I remember...
penny candy
push button light switches
fried bologna sandwiches
doilies
bacon grease kept in a coffee can on the stove
RC colas
I remember...
everyone carried pocket knives, even kids
avocado and harvest gold kitchen appliances
percolator coffee makers
rabbit ears on the TV with tinfoil on ends
swamp coolers instead of A/C
When the world was much slower and people spoke across fences. Kids respected their parents and automobiles looked like cars. Idols weren't celebrities or tattooed billboards. Cabled TV had fewer commercials and newspapers had the news.
Watching the Apollo missions (I was bit young to remember 11 very well, but the later ones I definitely remember watching). Yes, I'm a big space geek.
Saturday morning cartoons
Kittens being born in our basement (one of which remained with us until the year I got my Master's)
Pop Shoppe (a locally bottled soda in small, very distinctive bottles)
The Red Barn (a long defunct fast food joint)
The Central Ontario Exhibition (the local fair in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada where I grew up)
Hiway Market (a large, independent grocery store in Kitchener that folded in the late seventies or early eighties)
Oo, I could just keep going.
The Kitchener Farmer's Market.
Norris Bakery coffee cakes (bought on said market)
Carnarvon Bakery near our cottage, now long defunct (Yes, there's a Carnarvon in Ontario. It's a little village at the southern end of the lake where the cottage is located. No castle, alas.) Best damned dinner rolls I've ever had and some fantastic squares and pies
White Castle
Fuller Brush Man
Drive-In movies
A & W carhops
balcony seating in the movies
movie ushers
Dudes drive in (a local place in my hometown) foot long chili dogs
Starlight drive in movies
Custard Corner ice cream
Bus trips to the library with my sister
Homecoming parades
RC cola and moon pies
Playing outside barefoot til the porch light came on
I remember living in a cabin along a river. I remember snakes, crawdads, and seining a river bed with my dad. I remember chigger bites from the raspberry patch.
I remember my Dad's funeral. Closed casket due to the work accident that killed him.
I remember bluegill fishing in a small creek with my brother and sister every week for two summers.
I remember riding our bikes ten miles to our cousins' house three times a week in those same summers. My sister was five, my brother was seven, and I was nine. We stopped at the Essington Farm for water. We hand-pumped it out of the well. Mrs. Essington would come out and talk with us.
I remember swimming in a public quarry that was finally condemned for bad water. It was sold to a private party and then re-opened without any contamination problems the next year. Go figure.
I remember as a ten-year-old applying make-up on my mother's back and shoulders before her dates. We kids wanted her to marry Bill and told her. He bought us McDonald's hamburgers and took us to the drive-in with Mom. She told him she wouldn't marry him.
She married Bob. It was a mistake. Our wonderful, bucolic childhood was over.
I remember a lot about that, too.
Thunder and lightning while visiting my grandma and cousins
Twirling my baton
Diving from the high board at the YMCA
Endless hours of playing the piano
Going to church three days a week
Being in a singing group
All of my precious animals I had to keep me company, to love me unconditionally, to tell all of my secrets to
Living a carefree life without any worries. No responsibilities. No bills. No commitments ..meh. Just school, home, family, church, Sunday school, friends, playing in the streets, laughter and fun ..oh well.