I remember the corned beef of my Childhood,
And the bread that we cut with a knife,
When the Children helped with the housework,
And the men went to work not the wife.

The cheese never needed a fridge,
And the bread was so crusty and hot,
The Children were seldom unhappy,
And the Wife was content with her lot.

I remember the milk from the bottle,
With the yummy cream on the top,
Our dinner came hot from the oven,
And not from a freezer; or shop.

The kids were a lot more contented,
They didn't need money for kicks,
Just a game with their friends in the road,
And sometimes the Saturday flicks.

I remember the shop on the corner,
Where biscuits for pennies were sold
Do you think I'm a bit too nostalgic?
Or is it, I'm just getting Old?

Bathing was done in a wash tub,
With plenty of rich foamy suds
But the ironing seemed never ending
As Mum pressed everyone's 'duds'.

I remember the slap on my backside,
And the taste of soap if I swore
Anorexia and diets weren't heard of
And we hadn't much choice what we wore.

Do you think that bruised our ego?
Or our initiative was destroyed?
We ate what was put on the table
And I think life was better enjoyed.

Author, Unknown... 

This is no joke ... I do remember.

I remember too, life was simpler then and we were what we were, not what we pretended to be. I miss those days, unfortunately they're gone forever. I wonder what the next generation will say when they reach our age.

BTW, before I get taken to task, the above is MY opinion only.

RustyD wrote:

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In the street where I grew up in the 1950s everything was delivered by horse and cart: ice, night cart, bread, milk, green grocer. The problem here was that the street was always smelly & ankle deep in poo. And dogs, who didn't have to be tied up unless dangerous, would go out have a few mouthfuls then roll in it. Talk about dog's breath and doggy perfume. I don't miss that but I can relate to the poem.

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 Me too, but in the forties.

We had daily deliveries of fresh bulk milk.  In fact the milko left a couple of full 2 gallon cans & 1 pint & one quart measure under the trees at the corner of a couple of my local streets.  I used to deliver to all the houses in those streets, leaving any coins under the empty cans when I was finished.  On Saturday mornings after a 1/2 delivery we would drive out to the locals farms & pick up large cans of milk to take back to his cold room & chill. Learned how to ride horses & swim in the dams.

Then there was the occasional Fisho in his old horse & cart.  I assume that there was a green grocer but can't remember as Dad was a fantastic gardener (he had to be to survive as a POW of the Japs for 3 yrs in WW2), but we had the job of watering the bloody squashes et al (& feed the chooks that were fattened & sold to the neighbours after they finished laying)

I had a job with the Ice Man for a while too.  The ice was made in a local suburb & we helped deliver it. The kids had squares of chaff bags with slits cut in them for the hands, but the boss had ice tongs & warm hands.  You would put the blocks of ice into the top of the wooden, lead lined, kitchen ice chest.

Then there was the newsagent job. Every week day afternoon, six of us kids would line up at the gates of the local Railway Workshops with about 80 papers under our L arm (a stack or 50 more behind our legs). Our R hand was stretched out to form a cup in front of us.  On the whistle, about 3,000 workers would race out of the gate to their ride home and on the way past us deposit 4 pennies in our hand & take a paper from under our arm.  A good seller position would sell 100 papers in under 5 minutes & our money was always correct.  Once the hand was full the coins would quickly go into the apron pouch or leather money bag.  On the weekend we had an easier morning job selling magazines & tobacco as the shift workers came into start of the shift.  Sat afternoons were spent delivering a hundred or so rolled up papers around the suburb on pushbikes.  Thrown on to the roof of the narks of course.  

I got under the skin of the prop man (wooden clothes line props - no Hills Hoists for us) by going out into the local bush on the push bike & cutting forked branches to sell to the neighbours.

We had a thriving push bike repair business for a few years too, spraying them with house paint from a fly spray.  The mate who was supplying the stock got into trouble with the local Sergeant so that was the end of that good earner.

It was great fun to help the mates' Father in his bread bakery and delivery business using horse & cart.  The horses dam near harnessed themselves, reversing into their correct cart, and knew the route perfectly. edit  .. Impossible to put the wrong harness on them, they would just toss their head & stomp their bloody great draft hooves until we got the right set. They slowly plodded along the street, periodically stopping for us to catch up from our deliveries as we raced back & forth across the street with our wicker basket of hot bread.  But XMAS baking was the best, when we wrapped Ham legs in pastry & cooked in the wood fired ovens .. ahh the smell!!

All this & we found time to be pool room touts picking up a few coins from the Sat afternoon drunks playing Pin Pool & Kelly pool etc.

No pocket money or credit cards in those days.  You paid cash for everything other than a very rare Walton's layby of a catalogue Air Rifle or whatever.

I'd better stop rambling on.

-- Edited by Cupie on Thursday 30th of November 2017 12:52:55 PM