were out of breath and  
laughing so hard that your stomach hurt. 
Jumping on the bed, pillow fights, 
spinning around, getting dizzy and falling down was cause for the the giggles.
  
 
Remember too.....  
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team
  
War was a card game, 
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon
 
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle....
 
I'm not finished just yet... 
 
Eating Kool-aid powder and making your tongue blue or red, or green
 
Remember when...  
there were two types of sneakers for girls and boys (Keds & PF Flyers) and 
the only time you wore them at school, was for "gym."
  
It wasn't odd to have more than one "best" friend
  
When nobody owned a purebred dog and they followed you everywhere, even to school...
 
When a quarter was a decent allowance, and another quarter a miracle. 
 
When milk went up one cent and everyone talked about it for weeks, and the milkman left two quarts in the box on the porch
  
When you'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny...
  
When you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, 
without  
asking, for free, every time. And, you didn't pay for air. And, you got 
trading stamps to boot!
  
When laundry detergent had free glasses, dishes or towels hidden 
inside the box
 
When nearly everyone's Mom was at home when the kids got there.
  
When it took five minutes for the TV to warm up, if you even had one
  
When your Mom wore nylons that came in two pieces
  
It was magic when dad would "remove" his thumb
  
When it was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a  
real restaurant with your parents
 
When girls neither dated nor kissed until late high school, if then
  
When all of your male teachers wore neckties and female teachers had 
their hair done
  
When any parent could discipline any kid, or feed him or use him to carry 
groceries, and nobody, not even the kid, thought a thing of it
  
When they threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed .....and did!
When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate 
 that awaited a misbehaving student at home....
  
Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it wasn't from.... 
drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc...
 
Our parents! and grandparents! were 
a much bigger threat!
  
 
Didn't that feel good.. just to go back and say, 
Yeah, I remember that! 
 
Remember when............  
Decisions were made by going "eeny-meeny-miney-mo." 
 
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, "do over!"
 
"Race issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest.
  
Money issues were handled by whoever was the banker in "Monopoly."
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was head lice.
 
  
Having a weapon in school, meant being caught with a slingshot
  Nobody was prettier than Mom
 Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin
 Ice cream was considered a basic food group
 Getting a foot of snow was a dream come true
 Abilities were discovered because of a "double-dog-dare."
 Older siblings were the worst tormentors, but also the fiercest protectors
 If you can remember most or all of these, then you have LIVED!!!!
  
Page Three,Senior Citizen
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