i'm enjoying these memories so much, even though i didn't grow up in niagara county; that's where my dad, who died when i was a year old, was from and he was born in 1908. many things that folks are saying remind me of things i cherish about my own growing up years, even though i wasn't born till 1952, because i was raised in a small town suburb of cleveland where childhood in the fifties was more like it was in previous decades (with the addition of TV, of course) than what life for children became in the 1970s and beyond. life back then wasn't perfect of course, even with the passage of years i can't claim it was, but children were allowed to BE children then, and to grow up with the same two parents (in fact i was the only person i knew who only had one parent, and i felt like a freak; my mother was likewise the only working mother, by necessity not by choice, until she remarried when i was ten.) so many of the memories that have been written about are suffused with a touching innocence and the ability to take pleasure in life's little graces. there was no drug or alcohol problem among grade school kids, we didn't dare use 'pottymouth' words around our parents or teachers, we didn't find out about sex till puberty and we didn't experiment with it at least until high school; i remember being shocked when i transferred from catholic school to public high school in tenth grade to have friends who were sleeping with their boyfriends! by 1968-9 the world was changing, i knew some people who smoked marijuana, and my senior year a girl had to drop out before graduation because she was pregnant. i feel so sad when i hear the 20something kids i work with talk about their childhoods--chaotic families of unmarried parents, or multiple stepparents, single parents who made their kids their pals and confidants, drugs and sex by sixth grade, prozac by high school. it makes me ashamed for my 'baby boom generation.' i'm childless, but i have no illusions i would have been any better a parent than their parents, or than many of my friends have been: we were so self centered, we didn't want to make commitments that might interfere with 'doing our own thing', we parked our kids in front of tv sets or let them come home to empty houses, sometimes of course because both parents needed to work, but often, among the upper middle class, because neither parent felt being home with the kids was important (i don't think childcare is the responsibility only of women, but i've only ever known one family in which the man chose to be the full time childrearer--and he did a wonderful job.) too many kids were raised by daycare workers or a series of babysitters or nannies. the twentysomethings i work with claim not to feel angry about their parents' immaturity, even though some of them even now spend as much time worrying about their flakey fortysomething mom whose live in boyfriend slaps her around or their flakey fortysomething dad who just left his second wife to run off to brazil as they do dealing with their own personal lives. they stare at me in puzzlement when i say it is the parent who is supposed to care for the child's needs and not vice versa. not that there weren't bad or immature parents in my mother's generation, but by and large i think the lines were clearer about who was SUPPOSED to be the responsible party. certainly my dad always said 'a man is judged by how well he cares for his loved ones' and if at times he and other men of that era were not up to the task, at least they knew they were falling short, and so did everyone else. if a man took off for brazil he was a disgrace to his family, there was no BS about his 'right to self development.' it's fine if someone wants to always be number one in their own lives, but those folks probably shouldn't marry and sure shouldn't have kids! i wanted to be an artist and put that first, and felt if i couldn't give a child a stable, secure upbringing where their needs took primacy over my own, i wasn't going to have kids. sometimes i now regret that, because it's too late to change my mind, but that's an emotional reaction. deep down i know children need to be children, they need a time of innocence, they need adults who are mature and up to their responsibilities to let them come to knowledge of the unpleasant realities of life gradually, who are not afraid to say 'no you can't spend 40 dollars in one afternoon on pokemon cards' (as a friend who is a nanny tried to say to the spoiled 8 year old son of two busy attorneys whom she cares for). by no means were my early years straight out of norman rockwell, and when i was younger i went through a stage of regretting that i'd had such an ordinary, 'leave it to beaver' life--jumping rope and catching fireflies in the summer, playing barbie with my girlfriends on rainy afternoons, skating at the local pond in the winter. but now i'm glad my parents didn't name me 'sunshine' after their favorite brand of LSD, drag me along on the road to marrakech, and try to turn me into their pintsized unpaid therapist ;). ---------- >From: "Vee L. Housman" <housman@adelphia.net> >To: NYNIAGAR-L@rootsweb.com >Subject: Lockport Memories >Date: Fri, Jul 7, 2000, 7:35 PM > > Dear Bunch, > > I received a response to one of my recent messages from Barbara Petty > (bpetty@erols.com) regarding my posting my memories and she modestly called > my attention to memories of her own that is on the Lockport website. She > referred to them as a "meager offering" to the webmaster. > > Oh, Lordy, Barb, what you wrote was FANTASTIC!! Complete with old black and > white family photographs! And even though you're a tad younger than I, I've > gotta tell you that I also painted my second-hand bycicle green, yes the > boys tried to crash the girls' pajama party, no us girls didn't go skinny > dipping in Lake Ontario but we did walk down the middle of Macklem Avenue in > Niagara Falls at midnight in our pajamas, giggling all the way!! > > My father was also a movie projectionist--however it was in the 1930s and if > any of you have watched those old movies, you might notice that on occasion > there is a blinking(?) spot on the upper righthand corner of the screen. > Daddy told us that it was a signal to the projectionist that it was time for > him to switch to the next reel of film and he had just so many minutes or > seconds to do it. When the second blinking spot showed up on the screen, > that's when the second projector with the next reel was switched on. > > And yes, I also had a baby brother (born 1940) who tagged after me and my > girlfriend Marilyn. He's nine years younger than I and by that time Marilyn > and I were in our teens. So we used to try to scare him off with fancy > words we had learned in our Biology class--The paramecium will get you! He > didn't care, he just continued to tag along. > > And do you know what? When I was a kid my mother had the same problem with > me as your mother did with you. For some reason when I would go out to > play, I would never return back home at the hour she had set for me. And I > always knew that when I returned late, I would be punished by being > restricted to the area of only our back yard--for a full WEEK! And trust > me, that was cruel and unusal punishment!! But I never learned my lesson. > Oh how cruel mothers can be--and oh how she must have suffered from my > constent whining and begging her to let me take one step out of the yard!! > > Paper dolls, Loblaws Groceteria, wonderful Kate Smith with her marvelous > voice, cherry Cokes. . . oh WOW, what memories! > > Folks, check out what Barb wrote of her memories of Lockport--1943-1955--at > http://www.lockport-ny.com/Features/Petty.htm > > Barb, I'm still giggling about that SHAMEFUL book "Peyton Place" and how I > devoured every single lurid steamy paragraph! Thanks for the memories and > I'll get back with you regarding your JOHNSON family from Wilson. I haven't > had a chance to call Cora about it. > > vee > > > > ==== NYNIAGAR Mailing List ==== > Stuck for ideas? The Niagara County NYGenWeb page might help... > <http://www.rootsweb.com/~nyniagar/>. > >