I’ve always felt that I grew up in the perfect era. It was the early ‘70s and the Vietnam War was coming to an end. My generation never had to worry about being drafted by the armed forces. If you wanted to join the military, it was strictly voluntary.
While a few of my classmates chose to go in that direction, my attention was trying to get an athletic scholarship to play either football or baseball on the Division 1 level.
Let’s go back to my early years of growing up in the small East Texas town of Mt. Pleasant. As a child during this time frame, we had a lot of freedom. If you had a bike, it was this form of transportation that was basically unlimited. If you could ride your bike on it, there was no limit to where you could go.
We woke up at daylight and were on our bikes by 8 o’clock every summer morning and only came home for lunch, or right at dark. My kids still have a hard time understanding that the only rule we had — be home when the streetlights came on.
Parents didn’t always check on their kids. They pretty much knew where they supposed to be. My mother always knew where I was and who I was with most of the time. There was also a certain amount of trust between parents and their kids, until that trust was broken and we got into trouble.
We lived about three miles out of town and several days out of the week, I would ride my bike for miles. I was either playing ball somewhere at a local ballpark or somebody’s back yard. We rode our bikes looking for coke bottles on the side of the road that we could trade for candy at the local country store.
We played in creeks and ditches, especially after a big rain. As friends we were always together every day and spent a lot of time playing baseball or going to the local pool.
Occasionally, you could find me fishing at one of the stock ponds, or tanks as they call them in Texas. If I wasn’t at one of the ponds on our ranch, our neighbor Mr. Rayford Jones, who lived across the road from our house, owned a cattle farm and allowed my brother and me along with his grandson to fish his two ponds (tanks) that were full of bass and catfish.
Growing up in the country meant you probably had a garden to tend to. Every other day, I had to spend a couple of hours raking grass out of the garden, which was absolute torture for me. But the produce that came out of the garden was incredible, especially after dad had a load of chicken manure brought in!
We also had about two acres around our house that had to be mowed once every two weeks. Not with a riding mower, but with a push mower! That’s right, a 14-inch cut push mower, which required at least two days to complete the job.
I had a brother, seven years younger, who was supposed to take over the lawn cutting duties after I left home for college. Guess what showed up two days before I left home: that’s right, a Sears riding mower!
To say I voiced my displeasure to my parents about this purchase would be an understatement. For five years I push-mowed two acres and now my little brother would get to use a riding mower!
That being said, there were several chores demanded of me that my brother never took on. So, I guess you could say being the youngest had its privileges.
Looking back, I had an awesome childhood with more freedom than kids have today. They say it’s a different world than what my generation grew up in. I’m not sure that’s totally right.
There’s just so much more media exposure with up to the minute news and social media sites that are always shedding light on topics most really don’t want to hear about.
There’s always been bad people in the world who are looking to prey upon the weak. Today’s kids are growing up in a bubble of overprotection. Parents are less likely today to allow their kids to roam free like we did.
I think kids and young teenagers today are not near as mature as earlier generations. This is due to parents being overprotective, afraid to let their kids make mistakes they can learn from. With my generation, we all had summer and part-time jobs that helped us to mature and understand responsibility at an early age.
Our parents did a great job of preparing us for the real world. That gave us something I think is lacking with so many of today’s youth –maturity and accepting responsibility. We can only hope and pray that the generation of today will find its own path to success sooner rather than later.
Our country is at a crossroads in so many ways today. Far left extremists continues to gain ground in small areas of the country. But I don’t think when it comes down to a national election, they will have enough support to win.
I think common sense once again will prevail with the American people,like it did back in the good ole days. If it wasn’t for today’s social media, these small pockets of far-left activists would never even be heard. In God we trust! Stay strong America!
Contact Steve at sgraf26@yahoo.com