When I was your age…

I recently read that iTunes is now 10 years old.  It’s funny to look back and see how much things have changed in such a relatively short time.  Things we thought were “cool” when we were kids and things that simply don’t exist anymore – technology has become so integrated with our lives that I’m not sure we could ever live without it.  Remember when the remote control was attached to the TV by a long chord?

My friend, Kathy (yes, you, Kathy Veal Harper!) and I have been friends since

Kindergarten.  Over the years we've moved away from each other, run into each other by chance from time to time over the years, and gone long periods without knowing where the other was.  I was ecstatic to find her on FaceBook and we've had fun reminiscing about things we used to do as kids.  Cutting not only our dolls’ hair, but ours, much to our mothers’ horror; torturing our siblings, playing with Barbie dolls, baking “Shrinky Dinks” in the oven, playing in the woods with no fear of predators and making sure we crossed the front door’s threshold as the street lights came on.

As a child growing up in the 70’s and 80’s, life was sure different than it is for our kids now!  We learned to swim at about the same time “Jaws” came out…and still carry the emotional scars to prove it!    We tuned in regularly to the adventures of the Bionic Man, Bionic Woman, Wonder Woman and the Incredible Hulk and longed for those awesome abilities.  Schoolhouse Rock played a HUGE part in how we learned grammar, math and history and to this day, sing the little “conjunction junction” song when helping our own kids with homework!  Then there were those days when homework had to wait til the ‘ABC After School Special’ was over.  And who didn't want to be a Goonie?

Mom cut my hair like Dorothy Hamill…remember “Short and Sassy” shampoo?  A

predominant color in our wardrobe was “plaid”, and when I got a little older, we had to own SOMETHING with Jordache on it.  We wore banana clips, made “friendship pins” with beads and safety pins, and put feathers attached to roach clips in our hair without knowing what a roach clip was for!

Remember the console TV?  How ‘bout that $2,000, top-loading VCR that was almost the size of a coffee table?  We didn’t call the cable company when the picture got fuzzy, we adjusted the foil on the rabbit ears and beat the side of the TV til it came back into focus!

Everyone wanted to learn to play "Stairway to Heaven" on the guitar and we choreographed "Dancing Queen" in our bedrooms.  I knew all the words to the theme song of "The Greatest American Hero." ("BELIEVE IT OR NOT, I'M WALKIN' ON AIR... I NEVER THOUGHT I COULD FEEL SO FREE-EE-EE...") and secretly loved the book, “Are you there God, it’s me, Margaret.”

In high school, our hair defied gravity – we could go through a case of AquaNet hairspray in a week, and partying “like it’s 1999” seemed SO far away.  There were at LEAST three people in our school with names like “Skip”, “Buffy”, “Muffy” or “Dexter”.  The movie, “The Day After” scared the crap out of us and our first date took us to the local skating rink where we held hands for the “couples only” skate.  All skaters – change direction!

There was no “internet”, there was no “i” anything, and computers were something that filled up an entire city block somewhere inside the Pentagon.  Phones were attached to the wall and “cellular” phones weighed 15 pounds and had to be carried like a back-pack. 

The more technology advances, the more I forget how we ever lived without it.  My favorite part is staying connected to my friends and family that our busy lives would ordinarily keep me from.  Thanks you all for laughing with me!