They Don't Know What They Don't Know...

I received the following on my FaceBook page and thought it very apropos to publish here. It is very indicative of today's generational views, and I'll let you decide what those are as you read this reprint of my friend, Richard Hassell's, observations below:

Remember when...

   Checking out at the grocery store recently, the young cashier suggested I should bring my own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment. I apologized and explained, "We didn't have this 'green' thing back in my earlier days." The clerk responded, "That's our problem today — your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

   She was right about one thing; we didn't have the green thing back in “our” day.

   So what DID we have back then? After some reflection and soul-searching, here's what I remembered:

• Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles repeatedly. So they really were recycled. But we didn't have the green thing back then.
• We walked up and down stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn't have the green thing back then.
• We washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes in our day.
• Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their older brothers and sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady was right. We didn't have the green thing back in our day.
• We had one TV and/or a radio in the house — not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana.
• In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.
• When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded-up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
• We didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human sweat.
• We exercised by working  - not working out - so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. But she's right. We didn't have the green thing back then.
• We slurped from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we needed a drink of water.
• We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying an entirely new pen.
• We replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. Yep, we didn't have the green thing back then.
• In the "good ole days", people took the streetcar or a bus, and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service.
• We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances, stereos, and computer equipment.
• We didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.

   Isn't it sad that the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing when we were coming up?

   Please post this on your Facebook profile so another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a smarty-pants young person can add to this...lol!