Now That's Old School...LOL

I was thinking today about how easy kids have it.  I know, my parents spent a a lot of time telling me about how much easier my life is than theirs too, but I'm not as old as they are so I can't relate....LOL.  I can, however relate to my own then and nows.

I am going to be so dated by this blog but what the hell, I've earned my stripes so here goes.

Today, there are tons of products on the market that will help you to toddler proof your home.  There are locks for cabinets, plugs for outlets and all that neat shit.  Talk about soft!! When I was little, baby proofing was very different,  it was called a bobby pin.  You took the bobby pin, stuck it in the outlet and ZAP! Baby proofed.......after a good jolt of 120 volts, you just didn't do it again.  Talk about character building.

Also, to the best of my recollection, I didn't have a car seat.  Let alone them being mandatory.  We had a car that only had two seats, one in the front and one in the back.  Aww don't front, you all remember those long ass bench seats!  You thought that shit was mad fun when the car made a sharp turn or sudden stop.  That was like a poor man's Disneyland!  Sharp turn? Sliiiiiiiiide to the right and hope the door was locked.  Sharp turn left.......you learned how to drive because you were in the driver's seat.  Sudden stop? Hands out front, dashboard a-comming but you KNEW that, so you were prepared.  We would have been appalled at a contraption designed to tie is down into a metal rack.  Talk about raising hell....lol

I think as kids, we might have been smarter than kids today.  Why?  We had the common sense not to swallow "Lincoln Logs" "Leggos" and "Weeble Woobles".  Oh and contrary to marketing, if you cracked the bottom of a "Weeble Wooble" dunked it in water and laid it on it's side....Weebles woobled and they did fall down.  We might have torn up some shit but we didn't choke on toys.   Toy labels shouldn't read " choking hazard for children under three"......they should say "choking hazard for dumb-ass unsupervised kids".

Nowadays, they have child psychologists, adolescent psychologists, behavioral psychologists and medication to teach kids how to act.  You need an insurance plan now to train kids.  My folks? They had a 10 dollar belt.  That was the only behavior modification tool needed in the house.  I don't read too often about a kid being afraid of a psychologist but to this day, I'm scared to death of a belt over an inch wide........ha!  Problem, problem solved.

They have all these cool ass modernized toys to help kids learn how to read.  We had just one.  It was called a BOOK!  If we were dying to hear a story, we read that shit out loud.  Books were also multi purpose, they served as serving trays for miniature tea sets, defensive weapons against unruly siblings and the fastest way to give a teacher a nervous condition.  Nothing better than waiting until the teachers back was turned, leveling a book flat and letting that sucker hit the floor "POW"!  However, that usually led my ass back to that belt so I chose my teachers wisely....lol.

The closest we had to a personal computer was  "Simon" and a "Speak and Spell".  I won't even pretend to mention cell phones.  Back in the day, a mobile phone was phone with a one-hundred foot cord.  When the cord ran out, conversation was over or you backed the hell up.

Lastly.  Kids complain that parents invade their personal space.  PERSONAL SPACE?!!  We didn't even know what personal space was.  My parents made is crystal clear that as long as they paid the house payment, they owned every room in that bad boy and that the room I slept in was on loan because as soon as I turned 18, I had to check the hell out.  I didn't own shit.  I called myself locking the door on my dad one time and after he kicked it in, I was forced to reevaluate the existence of personal space....LOL.

Kids now, I think, do not know how fun it can really be to be young.  I wish that just once, one of these kids who considers them self to be old school, knew what the hell old school really is.