If I could wind the clock back 60 years.

If I could wind the clock back 60 years.​


Ah, a rather vivid memory


Linda

By the age of thirteen I’d mastered the art of girlfriendmanship.
The major thing about the ladies was they needed to be dazzled, swept off their feet, so to speak.
I knew this from my vast studies of Errol Flynn movies.
So, with my now astute knowledge of the opposite sex, it all came rather easy.
Take my next conquest for example.

I’ll call her ‘Linda’, mainly cause her name was (and probably still is) Linda.
I usually change the names to protect the innocent (me), but there’s nothing about Linda here that would be defamatory…pretty sure.

She had a beguiling smile…hell, all of ‘em had those beguiling smiles, but hers kinda took on a Susan Hayward look.

And, she was cool.

Never went to the same schools, as she lived in St John’s, and I lived up in the hills twenty miles outta Portland.
But I met her at swim lessons in Portland, lessons that near drowned me as I tried so hard to get hold of that long ass bamboo pole the bitch of a swim instructor kept poking at me, pushing me away from frantically hugging the edge of the pool.
Very frustrating for her, as several times I’d glommed onto that pole with both arms and legs, while she tried like hell to push me off the ledge and into the deep end.
I’d just climb the pole, hand over hand, like a waterborne lemur, as she’d whisk me back and forth across the pool.
It only took a half dozen lessons to figger out that one really can’t breathe water…

Linda smiled at me, thus I was smitten.

Since we didn’t have very many ways of hooking up, meeting was rather sporadic.
The next time we met was at Pier Park in St John’s.
We strolled around, holding hands…sweaty hands…a real tell in regard to my rico suave persona.
But she kept smiling and I kept sweating.

Mostly, our relationship consisted of letters and phone calls.
Letters were a snap, cause I could take my sweet time in expounding on my devil may care, swash buckling life style, but the phone calls required some fast thinking on my feet.
In my vast knowledge of the opposite sex, knowing they needed to be dazzled, my acute imagination begat that of my own version of Walter Mitty.

‘Hi, how are you?’

(I could just see her smiling that Susan Hayward smile)

‘Hi, I’m OK, now that I’m able to stitch up my shoulder.’

‘What?!’

‘Oh, it’s nuthin’, just got done fightin’ a grizzly in the back yard.’

‘Oh my god! What happened?!’

‘Well, I was choppin’ wood, and he kinda got the jump on me. So I just chopped him in the neck with my axe.’

‘Are you okay???’

‘Yeah, right now I’m stitching up my shoulder while we talk.’

‘Is the bear still there?!’

‘Naw, I chased him up the hill for several miles…had to cold camp a couple days, and lost him up in the high country.’

‘Oh, so the bear fight didn’t just happen?’

‘Uh, no…..sorta.’ (sweat)

‘Well, I gotta go. Gotta tell some folks that I’ve gotta cancel the sky diving lesson for today, so see ya.’

‘Oh, are you taking lessons?’

‘No, I teach it.’

‘Oh,’

‘Yeah, so I gotta go….bye.’ (my hands now sweat faucets)

I really don’t know what ever happened that severed our relationship.
It certainly wasn’t due to my boring life style that’s for sure.
Actually, I do remember seeing her for what was probably the last time, and somehow her smile no longer did it for me.


When I was in my mid teens, I used to think back on those times and get all embarrassed.

Then later, in my twenties, would vividly recall it all and just laugh my hind end off.
 
palides2021 said:
Going back 60 years when I immigrated to the US, I was four 1/2 years old and living in Piraeus, Greece with my family. My father had left a year earlier for America, and we were going to meet him there. The night before we left for the trip, I had this image imprinted in my mind. It was a dark night, and my aunt bent down and hugged me and my older sister. I stood on the sidewalk which was on a hill, watching my mother bid her a tearful goodbye. We left Greece the next morning, headed for America. I was dressed in my Sunday clothes and shoes, and held my mother's hand tightly, as we walked toward the very large ship. My older sister held my mother's other hand. The uniformed captain, tall and debonair, greeted us at the entrance with a smile. My mother was a beautiful woman, and she got her share of stares as we walked to our cabin. I remember the bunkbed and having to decide if I would sleep at the top or the bottom. I remember feeling excited about the trip.

Fast forward a few months later, when I attended kindergarten in East Cleveland. I knew no English. It was the first time I was separated from my mother. I walked with her to school, and she had me standing in a line of children to enter the school, then she told me she had to leave. As her slim frame walked away, I looked at her in disbelief, wanting to chase after her. Instead, the obedient girl that I was, I stayed in my place and realized she wasn't coming back. That's when I wailed so loud, crying and sobbing, that the other children in the line also started sobbing and crying. I particularly remember the little black boy in front of me and how hard he cried.

Kindergarden was fun, but it took me some time to learn the language. I remember sitting with the other children and the teacher would say something and everyone would get up to go somewhere, and I would be sitting there not understanding anything. The teacher gestured to me to join them. I learned the language so fast that by fourth grade, I won the spelling bee and later tutored other immigrant children the English language.:)
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Palides, what a lovely story, thank you, it I seemed like I was there with you, can you remember the name of the ship? 😊
 
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I loved baseball and street football. I probably spent most all my free time playing them.

home-run-home.gif
 
50 years ago ...... my husband and I were getting ready to start a new adventure, and move across the country.

We were leaving everything and all friends/relatives behind ... we packed up our kids, and St. Bernard puppy, and headed to Arizona.
Turned out to be a good life ... found a new home, great jobs ..... it was a good gamble.
But to turn the clock back to those days and do it again ... I just can't imagine.
 
50 years ago ( '72)... I ran away from home..literally told no-one, just packed a few small things, and left, caught a train and landed in another city, along with my friend who'd been having problems in her home also... .

We had little money between us and no plan of action, so to cut a long story short , we ended up living in the Salvation army hostel for women...she hadn't told me she was pregnant so after we'd been there a couple of weeks she had a miscarriage right there in front of me in the hostel.. talk about shock.. I'd never been intimate with any guy and as we all hung around in the same group, I hadn't any idea she'd been intimate with one of our gang .. ..This of course turned out to be the real reason she'd left home.

That was the begining of a 2 month eye opener on how other people live...
 
I've just read that again ^^^^...now I think of it, I'm in shock that it was actually as long ago as 50 years, it's all so clear in my mind !!
My Gosh 1/2 a century..and yet in the great scheme of things aside from technology hardly anything else has changed..it's not like it was the dark ages, which is what it makes you think of when someone says 50 years...

With my first post which was 60 years ago .. I was just a tot, so that does seem like a very long time ago to me.. but the 50 years seems like yesterday when I was wearing hot pants and platform sole boots.. that cannot possibly be 1/2 a century ago... :eek:
 
I would rewind the clock back 56 years to when I was 19 years old in 1965. I was very naive and immature and had NO idea what life was about. I had just graduated in 1964 from high school and didn't have a clue as to what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, so I let my mother and aunt (who was a nurse) talk me into going to nursing school. I hated it but I had no self-confidence to speak up for myself so that's what I did. I also married the first guy that came along so I could get out from my mother and father's disapproving ways on anything I did. I went from the frying pan into the fire, so to speak. It was a terrible mistake and I learned about all the seedier sides of life that I had no idea even existed. He was a drug addict, an alcoholic, and he was gay. Wow...what a terrible time that was in my life. All I can say is...my Guardian angel was working way over time.

IF I could go back to that time in 1965, I'd go to college and take business courses and accounting. I've always been good with math and numbers don't lie. I always wanted to write a book so I'd pursue that, too. I'd get my own apartment and probably never get married or have children. I would have been a career women with a mind of my own.
 
60 years ago, I had just joined the military....USAF....and began my journey into Adulthood. In the ensuing years, ever since, I can't count the number of mistakes I've made....fortunately, all fairly minor. At least I found the right young woman to marry, nearly 57 years ago, and she does a pretty good job of keeping me headed in the right direction.
 
timoc said:
I realize that some members were only children in 1962, or perhaps not even born, but please tell, what happened to you 60, or 50, or 40 years ago

Tenerife, 1962.

Walking along a beach with a huge ice cream cone, I spotted the most gorgeous creature sprawled back in a deck chair. She had those large dark lense sun glasses, I smiled at her and she smiled back. I offered her the ice cream, which she took, then I went to get another, when I returned she had gone....the rotten cow. :giggle:

Later that evening, at a bar, I met her again and we danced and danced and danced, then we got a bit more friendly. :giggle:
Her name was Simone and she was French.
If you, the reader, are expecting to be told in detail what happened later, tough, I'm not telling, suffice to say, that when I woke up in the morning, Simone was gone, and so was my very expensive camera. :oops:

Now, older and so much craftier, I'd love the opportunity of returning to that last night with Simone, dancing and dancing and dancing, and getting a bit more friendly........ and hiding that bloody camera. :giggle:
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I couldn't do much, I wasn't very old then, just 9. Don't have a whole lot of say so then. Not even a teenager yet.
 
Since you've asked that we cover a few decades, I do have happy memories of me and my son. I didn't have much money back then but I'd split my tax returns into thirds to pay bills, buy our necessities and do whatever I wanted with the rest. We took a few really nice vacations when he was young. When he was about 8 I took him to Philadelphia and we stayed in a hotel, I can't remember how many nights. We must've either taken the train or Greyhound because I didn't drive then. We visited the Liberty Bell and an African American History museum.

A few years later we went to Washington DC and visited the Smithsonian museums. He loved the air and space museum best. I also took him to Wildwood, N.J. for a week. My mother's former neighbor and her husband owned a house and rented out the room, otherwise I couldn't have afforded a week down there. Boy did we have fun. I rented a bike for him and trike for me and we rode up and down the boardwalk. Of course we enjoyed strolling the boardwalk too, sampling the food along the way as well as the amusements and rides. He still cherishes those memories.
 
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mrstime said:
Well 60 years ago DH and I had been married almost 5 years and had our 3 kids. In June we will be married 65 years. Sunday our baby will be 61 years old, can't stop the years going by.
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WOW!! That is awesome - 65 years. It will be 38 years in May for hubby and I. We have been through The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. One thing that holds the glue together for us is we like being around each other and we give each other space. What is one thing that holds the glue together for you guys?
 
Ladybj said:
WOW!! That is awesome - 65 years. It will be 38 years in May for hubby and I. We have been through The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. One thing that holds the glue together for us is we like being around each other and we give each other space. What is one thing that holds the glue together for you guys?
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Good question, we do actually like each other, it may seem crazy to anyone other than us, but we actually also respect each other. He has never done anything to lose my respect and I think he feels the same way about me. I could never love anyone I didn't respect.
 
mrstime said:
Well 60 years ago DH and I had been married almost 5 years and had our 3 kids. In June we will be married 65 years. Sunday our baby will be 61 years old, can't stop the years going by.
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We're almost on the same page, mstime.

We originally met in June of 1953 and were married in Feb 1956. Had our first of 4 kids in Feb of 57. Have collected 12 grandkids and 12 greatgrands. Our 66th anniversary in couple of days. The whole family is a very close group with constant interaction among us. The large "clan" all live within a 100 mile radius except for one grandson and wife who make cross-country visits on special occasions.
 
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Ruth n Jersey said:
@timoc, I'm going to go back 70 years. I was 6 and got my first dog. One of the happiest moments in my very young life.
I had been begging my dad to let me have a dog for awhile.
He loved all animals but believed they only belonged on a farm.

I found an old stuffed cat with barely any fur and was filthy. My friend gave me an old leash and I dragged that cat around wherever I went.
I told people who asked why I was dragging that thing around and I told them my dad wouldn't let me have a dog.
One evening dad told me to leave that sorry excuse for a cat at home because we were going for a ride.
He didn't tell me where, and back then kids didn't ask.

We drove to an old barn and a man met us at the door. We entered the building and there was a huge cardboard box. I looked inside and saw a whole litter of Beagle puppies. My dad told me to pick one.
The feeling of love I had for my dad and my new friend can't be described.
I grew up with Toby. He live to be 17 and my dad cried like a baby when he died.
The photo is the night we brought him home. Not a good photo of my dad. He may have been rethinking the whole thing. View attachment 207948
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Ruth, I love your puppy experience. Also your photo. Thanks for sharing this.
 

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