How did we survive?! We were sent this awesome list and just had to share it.
It really makes you think – especially since many children today are wrapped in cotton wool and we were free to run around and have fun!
- Our sandwiches contained leftover roast chicken; we didn’t have fridges in classrooms or ice bricks in our lunch boxes, but we didn’t get food poisoning.
- We rode bikes without helmets or adult supervision or bike paths but we mostly just ended up with scarred knees.
- Our mothers wiped our faces with spit on a hanky not an antibacterial wipe.
- Tuckshop was sausage rolls and cream donuts but kids were wiry and fast.
- Our parents rarely knew our teachers’ names, let alone their NAPLAN prep strategy.
- When our teachers would whack us, we wouldn’t tell our parents for fear of getting punished again, so we avoided trouble in the first place.
- What was said on the playground stayed on the playground.
- We went on camps and excursions without 18 forms to be signed and witnessed.
- As toddlers, we rode in supermarket trolleys without padded trolley liner thingys.
- Angry teachers were treated with caution. We just prayed for a nice one next year.
- Weekends were about our parents’ social lives. As kids, we played Murder in the Dark while parents talked with their friends and forgot we existed.
- Generally, we went to the closest school, not the best one.
- We got ourselves to Saturday sport and told tall tales about how the win was won.
- Helping with the washing up was as important as homework.
- When a kid was injured, people felt sorry for her parents. They didn’t ask what the hell were they thinking letting her climb that tree anyway.
- Cubby houses were built by kids not bought from Toys R Us.
- If you did badly in a test, you got a talking to, not a cuddle.
- A pocket-knife was a perfectly acceptable gift for a 10-year-old.
- If anyone got air conditioning in their bedroom, it was mum and dad.
- Family holidays came before kids’ sporting schedules.
- A teacher could put mercurochrome on a scraped knee without obtaining our parents’ permission and completing an ‘incident report’.
- A playdate was walking to a friend’s house, ringing the doorbell and saying, ‘Can Cathy come and play?’
- You could offer your friend a bite of your hot dog.
- If the bus driver yelled at you, the bus driver didn’t get in trouble, you did.
- If you didn’t make a team, you tried harder or tried something else.
- Pass the parcel had one winner.
- There was one kind of milk. It was full cream and it was delicious.
- Meat was bought at the butcher, and was packed without a use-by date. Our parents used their noses to tell if the mince was off.
- Getting one present on your Christmas wish list was good result.
- Drives of longer than an hour happened without supplies of rice crackers and juice.
- Going to the shops/church/the nursing home to visit Nan was boring as hell but could be endured without an iPad.
- School holidays were about not being at school, not soccer workshops, art classes and pony camp.
- Being tired was no excuse for being rude.
- You had to do something great to get a ‘student of the week’ award. Not just show up at school!
Did these make you laugh and remember!?