Essay - Please Read Specifications the Worldview of an Eighty-year-old Woman I...

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***** Worldview of an Eighty-year-old Woman I Met

Busy—but with little to do. Lazy. Disposable. All of these were the adjectives ***** heard an eighty-year-old woman use to describe our modern culture. She lived in an era where most families had one car. Children and parents ********** lived together ***** one large home, out of economic necessity. Mothers did work, contrary to popular mythology, but the grandmothers would watch the children at home, or the older ***** would ***** the younger children, rather than rushing off to soccer practice, cruising ***** Starbucks in their own sh*****y cars, or retreating to their rooms to play video games.

***** played back then, in a disorganized fashion. Baseball, bike riding, and jump rope, from the time they got home from school ***** when they ***** to go home ***** dinner at dusk. No one was lost. Every***** knew where everyone lived, and the daily routines of the neighbors. With fewer *****, dogs roamed the streets, ***** than being enclosed in *****visible fences like today. On her large, sprawling property ***** woman had *****ed several Great Danes.

Going shopping was an event, not a ***** occurrence. Going out to eat was a rare treat. T*****e ***** no franchises. Things tasted different, in different parts ***** the country, and food seemed to taste better, more wholesome, as if you could smell the farm on ***** surface of *****ter and in the eggs or wafting ***** the glass containers of milk. People baked from scratch, ***** from boxes. They had to, just ***** afford to live.

***** did ********** take new things for granted. Most children wore hand-me-downs and shoe ***** for the new school year was an event. Mo*****rs darned socks and mended holes rather than purchased new clothes.

***** a child had a problem with a teacher, the parent's first instinct ***** not ***** run to the school to complain, but to tell ***** ***** to respect authority. Parents assumed that ***** would be obeyed, by ***** large.

***** ***** still remember when she was a child how the iceman ***** come, and give a great block of ice to her family, to keep the food cold. How hard it was to scrub a floor with elbow grease, how it ***** ***** chore as a child to wash ***** dishes ***** help her mot***** hang out the laundry with clothespins. Do children still have chores, she wondered? Her children had a maid serv***** ***** came in ***** ***** homes, more often ***** *****, to take care of such basic, seemingly trivial duties. They had well-stocked refrigerators and pantries ***** great boxes bought ***** Costco ***** ***** and shiny appliances.

Today, parents ***** children are seldom at home together. ***** are usually working and ferrying their ***** ********** to various afterschool activities like soccer ***** gymnastics. Children are not supposed to play in the streets, or walk to school. Dinner is *****out, often eaten on ***** run in the back of a