How old is grandma?

[Kender]

From my email:

How old is Grandma?


Stay with this, the answer> is at the end, it will blow you away.

One evening a grandson was talking to his grandmother about current events. The grandson asked his grandmother what she thought about the shootings at schools, the computer age, and just things in general.

The Grandma replied, "Well, let me think a minute, I was born, before television, penicillin, polio shots, frozen foods, Xerox, contact lenses, Frisbees and the pill. There was no radar, credit cards, laser beams or ball-point pens. Man had not invented pantyhose, air conditioners, dishwashers, clothes dryers, and the clothes were hung out to dry in the fresh air and man hadn't yet walked on the moon.

Your Grandfather and I got married first-and then lived together. Every family had a father and a mother. Until I was 25, I called every man older than I, 'Sir'- and after I turned 25, I still called policemen and every man with a title, "Sir.' We were before gay-rights, computer- dating, dual careers, daycare centers, and group therapy.

Our lives were governed by the Ten Commandments, good judgment, and common sense. We were taught to know the difference between right and wrong and to stand up and take responsibility for our actions.

Serving your country was a privilege; living in this country was a bigger privilege. We thought fast food was what people ate during Lent. Having a meaningful relationship meant getting along with your cousins. Draft dodgers were people who closed their front doors when the evening breeze started. Time-sharing meant time the family spent together in the evenings and weekends-not purchasing condominiums.

We never heard of FM radios, tape decks, CDs, electric typewriters, yogurt, or guys wearing earrings. We listened to the Big Bands, Jack Benny, and the President's speeches on our radios. And I don't ever remember any kid blowing his brains out listening to Tommy Dorsey. If you saw anything with 'Made in Japan ' on it, it was junk. The term 'making out' referred to how you did on your school exam. Pizza Hut, McDonald's, and instant coffee were unheard of.

We had 5 &10-cent stores where you could actually buy things for 5 and 10 cents. Ice-cream cones, phone calls, rides on a streetcar, and a Pepsi were all a nickel. And if you didn't want to splurge, you could spend your nickel on enough stamps to mail 1 letter and 2 postcards.

You could buy a new Chevy Coupe for $600 but who could afford one? Too bad, because gas was 11 cents a gallon. In my day, "grass" was mowed, "coke" was a cold drink, "pot" was something your mother cooked in, and "rock music" was your grandmother's lullaby."Aids" were helpers in the Principal's office," chip" meant a piece of wood, "hardware" was found in a hardware store, and "software" wasn't even a word.

And we were the last generation to actually believe that a lady needed a husband to have a baby. No wonder people call us "old and confused" and say there is a generation gap.....and how old do you think I am .....

I bet you have this old lady in mind...you are in for a shock!

Read on to see -- pretty scary if you think about it and pretty sad at the same time.




This Woman would be only 58 years old!

[whatever]

I'm sorry Kender, but to many of us, myself included, those were darker days, not more innocent days. Perhaps the same way people differ in their feelings about "The South", confederacy, their flag and all that. I believe you didn't actually offer an opinion, as to whether they were better times or not, but that was the impression I got of the meaning of the story.

My mother was fired from her job at Chrysler when I was a kid, about 35 years ago, because I got sick and she had to stay home. I had 104 temp. I wasn't a sickly kid, and her missing too many days wasn't the issue. It was the principle, to her boss, who flat out told her that if she stayed home, he'd fire her. That's what happened. She didn't have a leg to stand on, and further more, social beliefs at that time gave her NO support. People weren't shocked, no one called the news.

Men supported their families, no one thought twice of firing a wife. Unmarried women mattered less. It didn't matter that she was using every dime of that money to do everything for us she could. Times were hard too. Her income was every bit as supportive as the money my father brought in, and in her hands, she did a lot more with the money she earned. A lot more for her entire family, not just for herself...as was much more the habit with my father.

It was okay, back then, to discrminate against a mother just because you could, not for any job related issue. So, as far as the society at that time, I take a dim view. It was all more convenient, for some, and heavily discriminitory for others, and not just women either.

Consider, had it been a more realistic world, as I think it is today, perhaps someone would have had a clue to look at me after, well, you know. Perhaps, if such things had been more in the light...it would have at least been noticed at the time. There were half a dozen adults at least, not just my parents. The one responsible, the monster, was very much one spoken to as "Sir", respectable and above reproach. His was that world.

Maybe, just maybe, common issues being delt with in todays society, things watched for, could have prevented other hurts against other kids. At the time, it just "didn't happen as much", or so at least many believe. Why they believe that, I have no idea. Living stories say otherwise.

Closely held social roles and duties? Clearly defined expectations in society? Frequently at the expense of someone. Frequently, as with those bastards in Iraq, it's the fairer sex. imo.

Not to get to strong with the comments, this was my take on it. People talk about going back to the "old days" and all I can remember is being told by the elementary school when I was "supposed" to wear a dress. Pants were for when it was colder, and they told us when to switch. Yeah. In PUBLIC school. It likely fits in well with many a religious lifestyle. But not mine. That isn't a life I want other people to "expect" me to live. Makes me shudder. Makes me want to go on and on about it! Almost ranted...

This story compares Christian values in society with Islamic law, and goes along pretty well with what I feel.

[Kender]

Interesting. I didn't read that deeply into the email, to be honest, perhaps because the original had lotsa distracting pictures. The way I read it (which is not necessarily the right way) - it just shows how much things have changed in a relatively short amount of time. Things we take for granted today, weren't around a mere 58 years ago. Things taken for granted 58 years ago...are diminished or outright gone.

Some of these changes are for the better. Legally enforced segregation is a thing of the past, though racism remains. There have been countless (ok, I suppose you could count them, but I'm too tired and lazy to try) advances in medicine, allowing some diseases to be eradicated (Polio), even though new ones have cropped up (AIDS)...

Some changes have been for the worse. Sometimes it just seems that things are worse than the "good ole days", because time has a way of glorifying the past, as the good of the "good ole days" are remembered, and the darker aspects are forgotten...

On that note, I happen to like the song "I think we're living in the good ole days". Strangely enough, I can't find the lyrics to the song on the internet. I'd type them from the CD, but it's 11:00 and my family would probably be annoyed with me playing it right now. LOL

[whatever]

I can see what you mean. Perhaps this difference in hisorical viewpoint is common, when thinking about the "old days". It was this paragraph that got me, I think
"Your Grandfather and I got married first-and then lived together. Every family had a father and a mother. Until I was 25, I called every man older than I, 'Sir'- and after I turned 25, I still called policemen and every man with a title, "Sir.' We were before gay-rights, computer- dating, dual careers, daycare centers, and group therapy. "

You know, those traditional roles? I hear that, and cringe. That attitude is what let that jerk fire my mom, even though her income was pretty important. We toughed it out after that, but I hear many nights when I was little he'd abandon us and go to his parents house for the evening, for dinner. Just...leave her at home. Me too. You know? And he's one of the good ones, my dad. He never did anything really "bad". So...I take such a dim view, on the traditional roles. And that's without even touching racism. I just can't believe that, socially, those were better times. We just had less people in prison.

In fact, a lot less people.

U.S. Prison Population Tops 2 Million
1 in 142 US residents now in prison
America's prison population topped 2 million inmates for the first time in history on June 30, 2002 according to a new report from the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS).

The 50 states, the District of Columbia and the federal government held 1,355,748 prisoners (two-thirds of the total incarcerated population), and local municipal and county jails held 665,475 inmates.



American Prisons: The Debate
Between 1973 and 2000 the rate of incarceration in the United States more than quadrupled. The International Centre for Prison Studies at Kings College, London now calculates the U.S. rate at 700 people per 100,000. (That number encompasses the most recently available federal, state and local prison population statistics.) There are now more than two million Americans behind bars. Add to that another four and a half million on probation or parole and three million ex-convicts.


U.S. Population by Race

State and Federal Inmates by Race

Prison Admissions for Male Drug Offenders by Race


No, I just hang my head. Things are so bad right now. It might have been a better world then, for some, but not because people acted any better, imho. We weren't quite so much the prison/police state then, but, we're very much in the lead now. Legal slavery. In some ways, we're the same as we were a hundred years ago. If I'm not mistaken, we were the last "developed" country to let go of that practice. Too.

Between 1973 and 2000 the rate of incarceration in the United States more than quadrupled
Somehow, so many people just all of a sudden went bad? I think some people did, but not all those people in prison. I take a dim view of American culture all the way around, anymore. Convenience, blindness, and sadness. It's just the most horrible thing I didn't understand about our nation until a few years ago, I'm sad to say. I'm still in shock.

[Kender]

Wow. I see what you mean.

Rereading the "gay rights" line, I think it's clear that it's written by a heterosexual (yeah, I know - big deductive powers there). I have no idea if the original author hated or resented gays, but I suspect that at a minimum, the author longs for a simpler time, when...for example, gays existed, but he didn't know about it. Similarly, teenagers still got pregnant in "the good old days", it was just so shameful that it was not spoken of, and quietly handled. The girl would "move" before she began to show, give birth, the baby would be quietly sent to an orphanage...well, okay, I wasn't there, that's mainly my impression from too many television programs...

The present is always difficult to deal with. The present has problems. The past had problems too, but they are - and this is going to sound like a real stupid sentence - in the past. Given enough time, we tend to forget that the past had its problems - especially when the problems of the present threaten to overwhelm us.

I feel like I'm repeating myself, so I think I'll shaddup now.

[whatever]

Yeah, I really tried to hammer that home didn't I? ;D Yes, when you say "Given enough time, we tend to forget that the past had its problems - especially when the problems of the present threaten to overwhelm us.", that rings true. Loudly.

People forget that everyone was happy to let gays live in the shaddows...except the gays. And the same for so many others.

So, Ohio just used the new legal definition/restriction of marriage to invalidate up till then valid Domestic Partner abuse laws, as they apply to any couple (gay or straight) living together that isn't legally married. Kinda makes you wonder why they ever needed domestic partner abuse laws in the first place, if it only holds true for the married ones. Or the phrasing "Domestic Partners"; as it that, in itself, had no meaning.

I really need to know what country to try to move to now. I could stay and "fight" politically, but I won't be a happy "Average American Worker" living comfortably in a nation that...well, let's just say I won't be complicit in what this nation is doing to it's people and others. Eventually, at some point, we're all responsible for it, living comfortably in the midst of those responsible. I strive to not be a dilettante. Sooner or later, living free in this nation will mean you're just that, no matter who you are, and no matter what you do.

So I'm stewwing over it. I figure it's going to take a huge effort to emigrate and don't see how I can work on being let into more than one country at a time. Not at the same time. Have to pick one. And go for it. Which one?? Should I look at jobs and the job market/unemployment, democratic laws and leadership, potentially dangerous hazardous political alliences (such as with Australia and the US), standard of living...look at ease of entry, look to Canada because it's closest...look to New Zealand because it's so far away...Ireland just because...Germany because they probably understand and their culture is so quietly dignified...Switzerland would be the best, but is the most difficult. Is the european version of socialism, with their sky high tax, actually far better now, better than the fascism we're becoming? Have become maybe. Will the Europeans end up falling under the sway of the US, and can it even be a safe place to run? In the end, if I have to worry about my family too much, here, from the draft to the police state, at what point does it not even matter where we go? These questions and more, I just don't have the answers to yet. But I'm seriously asking.

I miss the old days a lot.

[whatever]

Looking at other countries, also have to consider radiation. Not so uncommon in Europe, and now the Middle East. I'd rather not move my family into a radioactive area.


America's Depleted Uranium Weapons Have Devastated Iraq

Severe radioactive pollution and disease have been inflicted on Iraq through the use of weapons hardened with depleted uranium, and Iraqi authorities must seek redress from the occupying powers.

March 22, 2005

Original Article (Arabic)

The discovery of Iraqi sites with depleted uranium is garnering little attention in the Iraqi media, despite the fact that the Environment Ministry from time to time reports evidence of uranium pollution in Baghdad and Basra, and in other regions of the country. These reports point to the many damaged military vehicles left in areas scarred by battle in 2003. Much of this wreckage remains polluted by uranium, and is collected and sold in surrounding areas as junk. The Environment Ministry has also pointed to the presence of uranium in tree trunks. This is not the first time that the issue of pollution from depleted uranium has been a problem here. The previous regime appealed to international organizations for help in addressing the dangers of these pollutants, and accused the World Health Organization of procrastination, after American forces attacked Iraq during the First Gulf War in 1991 with over 94,000 missiles coated with depleted uranium.

Depleted uranium has become a permanent fixture in the Iraqi environment, and the question today is what are the consequences of radioactive contamination to public health in Iraq, and why isn't this issue being raised by the authorities?

Since their occupation of the country in 2003, the Americans have brought with them more than just the "fruits of democracy and freedom." What the purpose of the American project in Iraq and the region is, only Allah knows, but local and international authorities are behaving as though Iraqis and their environment are immune from the harm that results from the use of these types of weapons.

more...

And, I also would like not to have to give up the right to bear arms.

I just can't figure out which nation. Which one even comes close, close to what we want, close to what we had. I haven't quite thought of one yet. Hard to top the real American ideal, even hard to top the pretense it is now. A lot to give up. But I won't have my kids in a warzone by choice. Not by choice, not if I can help it.

That's just how I feel. Perhaps slightly obsessive about it. This week.

[outgirl]

Simpler times perhaps but not really better.