~Long before the days of "paper or plastic?" there was just one choice-- and that'd be PAPER. That paper bag was very multi-use. It could be the liner of a waste basket or what held the fresh produce that was picked from the garden. A paper bag that was cut in half could provide my little sister Cindy and I hours of fun while we drew on it or practiced our math facts. The other half of it, never to be wasted of course, could be used by mom as a dust pan when she swept the hard wood floors.
~When we ate toast for breakfast, Mom just put the slices of bread in the broiler of the oven. She didn't need no "stinkin" toaster to make her family breakfast. You just had to be sure you were there to flip the bread over so the other side could brown. And that toast, most agreed, was by far the more superior in taste.
~All those Saturday noon times when Mom fixed hot buttered popcorn by the bucket full for our lunch? We thought it was because we were special-we never knew until years later that it was because that was all the food we had in the house until Daddy got home. Imagine that, we were poor and didn't even realize it! We just figured every family was like us! :)
~Each kid had a job on the farm to do. No one really got excused from that responsibility. Some of the kids milked cows, some were on "poop scooping" detail, others gathered eggs and everyone had to help get in animals that had strayed out of their pens.
~We made mud pies, drank out of the garden hose, lived without drinking pop, had no cell phones or internet access, and had only ONE TV that had been bought when I was 6 years old. It was black and white and sat over in the corner of the living room. From there, my older sisters Janice and Kaye sat and watched the tv screen to see the Beatles performing for the first time on the Ed Sullivan show.
~It was a time when you knew your cousins and aunts and uncles, grandmas and grandpas. You would be guaranteed to join that same group on special holidays and birthdays. And you showed respect to your elders, everyone of them, every time! By the way, it was perfectly acceptable for your aunt or uncle to give you a swat across your backside if you ever forgot to be respectful.
~You wrote letters--NOT emails--that needed a 5 cent stamp to mail them. You called people on a rotary dial phone and there wasn't anything called "caller ID" or "call waiting" either. You actually talked to real people NOT a pre-recorded message.
~Everyone in our house remembered the cold winter night that a dozen baby pigs were brought in to live in our bathtub. Hey, you haven't lived until that happens people! The old sow that was their mother needed to be separated from them before she ate them, one by one. That momma sow lacked the maternal instict needed to be awarded "Mother of the Year". For the next few nights, it got a little crowded and noisy in that bathroom.
~And miracle of all miracles, once in a while on a hot summer Kansas evening, Daddy would pile all 7 kids in the family sedan and head to Newton to go to the "picture show". (you might have heard it referred to as a drive-in movie). I'm thinking there were NO seatbelts and at least two of us kids must have ridden over there on the floor. For a dollar a carload, you could be entertained for quite some time. Oh for the good old days once more!
As I worked on Item #9 of the Miller Bucket List, "to connect with my family members living all over the United States" I couldn't help but be astounded by the difference of the lives we led as young children growing up in the 50's and 60's in comparison to the lives of families today in 2011.
You know what? I think I'm pretty much "ok" with having grown up in the times that I did...As a matter of fact, wouldn't trade them for anything!
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