If I could wind the clock back 60 years.

timoc

timoc

Well-known Member
Location
UK
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:
 

@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. dad and toby (2).JPG
 
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
Click to expand...
Very nice!👍
 
I'd like to wind the clock back 40 years and tell my 24 year-old self with low self-esteem and the need for affirmation that he will someday be a well-adjusted person who is happy with himself and his successes in life. All the years I wasted being so concerned about what others thought of me when it is my own self-approval that mattered.
 
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I wouldn't want to do it. My senior years are the best times of my life for a few reasons. I was only 3 in 1950 but moving forward to the next couple of decades... life wasn't easy. I had some traumatic events happen to me back then. Although I was blessed in some ways and it wasn't all bad, it's not a time period I wish to reflect on.
 
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60 years is too far back, I was only 20, in the Royal Air Force and
cocky, big headed etc.

Going back 50 years I had calmed down and was getting some
sense, it was the beginning of my Globe Trotting, for work, I would
also like to keep the knowledge I have amassed, either technical,
or even of life itself, I won't be greedy, some will do, not all.

Mike.
 
Back 60 years... I was 6, I'd been sent to live with my granny in another city at 4 , I never did find out why.. and had missed the start of the school year at 5. I was taken home to my parents at 6, and had to start school...

It was a very wet day.. and all the mums and reception class kids were sitting on long wooden benches in the school hallway, waiting for names to be called and classes asigned ...a drab looking place ironically named the Rainbow Primary.

It was 1961..all the mums had their plastic rain bonnets on over their head scarves
s-l300.jpg
... and I was wearing my yellow sou'wester..I remember it so clearly..


child-enjoying-the-rain-in-his-galoshes-2-DGB1-D9.jpg

I'm not sure I actually knew what was happening, or why I was there, because my parents were the type who were information oasis..or should that be o-a-seas.. when it came to telling us kids anything at all... but I do remember wondering what the heck was going on as we sat there, and the screaming, crying and wailing from other kids was something to behold.. and I had no idea why they were bawling..

That's all I remember of that first day.. , I think after being in several foster homes by the time I was starting school.. I'd taken this completely in my stride as just another place I had to be placed..
 
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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
Click to expand...
Your dad looks like, "what have I done?" They usually do grow to love the dogs despite themselves, Ruth.
 
OneEyedDiva said:
I wouldn't want to do it. My senior years are the best times of my life for a few reasons. I was only 3 in 1950 but moving forward to the next coupld of decades... life wasn't easy. I had some traumatic events happen to me back then. Although I was blessed in some ways and it wasn't all bad, it's not a time period I wish to reflect on.
Click to expand...
You beat me to it. I wouldn't either, especially the 60 years to 15. I can reminisce and tell stories about things going on at various ages (some fun, some sad, some pivotal in my development) but that sophomore year of High School is rarely remembered and almost never fondly.
 
60 years ago my life was hectic touching on frantic at times, filled with caring for my children ( one of whom was battling a recently diagnosed severe illness) and earning a living while helping my husband get a new business off the ground. There were never enough hours in the day and I sometimes fell back on the Scarlett O'Hara solution ..... 'I'll think about it tomorrow', not a wise choice as life later proved. My children's physical needs were always met but not so emotionally and the scars remain today.
 
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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
Click to expand...
What a beautiful story and photo! You looked so happy there! Thanks for sharing!:)
 
60 years ago I was 8. I spent a lot of time at my grandmother's. My parents both worked and my siblings are older.
Grandma lived next door to the family (bread) bakery, so I would go over there and climb on the big sacks of flour, wheat and white. My cousin was there also at times w/me.

Grandma didn't speak English , but she loved watching Laurel and Hardy....and laughing. We played cards. We walked to Chittuni's market around the corner. Pomegranates were only 5c.

She passed in 1966. Her home is now gone...to make way for a parking lot for the expanding bakery.
 

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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:
Click to expand...
What a terrific story! You had me with the "rotten cow." I pictured someone fat, but then it changed swiftly to the dancing. Oh well, we'll never know what happened to your camera! I mean, the rotten cow Simone.Thanks for sharing! :D
 
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.:)
 
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.:)
Click to expand...
Do you still speak your mother tongue?
 
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