Take time out for a quick memory check

Remember when grocery stores were closed on Sundays and postcards cost a penny and were called "penny postcards?"

Remember when you had a wringer on the washing machine, no spin dry? (And no dryer. All those diapers had to hang on the line and be brought in when it rained.)

Remember when young women talked in normal voices and not fast and squeaky?

Remember when "like" was not like a component of like every sentence, and gay meant jolly?

Remember when real people answered the telephone?

Remember when you got your first bikini? (But belly buttons were not surgically revised for public display.)

Remember when "CC" meant carbon copy? (Remember carbon paper and when "access" and "impact" were nouns?)

Remember when movies had no cuss words? (Casablanca had no vulgar words, but was a memorable movie, anyway.)

Remember when you got your first TV and could watch Sid Caesar?

Remember when you played solitaire with cards, not the computer?

Remember when green stamps were given in grocery stores, and margarine was white and came with a capsule of yellow coloring for kids to squeeze into the margarine?

Remember when there were ration coupons, and during "the War," nylon hosiery was hard to find, so women went barelegged and drew stocking seams on their legs with eyebrow pencils?

Remember when beauty shops had hooded dryers?

Remember when your hair was not white and you were the grandchild instead of the grandparent?

- Dakota Eliason is the author of Kitchen Tables and Other Midlife Musings. Write to her in care of Seniority, St. Petersburg Times, P.O. Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33731; or send e-mail to Dakota.one2@verizon.net.

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