Who 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 brightly colored lead base paint blankets.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles,

Locks on doors or cabinets and when we rode

Our bikes, we had baseball caps not helmets on our heads.

As infants & 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 O.K.

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 Playstations, Nintendo’s and X-boxes.

There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable,

No video movies or DVD’s, no surround-sound or CD’s,

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 these accidents.

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,

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 years have been 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 them?      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 ?

This quote is 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 swine flu and terrorist attacks.

Are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the

Pledge of Allegiance”?

Author – Unknown