Those Were The Days

One of my friends has been talking about his favorite TV shows as a kid on facebook this week. Even though his favorite shows are from significantly earlier than my childhood (translation: some of them were shows my parents enjoyed growing up), it got me thinking about the many things that I miss about childhood.

And isn't it ironic that little kids can't wait to grow up, but adults wish they could could go back to being kids again?

But back to the point: Childhood was awesome, and not just because I didn't have so much responsibility. I miss so many things: Tang. VHS tapes. Cassette tapes & my walkman. MacGyver (who has apparently gone from a person to a verb :( poor Angus). Candy cigarettes. Trolling Pomeroy with Jeff for empty bottles to turn in for money to buy said candy cigarettes. The text-only Adventure game I used to get to play sometimes on Dad's computer-- it was on an 8-inch floppy disk that you could actually bend-- I'd have to get him to start it for me because I didn't know how to do C:// prompts. My yellow banana-seat bike (the best bike I ever had!) that I tried to ride down to Sandy Hollow and wiped out bigtime on the gravel... Speaking of which, Sandy Hollow (the local fishing/swimming hole, now closed b/c stupid city gov't thinks it's too dangerous to let you swim there at your own risk). Wearing leggings and bike shorts under skirts so that when you hang upside down from the monkey bars, your undies don't show. Regular monkey bars-- no curves, twists, bumps, etc. and merry-go-rounds. Games like Red Rover and Kickball. Jump roping around the block or having contests with friends while singing silly songs like "Cinderella Dressed in Yella". Playing 21 for M&Ms in the days before video games were the only thing kids played. 8-hour monopoly games. Board and card games in general. Little Golden Books, now sadly out of print, like Hiram's Red Shirt and Mr. Brown's Fix-it Shop. Or picture books not based on a movie...

I miss playing in moving boxes and using markers to make them rocket ships or cars. I miss climbing onto the hippos in the park and pretending I was going on safari. I miss climbing the slide and pretending I was a mountain climber, or sliding down in socks pretending to be a surfer. I miss looking at the Christmas catalogs that came in the mail and dreaming about presents and magic while making a Christmas list. Being a child was a magical time.

And it's inspired a number of poems over the years, including shorties like "Winter Children" back in 2007 to long poems like "Stupid" and "The Tree" to the mid-length poems like the one I wrote yesterday:

Those Were The Days

When fun was sitting at a picnic table
Playing hand and foot
With my siblings and parents
Those were the days

When there was endless time
For climbing slides and
Getting dizzy on merry-go-rounds
Those were the days

When reading books and studying
Were something fun and easy
And libraries were my favorite place
Those were the days

When conversations still took place
Face to face or on the phone
And getting together didn't mean skype
Those were the days

When "cool" was still spelled properly
"Wicked" was not something to aspire to
And "sucks" was a bad word
Those were the days