# WE Are Awesome



## riptheirlips (Jun 30, 2008)

No matter what our kids
And the new generation think about us, 


WE ARE AWESOME !!! 
OUR Lives are LIVING PROOF !!! 

To Those of Us Born 
1925 - 1970: 

At the end
Of this email is a quote of the month by Jay Leno. 
If you don't read anything else, Please read what he said. 
Very well stated,
Mr. Leno

TO ALL THE
KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE 
1930s, '40s, '50s,
'60s and '70s!! 


First, we survived
Being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank 
While they were Pregnant. 


They took aspirin, Ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes. 


Then, after that Trauma, we were Put to sleep On our tummies In baby cribs
Covered with bright colored Lead-based paints. 

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, 
And, when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps, n ot helmets, on
our heads. 

As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.. 

Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat. 

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. 

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this. 

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter, and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren't overweight. 
WHY? 

Because we were always outside playing...that's why! 

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. 
And, we were OKAY. 

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps 
And then ride them down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes..
After running into the bushes a few times, we learned To solve the problem.. 

We did not have Play Stations, Nintendos and X-boxes. There were 
no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVDs, 
no surround-sound or CDs, no cell phones, no personal computers, 
no Internet and no chat rooms. 

WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them! 

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth, and there were
no lawsuits from those accidents.

We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping-pong paddles, or just a bare hand, and no one would call child services to report abuse. 

We ate worms, and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did
not live in us forever. 

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, 22 rifles for our 12th, rode horses, made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and although we were told it would happen- we did not put out very many eyes. 

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them. 

Little League had tryouts 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 us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law! 

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and
inventors ever. 

The past 50 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas. 

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. 

If YOU are one of those born between 1925-1970, CONGRATULATIONS! 

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good. 

While you are at it, forward it to your kids, so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were. 

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ? 


The quote of the month by Jay Leno: 

"With hurricanes, tornados,
fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the 
country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist 
attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?" 

For those that
prefer to think that God is not watching over us...go ahead and delete this..


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

-DallanC


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## Catherder (Aug 2, 2008)

Darn Straight! 8)


Good luck convincing my kids of that though. ;-)


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## LostLouisianian (Oct 11, 2010)

Yep that original post pretty much sums up my childhood and I could add quite a few more but that's a great start.


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## riptheirlips (Jun 30, 2008)

LostLouisianian said:


> Yep that original post pretty much sums up my childhood and I could add quite a few more but that's a great start.


Maybe we could all start naming some of them. I wonder how we survived sometimes.


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

riptheirlips said:


> Maybe we could all start naming some of them. I wonder how we survived sometimes.


Drinking water straight out of the ditch, river, or lake.

Riding our bikes down to Utah Lake (5 miles) to catch some catfish for dinner.

Trick or Treating from sundown to midnight or later and knowing all the best places to get goodies. Mine would last until well after Christmas.

Actually having to work to get spending money.


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## LostLouisianian (Oct 11, 2010)

Working at grandpa's farm picking vegetables from daylight to noon....going to the marina to clean fish from noon to sundown

Yep swimming in the bayou with cottonmouths and gators

Attempting to ride unbroken horses without a saddle or bridle....Hey I lasted maybe 3 seconds before going unconscious hitting the ground

Cutting the grass with a push mower...not self propelled either...we had almost 2 acres and it had to be cut weekly

Making a bonfire in the lot across the street with a pile of oak leaves the size of two pickup trucks...

Catching cottonmouths and killing them with a stick....

Water skiing in and out of cypress trees....

Yeah I did stupid stuff and lived to tell about it. + or - 30 broken bones


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## Loke (Sep 7, 2007)

Finding pop bottles on the side of the road and cashing them in at Burgess' Market for 22 shells. 50 cents a box. We were 9 or 10 at the time.


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

Well thats a blast from the past. I doubt there are more than 3 people here who know what that is... or shopped there. You, Me and Packout.


-DallanC


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

I lived down in the sticks in Provo where there was no Burgess Market. 

I sold my pop bottles up at the store on 8th North and 7th East just off of the BYU campus. I have no idea what their name was. The big store was Safeway about a mile a half away. I remember that when we found a 2 quart bottle that we were in the money then, a whole 5 cents.


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

How many here not only rode in the back of a pickup... but in the back of a pickup on TOP of a fully stacked bed of hay? :mrgreen: Could touch the power lines that cross the street fairly easily laying there.


-DallanC


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## riptheirlips (Jun 30, 2008)

Critter said:


> Drinking water straight out of the ditch, river, or lake.
> 
> Trick or Treating from sundown to midnight or later and knowing all the best places to get goodies. Mine would last until well after Christmas.
> 
> Sounds familiar, we would carry pillow cases for the candy. No trunk or treating only thing trunks were used for was to get in the drive in movie.


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## riptheirlips (Jun 30, 2008)

DallanC said:


> How many here not only rode in the back of a pickup... but in the back of a pickup on TOP of a fully stacked bed of hay? :mrgreen: Could touch the power lines that cross the street fairly easily laying there.
> 
> -DallanC


And you actually had to haul the hay by hand, no hay wagons, no 3x4 bales. I hauled hay for an old boy he paid me a nickel a bale.


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## Loke (Sep 7, 2007)

Provo was the BIG CITY, we only went there once a year for school shopping at the J.C. Penney's and Kress stores on center street. If we minded our manners we got to stop at the Hostess day old store on the way home. We didn't stop there much.


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## LostLouisianian (Oct 11, 2010)

riptheirlips said:


> And you actually had to haul the hay by hand, no hay wagons, no 3x4 bales. I hauled hay for an old boy he paid me a nickel a bale.


Yep that was what the neighbor paid us, nickel a bale ...


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## Loke (Sep 7, 2007)

Those 60 pound bales were a lot of fun for a 40 pound ten year old. Gloves were for sissies.


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## Dunkem (May 8, 2012)

Hauling hay for 4 cents a bale, had to pay for our own gas for the little ford tractor.
Hand milking 10 jerseys every am and pm. Delivering newspapers on a old schwinn fat tire bike in the snow. Having to use the money I made in the summer to buy my own school clothes. And don't forget walking 5 miles to school and it was uphill both ways.


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

Guys we had bail our hay replaced their sheer pins with grade 8 bolts, cranked down the wire bailer as far as it would go and pooped out 90-115lb bales... it SUCKED. Worst part was stacking it in the barn, no elevator... dust so thick you cant see. I had hay-fever so it was hell on earth. 

My dad would just stand there beer in hand and chuckle, like dads back then did.


-DallanC


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

You guys got paid for bucking hay? /**|**\\/**|**\\


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## LostLouisianian (Oct 11, 2010)

Once at around 10 years old we fell for the oldest trick in the book. Hauling hay our neighbor said he would buy us each a "beer" if we finished before a certain time. We busted our tails and did it....went into the local grocery store while we waited in back of the pickup just dreaming of getting a beer and being all growed up....imagine our disgust when he walked out with 6 bottles of ROOT BEER !!!!! Man we were some PO'd. dumb kids...LOL


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## mjensen1313 (Jul 29, 2015)

I argue that I was born in the wrong time....I can relate directly with about 99.9% of everything said above (except the pic. of the nose-pierced girl with her cat)!

although I'm not too far after 1970 ('75 to be exact).

on a side note; my kids will always do their first report out of my 1980 set of encyclopedia (NOT THE INTERNET) at least they know they can do a report by candle light even if the power is out!

THEY HATE ME FOR THAT!


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## Packfish (Oct 30, 2007)

Speaking of 2 cent for pop bottles- I can remember when my mom caught me ( I was 6 in 1960) with a shopping cart of pop bottles- we were at a dive motel in Florida and I had gone down the street to 1 other motel collecting bottles from their return racks and was heading for a grocery store to turn them in so I could buy cherry bombs to throw in the jelly fish washed up on the beach. Good times


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