Basking In What We Didn’t Have…

Y’Know – we didn’t have much growing up in the 1960s and 1970s. We didn’t have video games or big screen televisions. We didn’t have a lot of the luxury kids have today.

Yet – we were happy.

We played ball – both kickball and baseball. We had soccer too. We rode our bikes all over the place – sometimes miles away (especially if our parents didn’t know about it). We had the woods. We played in the dirt and carved out cities and streets. We had a ball living with only our imaginations, being anything we wanted to be.

As we grew up – we had bowling, billiards, teen activities on Friday nights, movies, drag racing at local racetracks, and…..oh the concerts and great music! We had the Washington Senators baseball and our beloved REDSKINS. If you grew up in the Mid-Atlantic, you will understand the passion, insanity, madness, and loyalty to these teams. If you leaned toward Baltimore – you had the O’s and the Colts (yes…The Colts). And – let’s not ever forget basketball – The Capitol Bullets. Political Correctness changed that – and The Redskins… (The Washington Commanders? Seriously?????).

This was the beauty of living between Washington and Baltimore. You had a choice of big town hometowns – either Washington or Baltimore – and sometimes both. Depending upon how well your home team was doing, you could always switch. Redskins fans will understand that.

As young boomers, we had our precious imaginations. We could mentally go anywhere and be anything. Just imagine….and remember… At 60+, we tend to want to act on our imaginations. On television – we had the greatest cartoons in history. We had “The Captain” – “The Best to You Each Morning” from actor and mentor Bob Keeshan who brought us into the Treasure House as Captain Kangaroo. We watched, listened, and learned before school. That is…before CBS decided to minimize The Captain’s influence and fill that time slot with the morning news.

In the evenings, we had great comedy and futuristic programming. There were the odd-duck sitcoms like “I Dream of Jeannie,” “Mister Ed,” “Bewitched,” and a host of others where one or two people knew the big secret. Because the future was ours to hold, there were the science fiction programs like “Lost In Space” and “Time Tunnel” to keep us imaginative and entertained. Thank goodness for great imaginations in Hollywood, which has never been short on imagination.

If you loved Westerns – there was plenty to see every night.

“The News” was….well…..THE NEWS… Respected commentators and reporters told us what happened – and without opinion and a panel of pundits. Thirty Minutes of network and give or take – an hour of local news. They reported what happened without opinion or editorializing. We had Louie Allen or Gordon Barnes with The Weather in Washington, D.C. We had Glenn Rinker and Jim Vance at WRC -TV (NBC). We had Gordon Peterson at WTOP (now WUSA). And if you wanted a good laugh along with News Weather & Sports – there was sportscaster Glenn Brenner at Channel 9. Always good for laughs and great entertainment along with the news.

I could go on…. We all remember growing up in America in the 1960s and 1970s. We couldn’t wait to bust out of our hometowns to see the world – aka George Bailey in “It’s A Wonderful Life.” We sat around in our favorite cruising spots and bowling alleys – lamenting about how we could not wait to leave. And now….we are tearful with memories of “back home” where we get to relive the deep and distance past with nothing but our thoughts and that motion picture in our mind’s eye.

As the generation that changed everything about America and the world, we have our memories – and each other. Close your eyes, turn on the great music of the era, and take that mental vacation.