Penny For Your Thoughts By: Nancy Whitaker
Yep. I am old but my memories are vivid. Memories of childhood, teenage years, young adult and…being a Senior Citizen.
Sometimes I wonder how times would have been if we would have had access to the internet way back then. First of all, growing up with my mom, grandma and grandpa, they were very religious and probably would have thought it was a sin.
So as many who lived during my era know, we played outside until supper, ate supper and then it was back outside to the porch to catch fire flies.
So how did we entertain ourselves and what did we play? For one thing, I had a family of paper dolls and cutout clothes for them. I built their homes out of cardboard boxes and named all of them.
Another game we gals liked to play was Jacks. There were 10 Jacks and a little ball. The goal was to bounce the ball, pick up jacks and catch the ball.
Then jump rope was popular with girls. There was single jump ropes for jumping alone and longer ropes where 2 people turned the rope while another jumped.
Chants rang out as we jumped and there were jumps like Pepper which was fast, running through the rope with out getting hit on the back with the rope, and Eevy Ivy Over. Do they still jump rope for fun?
Then I remember all of my classmates or cousins playing Red Rover. There were 2 teams and each team held hands and called someone from the other team saying, “Red Rover, Red Rover. Let (someone) come over.” The goal was to break through the other teams hands and steal that player who couldn’t break through.
Another favorite game my family played was “My Father Owns A Grocery Store” Number 1 would start with the letter A. The rest of us all had to guess the item. The one who guessed it then took the letter B, but they had to name the A food and then the B. It was a fun memory game.
As kids we played games, did a few chores, slept with the windows open, ran barefoot and went to school in -10 degree weather.
Simple times, simple pleasures and simple games. We played all week but on Saturday nights we took a bath for church on Sunday.
When we went to church on Sunday, the girls wore dresses and the boys wore suits. Ladies wore hats and gloves and men also wore suits, ties and maybe some kind of top hat.
We would look around church to see who was there, sneak a piece of gum in our mouth and try to act like we were paying attention to the sermon.
There’s an old saying I always heard about a preacher’s sermon.
My Mama always said, “If the preacher puts a mint in his mouth when he starts preaching when the mint is gone the sermon should be done. (I don’t believe preachers do this).
Of course that’s not true, but being young, I thought it was. After church we changed our church clothes and ate Sunday dinner. We didn’t play a lot on Sunday and Sunday night we went to church again.
We lived a life of no plumbing, outhouses, an outdoor water pump with a tin cup we all used. We climbed trees, went barefoot, went fishing in a creek and picked wild flowers. This was our life, our times and our memories.
Things have changed and now modern technology has made it possible for all of our things we enjoy today. We have cell phones, online shopping, play video games, have self serve checkouts and electric cars just to name a few.
Who knows what new things there will be in future eras. Everyone thinks that their “good old days” in which they grew up were the best, but we are all making memories and while my kids thinks the 70s-80s were the best times, I like my 50s and 60s and we had good music! (and Elvis)
Do you think that your growing up years time were the good old days? What games do you play today and have you ever played Red Rover?
Let me know and I’ll give you a Penny for Your Thoughts.
