By Barry Evans
Some grandparents complain that it is hard to get the attention of their grandkids. It is really not. All you have to do is tell them stories of when you were young. They will believe that you are making things up and will think it is really funny – particularly if they know you have a warped sense of humor like mine. Just the other day, I was telling my grandkids of the exciting things we used to do when I was little. The Blonde in the house indicates that I should not do this as it gets them too excited.
I started off real early in my life by explaining that when I was of a young age, we used to visit my grandmother who lived on a hill in Sandy Lake, PA. I informed them that she had no electricity, gas, or running water. The house was heated with a small coal stove in the winter, and one had to use the outhouse out back – which they thought was a guest house so I had to explain. I pointed out using it was obviously cold in the winter and had bees in the summer. At this point they were certain that I was feeding them a poor science science-fiction story.
So, I switched to what I would do when I would come from a hard day in school. (It was really hard in the winter as I had to walk three miles through snow drifts which were as high as me. No school buses unless you lived more than four miles from the school – as the crow flies). What I did first was turn on the radio and listen to fifteen minute serials of Captain Midnight, Tom Mix and his Ralston Straight-Shooters, Jack Armstrong the All American Boy and Superman. I informed them that these were great serials, but I had one problem in that there was another station that carried other serials, but they were on at the same time, and I could not hear them.
Looking at me somewhat askance, they demanded to know why I just didn’t record the other channel and play it back later. Horror shown on their little faces when I explained the reason! They then wanted to know if I watched much TV once I had listened to the serials. They were shocked almost speechless when I pointed out that there was no TV then. I indicated that we actually had to go outside and play “Prove It” or “May I”, “Hide and Go Seek”, “Marbles” or some other great game. I then had to spend some time explaining what these games were. (I didn’t tell them about mumbly-peg as the use of a knife would have gotten wives and mothers all unsettled). It was better understood when I explained that as I got older we played softball, soccer, basketball, etc.
Being persistent they wanted to know when I did get TV. I informed them that since we lived seventy miles from any big city, I was in college before my parents bought one. I acquainted them of the hard times that went with it like having to get up from the couch to change the channel. In fact sometimes you had to turn the antenna too – which I noted was on the roof. Then there were the three particular days a week when I would be studying and my mother would be watching Liberace on the black and white grainy tube. It was the same program all three nights, but different channels and my mother loved Liberace. (I didn’t tell them that we finally got color TV several years after the Blonde in the house and I were married).
They did not know who Liberace was so I remarked that he was an early member of Kiss, but that he looked too good so they threw him off the band. I frightened them further by pointing out that when kids stayed up for New Year’s Eve, they had to listen to Guy Lombardo. Since I have a Guy Lombardo CD that I sometimes play when they are here, they know what his band sounds like. That story turned them rather green so they went in to play some wii games – which was just as well as I had some work to do on the computer (they think I hire someone to do my computer work). Besides my sister was around and I didn’t want her telling them how far I did walk to school.
Barry Evans is a Villager.
