Ah, the way life use to be.
(gab.com)
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Mum, can I have 10 bucks?
5 bucks? What do you need 3 bucks for? Here’s 2 bucks: share with your sister.
OMG I love this. I would have gotten a quarter not $2. You must have been rich.
No, I had to find a job to have money which I then had no clue what to purchase with.
That indeed was a job about how it was happening at a spoiled kid’s home.
My first job at 12 years old (1963) was babysitting for 6 children...the youngest a baby...for $.25/hour...and I even did the dishes and straightened the house...but for the quarter I could buy a nickel cherry coke at the soda fountain, a 5 cent candy bar, a $.07 scoop of ice cream and 8 cents worth of penny candy...quite a haul in those days...
My first non babysitting job was when I was 12. I lied about my age (I guess it was easier in 1979) and did filing and vacuuming at a Rent-a-Center. Even at 12 I had sense enough to know that if I wanted something, I damn sure couldn't burden my single working mom for it, I had to work for it.
I began distributing ads in mailboxes all around the area at 12, then I babysitted a little on Friday nights (which allowed me to view the late cine club show which let me discover the Marx Brothers, Harold Lloyd, and others stupendous oldies young French scholars could never know about. I also experimented working on markets, leading younger kids in camp, also cooking for them. I had less money than most boys my age I knew, but it was mine, not something my parents would give me to rid of me.🤓
The satisfaction of earning your own money! I baby sat, delivered newspapers, and did my brothers choirs for them. That's why we are different, we can think, earn and learn for ourselves.
I think what made me the happiest was to feel useful and trusted. I was the last of 5 living kids (the 3rd before me died a few hours after being born) and always felt alone and neglected.
Sounds like your family went through some hard times. You were trying to find your place within the family unit while trying to make yourself stand out and be useful. Our xperiences made us who we are. I'm happy with me and wouldn't have changed anything, hopefully you are too.
Had a similar babysitting job in the same time frame. Five children, including a baby. I watched them from 9am to 5pm, nearly every week day in summer. The kids were great. In my early twenties, the family would still ask me to babysit on weekends occasionally. A lot of responsibility at a young age, but great experience in real life.
That was when neighbors knew neighbors and it was all really extended family. We were so responsible, independent and everything we did prepared us for real life...I had a crappy home life but I had a fantastic community, church, neighborhood, school, etc that allowed me to really enjoy my childhood...I grew up in the 50's and graduated HS in '69 and I could not have imagined a better life...so much has changed...it takes a lot of effort to maintain any normalcy for our kids and grandkids...
"You can wait for your birthday/Christmas," was always my parents go-to.
Then by 11 I started working under the table cleaning apartment lobbies.
I have to laugh it is like he was quoting my mother. I remember sitting at the kitchen table for what seemed like hours because I didn't want to eat beans.
Same here! Ours was liver & onions
I thank God that my Mother hated liver and onions lol.
I think mine hated it, too. They seemed to suffer through it. We all just stared at it and mostly went hungry those nights. We had our tolerance limits, even then 😉
Same thing...I didn't want to eat canned peas...yuk...
I used to take peas and stuff them in my pants' pocket when the parents were otherwise engaged in discussion. I got away with it all the time. Kinda gross in the pants, but it was worth it.
And fried Spam!
You are giving me PTSD. My mom used to make a macaroni and cheese thing with canned peas and SPAM in it.
😄Sorry. At least you got needed carbs, veggie, fat and a ???bonus??? How did we manage to live through it.
My mom used to make this disgusting breakfast cereal called shredded wheat. She would break it up in a bowl, pour boiling water over it, drain it and add sugar and milk. Blech!! Babysitter made it day after day. I hated it. One day when I was about 5, I refused to eat it and she made me sit there until I did. I sat there until it was time for my mom to get home from work. Babysitter gave up and I never ate shredded wheat again,
Shredded Wheat, was simply repackaged Brillo pads.
Definitely! 🤮
Fond memories. My dad use to make this for me for breakfast. Didn't know putting hot water on shredded wheat was a thing back then. I thought it was special because dad made it for me. Now I'm depressed.
Ohhhhh I'm sorry. 😉
When I was a kid, for cereal it was either plain Cheerios or Shredded Wheat.
I actually liked the Shredded Wheat. I even ate it for awhile after I had moved out and had my own place.
But the prep was just taking the shredded wheat 'brick' and breaking it up a little and adding milk. Using hot water, first, sounds horrible.
Yeah we didn't get much in the form of cereals. Was a major think to get those little boxes. No wonder bread either. We were deprived, those Disney nights were special splitting that 6oz bottle of pop once a week with popcorn and apples!
I didn't eat something for dinner once and and my mom said she would serve it to me for breakfast. My sister said, mom you wouldn't do that.
Damn straight she did.
Me: Mum, I’m hungry. Mum: I don’t see any bones showing.
Ah, the good ‘ole days. We learned not to whine, and to take responsibility for our actions.
I just had to be home before the street lights came on
Same! This was in the 90s. We had a school directory and if my mom needed to find me, she’d call a few of the neighbors to see where I was. Everyone looked out for everyone else’s kids, too.
This is true and your neighbors better not ever call your parents to say you were doing something wrong. You would pay hell for that.
I always dreaded the words "well - boys will be boys" if my mom was talking to other parents or even my grandparents. They didn't have to say what I did. That was enough.
Lol - here in Alaska the street lights don't go on until after midnight in some places because the sun is up that long. Summer camp is rough - kids never want to go to bed!
Same here.
Ha ha, I don't remember that one.
Liberty with all the bumps and scrapes and bloody knees and pitfalls it comes with, VS a prison with comforting noises, padded cells, defective food, squeaky toys, and a warden who does not have your best interests at heart.
The reasons GenX and prior are made of tougher stuff
My kids are GenX. I see them as the last of the Free Range Children. They played in the street, fell off bikes and swing sets. No padding anywhere. Bumps and bruises all summer long. We even had a Slip and Slide. Grass burns ensued. Healthy, happy kids.
We also had real lawn darts with the points. Not those stupid kid-save things with the ball on the end. Croquet as well. Imagine giving kids heavy ceramic balls and mallets these days.
LOL! We also had real lawn darts when my kids were growing up, and I played Croquet all through childhood. Good times!
Lawn darts! Tally the points, remove the injured, carry on until you had a winner
Millennial here, grew up the same. We didn’t even have a computer until I was in 6th grade.
Rich. I'm also a millenial but we couldn't afford a computer back then, lol. Got a hand-me-down computer with no internet and windows 95 when i was 17. Bought a laptop at 19 though with my own money, but still didn't have internet at my place.
But yeah, my friends and i were constantly outside running around the neighborhood riding bikes and living the right-side of OP's graphic. I feel like that all stopped in the late 90's. Or maybe 9/11. Different generation of kids after that.
I always wanted to do what others were doing.
Mom would say if they jumped off the bridge would you follow them?
I can so relate to the right side.
I dont think parents need to interact with kids like they are therapists. Therapists use a specific type of communication to try not to break fragile people. My supposition is that raised with "therapist talk" parents, kids will grow up to be mentally and emotionally fragile and have no idea how to cope with people not constantly interacting via therapist techniques.