You know you are getting old when:

[MisterCairo]

I just like the cars,...

 

[Captain O]

I agree with Zombie_61 (!!!) about the way our parents and relatives were and why they were that way. They all had twenty difficult years that my generation never had, if you ignore Vietnam, which wasn't much like WWII (unless you went there). I have no idea who Loeb and Hollenbeck were. I also grew up in a blue collar neighborhood. My father never attended high school and struggled with reading. I graduated from college, the first in my family to do so. Only a couple of my relatives did but none I saw regularly.

I have no memory of any student smoking around school when I was in junior high or high school but I'm sure some did. But since so many people smoked, it probably wouldn't have made any impression on me. The usual joke is that you learn to smoke from the janitor down in the boiler room, which was probably never true. But I did work on a tobacco farm one summer and I can tell you that the tar they talk about is literally tar. It is black and a little gummy and comes off on your hands when you handle the plant. But everyone knew that cigarettes were unhealthy. They were being called coffin nails and cancer sticks before I was born. There was even a popular country & western song in the 1950s about smoking.

"Tell St. Peter at the Golden Gate that you hate to make him wait, but you just gotta have another cigarette!"

I remember the 1947 Tex Williams recording of "Smoke, Smoke, Smoke, (that cigarette)"! the most clearly.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Someone once told me that old people make poor role models. They are impatient and bitter about everything. I think he may have had a point.

I think it's probably safe to say that the older a certain type of people get the less tolerant they are of any aspect of the world that isn't exactly the way it was when they were eight years old.

 

[2jakes]

Someone once told me that old people make poor role models. They are impatient and bitter about everything. I think he may have had a point.

Reminds me of the time when I was a young man and asked an elderly person
why was he so bitter all the time. I
also wondered if there was ever a time
when he was happy.
He looked at me for moment. Had a puzzled look on his face.
He told me he was happy even though
he came across as otherwise most of the
time.
I remember this because that was the last conversation we had.
He died the following week.

 

[ChiTownScion]

Someone once told me that old people make poor role models. They are impatient and bitter about everything. I think he may have had a point.

Certainly was true as far as my maternal grandmother and her sister. They were the most bigoted individuals that a kid should ever have to deal with. Had I ever used the N- word in my house, either my mother or father would have washed out my mouth with soap. My dear, sweet grandmother and her sister threw it around without thinking. But they were, in their defense, equal opportunity bigots. Anyone who was not Irish Catholic was, to one degree or the other, the child of a lesser God. (And there were quite a few of their own Irish Catholic tribe- they'd dismiss that sort as "shanty Irish"- who were never good enough for them, to be fair.) But of course, anyone who dared to criticize the Catholic Church was an intolerant bigot.

And there were elements of contradiction and inconsistency in all of it as well. Grandmother was a big supporter of FDR and the New Deal (although she never quite trusted Eleanor)... but she also regarded Father Charles Coughlin as somewhat of a hero as well. (To her credit, my mom did her utmost to distance herself from the racism and anti-Semitism. I was taught that all were entitled to equality before the law, and that I would do well to emulate Jewish kids who "studied hard in school and will end up making something good with their lives." Grandmother's wet blanket on all of this was that some of those Jewish kids ended up studying too hard and went mad, like Leopold and Loeb. Painful lesson in life to realize at age nine that your own dear sweet grandmother is full of crap... but I digress.

To be quite honest, the best thing that could ever actually did happen, and provided a needed reality check to their bigotry (tribalism, really): my grandmother's brother was murdered during a street robbery gone bad in 1977 by a black man in Newark in 1977. Now, you'd think that kind of an experience would entrench a bigot even more... but not so. They had to travel to the hospital in Newark from Chicago, and they saw a side of decent, caring, law abiding African Americans at a time when they were most vulnerable. Every kindness, courtesy and favor that could be shown to another person in that unfortunate circumstance was shown to those two old ladies, and on numerous occasions. When they returned home, all the two of them could do was go on about how well they were treated, the kindnesses shown them, how gracious everyone was, etc. Perhaps they felt guilty for misjudging an entire race and were trying to compensate: I have no idea. They were not quite ready to be the poster kids for National Brotherhood Week, mind you. But I never heard the N- word out of their mouths after that.

 

[ChrisB]

Remember the "Cyclamate scare" of the mid-to-late 1970's? The trumped-up fears were bogus because you had to consume more cyclamates than you normally would in a course of five lifetimes to make the artificial sweetener a true carcinogenic threat.

Cyclamates are still in use in the EU.

 

[ChrisB]

My feelings about the period, I will freely admit, are motivated to a great extent by the fact that had I been born in 1913 instead of 1963, I could have easily been listed in Red Channels myself, right there on page 109 between Paul McGrath and Burgess Meredith.

It seems that every era has its scapegoats.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Painful lesson in life to realize at age nine that your own dear sweet grandmother is full of crap... but I digress.

"Even fools get old."

 

[Fading Fast]

Certainly was true as far as my maternal grandmother and her sister. They were the most bigoted individuals that a kid should ever have to deal with. Had I ever used the N- word in my house, either my mother or father would have washed out my mouth with soap. My dear, sweet grandmother and her sister threw it around without thinking. But they were, in their defense, equal opportunity bigots. Anyone who was not Irish Catholic was, to one degree or the other, the child of a lesser God. (And there were quite a few of their own Irish Catholic tribe- they'd dismiss that sort as "shanty Irish"- who were never good enough for them, to be fair.) But of course, anyone who dared to criticize the Catholic Church was an intolerant bigot.

And there were elements of contradiction and inconsistency in all of it as well. Grandmother was a big supporter of FDR and the New Deal (although she never quite trusted Eleanor)... but she also regarded Father Charles Coughlin as somewhat of a hero as well. (To her credit, my mom did her utmost to distance herself from the racism and anti-Semitism. I was taught that all were entitled to equality before the law, and that I would do well to emulate Jewish kids who "studied hard in school and will end up making something good with their lives." Grandmother's wet blanket on all of this was that some of those Jewish kids ended up studying too hard and went mad, like Leopold and Loeb. Painful lesson in life to realize at age nine that your own dear sweet grandmother is full of crap... but I digress.

To be quite honest, the best thing that could ever actually did happen, and provided a needed reality check to their bigotry (tribalism, really): my grandmother's brother was murdered during a street robbery gone bad in 1977 by a black man in Newark in 1977. Now, you'd think that kind of an experience would entrench a bigot even more... but not so. They had to travel to the hospital in Newark from Chicago, and they saw a side of decent, caring, law abiding African Americans at a time when they were most vulnerable. Every kindness, courtesy and favor that could be shown to another person in that unfortunate circumstance was shown to those two old ladies, and on numerous occasions. When they returned home, all the two of them could do was go on about how well they were treated, the kindnesses shown them, how gracious everyone was, etc. Perhaps they felt guilty for misjudging an entire race and were trying to compensate: I have no idea. They were not quite ready to be the poster kids for National Brotherhood Week, mind you. But I never heard the N- word out of their mouths after that.

Two things, Leopold and Loeb is one absolutely insane story. And that they might (might) have gotten away with it all but for a quirky hinge on a pair of eyeglasses is crazy. And it bugs me to this day that Leopold had a life after prison, more so than his victim.

And, two, I often think that my dad and mom's, for the time, open attitude toward different races, religions, even homosexuality had to do with the fact that they both grew up dirt poor but in mixed neighborhoods so they saw that people of all backgrounds are pretty similar away from the surface / cultural differences. When you're kids and you're all running around in near rags, worried about the next meal - the gender, color, culture of the kids in the group seemed like a small difference. My dad had a very diverse set of friends - fifty years before that word became trendy - but they would kid each other hard about their difference in a way that would offend many today - but they were all friends for life.

 

[2jakes]

Two things, Leopold and Loeb is one absolutely insane story. And that they might (might) have gotten away with it all but for a quirky hinge on a pair of eyeglasses is crazy. And it bugs me to this day that Leopold had a life after prison, more so than his victim.

And, two, I often think that my dad and mom's, for the time, open attitude toward different races, religions, even homosexuality had to do with the fact that they both grew up dirt poor but in mixed neighborhoods so they saw that people of all backgrounds are pretty similar away from the surface / cultural differences. When you're kids and you're all running around in near rags, worried about the next meal - the gender, color, culture of the kids in the group seemed like a small difference. My dad had a very diverse set of friends - fifty years before that word became trendy - but they would kid each other hard about their difference in a way that would offend many today - but they were all friends for life.

I asked my grandmother how it was for her during the times of
the depression.
She told me that it was all the same for everyone in the neighborhood.
She added that it was mostly the rich folks that got hit the
hardest when they lost most of everything.

 

[Fading Fast]

I asked my grandmother how it was for her during the times of
the depression.
She told me that it was all the same for everyone in the neighborhood.
She added that it was mostly the rich folks that got hit the
hardest when they lost most of everything.

My mom's family was poor and got poorer during the depression / my dad's family was what we'd call middle class, I guess, before the depression as they had a small home (I saw it from the outside - nothing much, '20s bungalow - small, but cute) and a second-hand car, but they lost the house and moved into a tenement (which my grandmother still lived in when I came along in the '60s) when the depression hit.

While both my parents had an hyper-fear of poverty and the depression was alive for them everyday even fifty years later, my dad probably felt it harder because losing the house really meant something very tangible changed in his life.

That's my long way of saying that I can understand what your grandmother meant because if you were upper middle class or rich and lost all those thing - my God, that had to be brutal. I lack the subtle, sometimes hidden-on-the-surface (sometimes not), antipathy that many (not all, not you, not pointing at anyone in particular) seem to have toward "the rich" as, unless I know someone's specifics, I have no reason at all to believe they didn't earn what they have. So, I feel very badly for everyone thinking about the depression as it was not any one individual's fault - and I can appreciate that it would be, if not harder, different and in ways more difficult to have lost so much.

 

[BlueTrain]

I think there was a feeling, not necessarily held by all, that some people were better than other people and that some people were simply better off than other people. If the people that were better than other people happen to also be better off but then had a reversal in fortune, then they were still better than other people. It gets tricky. But that came through in juvenile literature now and then and sometimes in the movies, too. But I also believe that sort of thinking disappeared by the 1960s, maybe because it was either unrealistic or unfashionable to say so. Doctors, for example, used to be held in high esteem but I'm not so sure that's as true these days. Lawyers not so much. I say that with two lawyers in the family (not my immediate family, mind you). We're down to one clergyman but no doctors, unless you count acupuncture.

There are plenty of expressions that remind you that people do not necessarily reserve their expressions of superiority for use only in comparison with other races (as they define the same) but freely acknowledge it by using terms like white trash, trailer trash, hick, yokel, hillbilly or conversely, city slicker, and so on. Basically they are all slurs. Naturally the list goes on and there are expressions for those in more fortunate circumstances as well.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There was a strong belief among some in the decades before the Depression that the social order existed by divine mandate. The rich were rich because they were divinely ordained to be so. The poor were poor because they were personally unworthy of receiving such a blessing. This attitude was especially common in New England thanks to the thin-lipped constipated Puritans who founded the place. The coming of the Depression, however, suggested to many that perhaps the Almighty had other ideas than those attributed to him by the "worthiest" of his followers.

 

[BlueTrain]

I think being rich would be divine! But I don't think Jesus wanted us to be wealthy, contrary to what is sometimes preached. I think there is still a strong belief, stronger in some places than others, that the social order was divinely ordered, which is not to say it was heavenly for everyone. The most important thing was that people know their place in the hierarchy and to never get too big for their britches.

Ultimately, that vaguely feudal system goes back a thousand years and was not based on heavenly favoritism but rather on decidedly earthly royal favoritism. In this country, that is how just a few well-placed individuals wound up with large estates. They were simply given title to vast amounts of land. It happened in New France, New Spain and in the American Colonies. I suspect some property around North American is still held by descendants of colonial land grants.

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

On the subject of grandmothers, my maternal grandmother was born in the late 1890s and married the ne'er-do-well scion of the town's most prominent family . In 1922 she had twin daughters and a few years later her husband abandoned the family. She never remarried and was something of a scandal in that little Texas town, and retained her Flapper attitudes for the rest of her life. She taught me and my brother to play poker before we could read, though she could never interest me in bridge. In later years she was a Life Master and went on bridge cruises with Charles Goren. On her birthday and Mother's day, instead of flowers, my mother and her sisters would treat her to a weekend in Vegas. Needless to say, she had a far greater influence on me than my other grandmother, a dour, petty-minded Irish Catholic.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I think being rich would be divine! But I don't think Jesus wanted us to be wealthy, contrary to what is sometimes preached. I think there is still a strong belief, stronger in some places than others, that the social order was divinely ordered, which is not to say it was heavenly for everyone. The most important thing was that people know their place in the hierarchy and to never get too big for their britches.

Ultimately, that vaguely feudal system goes back a thousand years and was not based on heavenly favoritism but rather on decidedly earthly royal favoritism. In this country, that is how just a few well-placed individuals wound up with large estates. They were simply given title to vast amounts of land. It happened in New France, New Spain and in the American Colonies. I suspect some property around North American is still held by descendants of colonial land grants.

Yep. And you can extend that to the grandees of the West, many of whom got that way thanks to illegal manipulation of the vast Government gimme program that was the Homestead Act, and plague take any Indian who decided he didn't like it.

 

[Zombie_61]

I worked as a butler for one year in Beverly Hills. I put the question to someone who had been around. Why did these folks all have the lavish swimming pools, tennis courts and several expensive cars? Some didn’t know a thing about tennis but had to have a court or a yacht. He told me basically that these folks were not born rich. When they became successful, they lavish themselves with many material things they never had before. A reminder that they had made it and were successful. Sadly, some did not know how to cope with the change. Using medications with fatal results...

The Gent who was responsible for maintaining and repairing the computer equipment at my last place of employment told me a story one day that I found interesting. One of his neighbors, and good friend, worked for Bill Gates. Yes, that Bill Gates. He not only worked for him, but was part of Mr. Gates' "inner circle" of close and valued associates, i.e. people Mr. Gates believed he could trust. Now, this neighbor/friend didn't plan for this to happen, and readily admitted that he was no better at his job than many other people in his occupation, but Mr. Gates took a liking to him and deliberately placed him in a position within the organization for which he would be ridiculously well compensated. Not long after this happened said neighbor/friend began exhibiting symptoms of severe depression with no apparent cause, and eventually found himself being examined by a psychologist. During his therapy sessions he learned two things. The first was that the depression was actually a manifestation of guilt. The second was that this happens to most people who suddenly find themselves being paid large amounts of money but doing so little to actually earn it--they feel guilty about being paid so much for doing so little while so many people are struggling to make ends meet--and that it happens so often that the "experts" had to create a name for this syndrome. His neighbor/friend was able to recover with some help, but a lot of these people don't recognize or admit they have a problem, hence the self-medication with their poison of choice.

 

[tonyb]

^^^^
At least they can afford the poison.

 

[tonyb]

A recently deceased friend (diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer in September, dead in January) had himself lost a brother to cancer a couple three or four years earlier. My friend did what he reasonably could to accommodate his brother's desires during the final months of his life. This turned into his passing many an hour at the tribal casino, which had me wondering just what motivated the dying fellow. Hit it big and be dead in a matter of weeks anyway? But then, he had the gambling bug, and I don't. There's apparently something in it that's all but entirely lost on me.

 

[Captain O]

A recently deceased friend (diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer in September, dead in January) had himself lost a brother to cancer a couple three or four years earlier. My friend did what he reasonably could to accommodate his brother's desires during the final months of his life. This turned into his passing many an hour at the tribal casino, which had me wondering just what motivated the dying fellow. Hit it big and be dead in a matter of weeks anyway? But then, he had the gambling bug, and I don't. There's apparently something in it that's all but entirely lost on me.

I'm too cheap to attempt this kind of foolishness. They can have it. I hope that he enjoyed himself, but it wouldn't be for me.