45 years. In that time, they have lived in Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, New York, New Jersey, Louisiana, Utah, Florida, and England. I don't begin to recall all of the places that J&G have visited, but I believe at least Australia and Scotland are in the mix along with some jaunts into neighboring countries while they were living in England, and a trip to New Zealand is on the horizon. They have raised two daughters, lost one son, and joyously welcomed 2 grandchildren with a 3rd on the way. And they have stayed together. Nay, not just stayed together. They have grown together. As One. Yet they have also done a wonderful job of retaining their own individual identities. Plus they smile and laugh a lot together. If you want some tips and tricks on building a good marriage, you would do well to take Marriage 101, 201, 301 and 401 from J&G.
But I got to thinking recently about all of the changes they have seen in 45 years - from 1969 to now. And the more I thought about it, the longer the list got. It would be a much shorter DD if I wrote about what has NOT changed in 45 years! But that would also be a bit harder to write, if truth be told...
A mere 6 weeks after J&G got married, Neil Armstrong was the first person to walk on the moon. Since that time, we have not only built a space shuttle that could make multiple trips into space, we have actually retired said space shuttle.
Our households have changed. Microwaves are considered a staple appliance in the kitchen as well as a dishwasher and refrigerator with ice maker and water dispensing. Our televisions have gone from black and white large box "furniture" to flat screen, HD, hang-on-the-wall and connect to the internet. Who would've ever thought of having a house with a 3-car garage as "necessary" back in 1969?
Our shopping experiences have changed. From the popularity of malls and food courts to the most basic of things to us now, the magnetic strip on the back of our debit and credit cards. Anyone else remember the old charge card machines where the sales associate would lay your charge card on the metal plate on the left hand side, set the amount of the bill with the slide levers on the bottom, lay a carbon receipt over the card and numbers and then slide the roller across the whole thing to capture the credit card information and price?
Speaking of gas - just self-service gas. Or how about this? The gas station itself. No longer it is a stand alone building that only offers gas, bathrooms and maybe a garage or a soda vending machine like we saw back in 1969. Now gas is purchased at convenience stores with everything from milk to beer to liquor to hot dogs to taquitos to a full soda fountain with flavored syrups.
Once I mention the magnetic strip, that leads us into all sorts of technology places in the last 45 years - ready to drink from a fire hose? World Wide Web, blogs, tweets, pins, hashtags, emoticons, personal computers, laptops, pads, smart phones, Nintendo, Walkman, VCR (Beta and VHS), 8-track, cassettes, DVD, Blue-Ray, CD’s, boomboxes (a word Microsoft dictionary doesn't recognize), Microsoft office suite, email, Y2K, IM, Buddy Lists, home video, phone video, You Tube, bar codes, RF scanners. Are you drowning yet? Each one of these is a paragraph unto itself of how our lives have changed over the last 45 years - the things we have seen come - and yes, even go, in some of these cases.
What about food - one of my favorite topics. In 1969, eating out was a rare treat. Not so today. It is still a treat, but it is not so rare. Think about the grocery store - boxed "dinners" are a mainstay, salsa surpassed ketchup as the # 1 condiment in America (a good thing), pre-packaged convenience dinners have replaced "TV dinners", and the sheer size of our grocery stores has probably tripled in that time as well as offering at least that many times more of items for sale. How often was fresh seafood sold in suburban grocery stores in 1969? Think about all of the gourmet offerings in stores today from coffee and tea to crackers, cookies and popcorn salts. Probably one of the most iconic changes in food would be sushi. In 1969, sushi was a rare something brave and rich world travelers would try in Japan only. Today sushi is mainstream. And short of a seafood shortage, I doubt that will reverse. (Also a good thing.)
Think about how much our language has changed in 45 years. Acronyms are commonplace. Phrases such as "there's an app for that" are now cliche. Who ever talked about cholesterol and carbs in 1969? What is hand sanitizer in 1969? Our mothers and grandmothers would say "Waste not want not" but that has been replaced with the word "recycle." "Being green" has gone from being only a lyric in a song sung by Kermit the Frog to something all the cool kids do.
Speaking of Kermit the Frog, Sesame Street is the same age as J&G's marriage. Or almost anyway. SS is about 5 months younger than their marriage, but it still counts in my mind. And that just leads us into all of the things that J&G could have seen on TV in the last 45 years. We have the families - The Brady Bunch, The Waltons, The Cosby Show and Full House to name but a few. We have the dysfunctional night-time soap families such as the Ewings from Dallas (Who shot JR?) or the Carringtons from Dynasty (cat fights between Krystle and Alexis anyone?). Going back to PBS, the home of Sesame Street, anyone remember Bob Ross? Was there ever a more peaceful show? Bob Ross had the most gentle voice with "happy little trees" that came to life with a few strokes of his paintbrush! He really made you believe that you COULD paint! We've seen Saturday Night Live, MTV go from music to whatever it is they do now, Cheers, the WWF (why?? Can someone please tell me why??), MacGyver (now code for genius re-purposing of most anything to solve a problem) and Seinfeld. I can't leave TV though without mentioning one other change - the show has been around longer than 45 years, but it has had 4 hosts in that amount of time, Johnny Carson, Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and Jimmy Fallon. The main change in 45 years though has probably been the sheer onslaught of channels. We used to have 6 channels - maybe 1 or 2 more fuzzy "UHF" channels if you were lucky and it was a clear day - brought to you courtesy of the antenna. Today we can't count all of the channels available to us via the surfing medium of our choice, be that cable, U-verse or dish/satellite.
I haven't even gotten to music - disco, punk, alternative, indie rock, heavy metal, hip hop, rap. And country has gone mainstream in the last 45 years. Nor have I talked about fashion - bell bottoms, leisure suits, polyester, big hair, straight hari, perms are in, perms ar out, mullets, short shorts (even for men). Was this just wrong?
Anyone remember Christmas catalogs from Sears, J C Penney and Montgomery Ward? Those were common before 1969. Not so much any more.
I could go on for quite a while. I want to say that J&G had a Dodge Duster at one point in their marriage; I don't know that for sure, but as I was thinking about this DD, I remembered one other feature that you never see in cars any more. Remember the triangle shaped window at the very front of the driver and passenger side windows that some people called a "wing window" or the "vent window"? You could turn that a number of ways to direct the wind flow where you wanted it. Alas with the advent of AC in cars, this was no longer needed.
Yep, lots of changes. 45 years. J&G are in Cincinnati this weekend celebrating with family. Not sure when they might get a chance to read this, but I hope that when they do it sparks some fun conversations and will bring back some fun memories for them. I love these two so much and am so happy for their marriage life.
Hope anyone else who has stopped by has also enjoyed this very quick, not-the-least-bit comprehensive look at life over the last 45 years. It has been fun for G&I to reminisce a bit. If there are any young folks who have stopped by, well I hope you've also enjoyed a glimpse into the past - it feels like a recent past for some of us, but may feel like the distant past to you.
One last quasi-philosophical thought - change is constant. It is way more constant than non-change. If you don't believe that, simply look around a bit. I tend to be one of those "change agents" so I usually embrace change fairly easily. Doing so makes this ride called "life" a whole lot more enjoyable! J&G tend to do so as well. Could be one of those tips and tricks they might teach in Marriage 101...
Love,
D
No comments:
Post a Comment