Grandpa, tell me about the good old days

Back in the Fifties


My grandchildren are getting older -- too old to sit on my lap.

I guess that means I'm getting older, too.

Out of six grandchildren, two have already graduated from high school and a third one recently graduated from middle school and will enter high school in the fall. The other three will occasionally sit on my knee, squirm a bit, and then run off to play.

From time to time, I might be lucky enough to corner some of the older ones and once in a while they just might toss away their smart phone or I-pad for a moment and ask me -- the old gray-haired old guy, sittin' across from them,  "Grandpa, tell me about the good old days."

"Well, thanks for asking," I'd say. "Not too much to tell. "We had phone booths back then."

"What's a phone booth?" they'd say.

I then proceeded to tell them just how we communicated back then. As they sat there, across from me, I could hear them muttering under their breath,"That's crazy!"

Yes, times have changed.

I proceeded to tell them how it was 60 years ago -- back before CNN, ESPN, Facebook and Twitter, back in those prehistoric days when it cost 25 cents to go to the movies and gas was under a dollar and you could survive, if you had a job, on $400 a month.

Or, for a couple bucks, you could go to a drive-in theatre and watch five of Clint Eastwood's Westerns -- one after another.

"What's a drive-in theater and who's Clint Eastwood?"

I guess bringing up Elvis Presley would really be pushing it.

Maybe, it's time I should reverse the conversation and let them educate me on the "more current times."

"Does Lady Gaga have a last name?"

"Oh, Grandpa," they'd say, as they picked up their smart phone on the first ring, and quickly ran out of the room with both thumbs thumping away at the speed of sound.

"Darn!" And I was just about to tell them about my arthritis.