COMMAERNTTARY
I Am Old
By Aaron R. Fodiman
Getting old sure beats the alternative.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018 | TAMPA BAY MAGAZINE 157
I was born before television,
Xerox, polio shots, frozen
TV dinners, contact lenses,
Frisbees and so much more.
There were no credit cards,
ballpoint pens or air conditioners, much less “The Pill.” No
one imagined that someday a man would walk on the moon.
Computers were strictly for scientists, and no one ever
thought we would use them for dating. A chip was a piece
of wood, and soft wear was a cozy flannel nightshirt. There
was no pizza, McDonalds or instant coffee. You could buy
lots of things for a penny or a nickel and make a phone call
from a phone booth with a dime. We had ice cream, but
the number of flavors was limited. However, we could
stand in the street and buy ice cream from a truck that rang
a bell to let us know it was coming.
Back when I was growing up, the only grass we knew
needed mowing, and pot was what your mother used when
she cooked. I grew up during World War II when everyone
was a patriot, and we all agreed on who the enemy was.
As time went on, the world began to change faster and
faster. Movies were in Technicolor, and cars began to look
like space age vehicles with fins and lots of chrome. It was
a good time. We won the war, and the nation was moving
ahead economically. It was a
simpler time, not necessarily
better, but certainly simpler.
Cameras used film. We knew
how we were expected to act,
dress and speak. We loved our families and believed in
justice. We had no idea how the police worked. We had time
to watch 160 baseball games a season and could name the
players on our favorite team, as they did not change much
year after year. We could turn on any news report on the
radio and eventually on the television and know what was
happening, since the facts were reported as evenhandedly
as possible. We trusted the journalists, who seemed not to
take sides.
As time went by, the world changed more and more,
quicker and quicker. New technology, new ideas, new
discoveries and a large variety of wonderful things have
made our lives easier, more fun, more productive and better
in so many ways. Yet I miss those earlier days when I was
younger. I’m sure 20 years from now, someone born in the
1970s will have the same sort of lament; or maybe those
born in the 1990s already feel this way. Maybe the past is not
really better. Perhaps it just looks that way from a distance.
But for me, the older I get, the better it was. 9
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