Courtesy Microsoft Clip Arts

Courtesy Microsoft Clip Arts

Answer the quiz at the bottom to see if you are also older than dirt.  This isn’t my personal experience but it could be.

Someone asked the other day,

‘What was your favorite fast food when you were growing up?’
‘We didn’t have fast food when I was growing up ?’  I informed him , ‘All the food was slow.’

‘C”mon, seriously. Where did you eat?’
‘It was a place called ‘at home!’ I explained.   ‘Mom cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat down together at the dining room table & if I didn’t like what was put on my plate, I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.’

By this time, the kid was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn’t tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table.

Here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood if I figured his system could have handled it :

  • Some parents NEVER owned their own house, wore Levis , set foot on a golf course, traveled out of the country or had a credit card.
  • My parents never drove me to school. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds and only had one speed, (slow).
  • We didn’t have a television in our house until I was 10. It was, of course, black and white, and the station went off the air at 11, after playing the national anthem and a poem about God. It came back on the air at about 6 a.m. and there was usually a locally produced news and farm show on, featuring local people.
  • I never had a telephone in my room. The only phone was on a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen to make sure some people you didn’t know weren’t already using the line.
  • Pizzas were not delivered to our home. . . but milk was.
  • All newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys delivered newspapers — my brother delivered a newspaper, six days a week. He had to get up at 5AM every morning.
  • Movie stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least, they did in the movies. There were no movie ratings because all movies were responsibly produced for everyone to enjoy viewing, without profanity or violence or most anything offensive.

Growing up isn’t what it used to be, is it?

MEMORIES:

How many do you remember?

  • Pop bottles with bottle tops & stoppers with lots of holes in the top (for sprinkling laundry with before steam irons)
  • Head lights dimmer switches on the floor.
  • Ignition switches on the dashboard.
  • Pant leg clips for bicycles without chain guards.
  • Soldering irons you heat on a gas burner.
  • Using hand signals for cars without turn signals.

Older Than Dirt Quiz :
Count all the ones you remember, NOT the ones you were told about !!   Ratings at the bottom.

1. Candy cigarettes

2. Coffee shops with tableside juke boxes

3. Home milk delivery in glass bottles

4. Party lines on the telephones

5. Newsreels before the movie

6. TV test patterns came on at night after the last show & were there until TV shows started again in the morning. (there were only 3 channels !! [if you were fortunate]

7. Peashooters

8. Howdy Doody

9. 45 RPM records

10.Hi-fi’s records

11. Metal ice trays with lever

12. Blue flashbulb

13. Cork popguns

14. Studebakers

15. Wash tub wringers

If you remembered 0-3 = You’re still young
If you remembered 3-6 = You are getting older
If you remembered 7-10 = Don’t tell your age, &
If you remembered 11-15 =

You’re older than dirt !!! THAT’S ME !!!

I might be older than dirt but those memories are some of the best parts of my life.