I did and I'm OK

[Maggie1]

Had this sent to me and its so true

CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL BORN IN 1930's, 1940's, 50's, 60's, 70's and Early 80's !!!

First, you survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us. They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a tin, and didn't get tested for diabetes. Then after that trauma, your baby cots were covered with bright coloured lead-based paints. You had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets. When you rode your bikes, you had no helmets, not to mention, the risks you took hitch-hiking..
As children, you would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. Riding in the back of a van - loose - was always great fun. You drank water from the garden hosepipe and NOT from a bottle. You shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this. You ate cakes, white bread and real butter and drank pop with sugar in it, but you weren't overweight because...... YOU WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!!
You would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on. No one was able to reach you all day. And you were OK. You would spend hours building your go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out you forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, you learned to solve the problem . You did not have Playstations, Nintendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound, no mobile phones, no text messaging, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms..........YOU HAD FRIENDS and you went outside and found them!
You fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents you played with worms(well most boys did) and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. You made up games with sticks and tennis balls and although you were told it would happen, you did not poke out any eyes. You rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!
Local teams had try outs and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! The idea of a parent bailing you out if you broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law! This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. You had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and you learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL! And YOU are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to show this to others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good. And while you are at it, show it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were

[Linda S]

Definately agree Maggie and alot of us turned out not to bad either dont you think Lindaxx

[silverback]

And dare I say it Maggie, after all of the above, I also survived playing that very dangerous game of CONKERS! ........How true though!! .

[Linda S]

Oooh SB you were such a reckless little Lindaxx

[HappyBob]

Good post Maggie and so true.

[Mo]

Yes BUT



Are you going to tell the woman who has lost a baby that you are not going to do any research to answer her question WHY? And when you know the answer are you going to ignore it or give out the knowledge as guidlines.

Balancing risk and freedom is not easy. I used to get nagged by the headmaster for letting my daughter walk home from school. No mobile phones then, but when she was old enough to have a pony she had one (the size of a brick) and took it with her when she hacked out. Only used it once but she had fallen off, was seeing stars, and was glad of us to collect her, drive her home and lead the pony home.
Our parents accepted risks because there was no choice, when there is a choice why be reckless.

[kitla]

I agree with lots of that but not all, we've certainly gone too far the other way, I hate all the litigation stuff with a passion! We should take our own risks & take the consequences,
(with some exceptions) but to know what the risks are we learned from those that weren't so lucky and some that aren't here to tell their tale. My mother worked with chemicals during her first pregnancy & my brother was born with cancer & died a few years later, few questions were asked & no answers given, her best friend also lost her only son as a toddler when he decided to clean the bathroom, mixed bleach with t/cleaner. A little boy down our road died instantly falling off the gate he was sitting on. I'm sure we can all cast our minds back & remember some unpleasant accidents that are unlikely to happen to our kids because we've learned from their experience.
So I agree with a lot of the post but I also think to make informed choices we have
to get the information.

[albertajune]

A brilliant post Maggie. Yes there were sad and bad things happen as pointed out, but the kids of today seem to have lost the pleasure of play and living and learning from the errors that they made. I'm sure that we all had bumps, bruises and grazes from the rough and tumble that we indulged in; but the memory of rolling down that steep hill, when I couldn't stop and playing piggy back and rounders in the street will live with me forever. As will going with my friends on a bus, with our jam sandwiches and lemonade for an afternoon out to have an adventure in one of the parks. Greenwich being our favourite as to us it was so big and had the added bonus of the river where we paddled. My mum didn't worry about us getting home. We had our instructions that we carried out, even in the war years when we had to take our gas masks with us.

The only down side was if we had something wrong like a boil or sore throat for instance. Home remedies came to the fore then, like bread poultice and home made gargles. The doctor only came into the picture if self help didn't work or for something more serious. At one point in my childhood there was no NHS, so for the ordinary working family finding money for a doctor wasn't easy. Up to having my first baby I had never seen inside a hospital.

For me, the good outweighed the bad. What will the memories of todays be?

[fabindia]

Great account Maggie. I do understand though the comment about balancing risks. I grew up in that period and well remember the freedom together with all the knocks, scrapes and cuts.

I must admit though I let my kids grow up in the same manner and am sometimes amazed that any of them made it to adulthood. My two youngest went to school in India for a year and we let them go on school camping trips in the Himalayas at a time before any of us had mobile phones. We just waved them off at the school gates and returned to pick them up a few days later. Life is too short to worry about what might happen to you. You just need to go out and live it.

[HensAloud]

Love it, and oh so true