[Nova Jed]

I did not live in this era, but I learned what my parents have taught me. I grew up learning the same values that you had mentioned in your post and totally agree with all of that.

I am one of those kids that lived my life with the value of playing outside, playing baseball in the summer, building forts out in the woods and having good fun with my friends when it snowed or we were all bored in the neighborhood. You could ride your bike for a couple of miles and not have to worry about getting picked up by some pedofile. Go throw toilet paper around trees on Halloween and not have to worry about the cops coming. Set fireworks off in the backyard without the fire company coming. Make phone calls from the "house" phone and fight over who gets to watch what show when. Listen to foul language movies without repeating the words around grown ups. Work on model cars without the side affects of becoming brain dead. Working at age 14 because I wanted to.

I didn't do what everyone else did because it was popular. I did my own thing. I worked on bikes and made ramps and bent rims and changed them. I popped my tires and patched them. I took apart a cookoo clock and put it back together and I didn't even have directions. I took apart a 307 in my Nova before I knew what valve timing was and got that running better then it was before and didn't call a mechanic.

My parents weren't caught up in keeping up with the "Jone's" but, keeping up with their kids studies. And when the sun went down, we were in the backyard catching lighting bugs. When my parents split up, I was 11 and mowed the grass for my Mom because I knew she didn't have time. I lived in a rural area when I was a kid and moved to the burbs when I was a teenager and it was a culture shock to me.

I don't own any video games and I don't have a dvd player, but it's sad to know that society has become greedy and marketing plays a key in the necessities of our daily lives. You need a computer for certain jobs and cell phones to keep in touch with everyone because no one is ever home. It's become easier to get on the internet and read something instead of finding space for books. Everything has been made to be a convenience because no one has patients. Jobs are "hurry up and get it done" because "we don't care about quality" type attitude. Or the "ah who cares if it doesn't last forever, make it cheap so people will have to by another one sooner". I'm sorry to go off, but my one friend and I would talk about the same things that you have mentioned all the time. I have had this conversation with my parents and my friend's parents all the time and the one thing that they say is, "you kids don't have it like we did." Meaning, they think it was a lot easier to live comfortable when they were starting out.

Ha, how about dating? WOW! Try to find a good woman nowadays that isn't caught up like these girls on these TV shows. I'm 27 and I myself have no clue what the hell this world is coming to? If I would ever get married and have kids, the odds are against me before I even get started. If I would raise kids like I was, I'd be in jail for child abuse because some official saw a bruse on my kid's arm and said it was abuse and not punishment for something they did. Where does it start to be the end of this crap. I still wonder what this world would have been like if John Lennon was never killed and yes I was alive when he was shot. FWIW, just my .02.

Jed