Advanced search

Sunday Punch Steve Johnston

The Long View

Looking back at those good ol' days, well, they were good

MY FRIENDS LIKE to remind me that I'm getting old. It stands to reason that if you continue to breathe, you will continue to get old, but these "friends" like to send stuff that rubs it in. Especially now that I turned 60.

The other day I got a message that started out with a kid asking his father what was the old man's favorite fast-food place when he was growing up. "We didn't have fast food when I was growing up," the father said. "All the food was slow."

Of course, the children thought Dad was pulling a fast one on them. "C'mon," the kids said. "Seriously. Where did you eat?"

"It was a place called 'home,' " the man said. "Grandma cooked every day, and when Grandpa got home from work, we sat down together at the dining-room table, and if I didn't like what she put on my plate I was allowed to sit there until I did like it."

The man went on to remember things from his past that sounded remarkably like things from my growing-up days in the 1950s and '60s. "My parents never drove me to soccer practice. This is mostly because we never heard of soccer," he said. "I never had a telephone in my room. The only phone in the house was in the living room, and it was a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen and make sure some people you didn't know weren't already using the line."

The article ended up with a quiz to tell how old you were and what you remember. There were 25 items going from Blackjack chewing gum to roller-skate keys to S&H Green Stamps. If you knew more than 16 answers, the quiz said, "You're older than dirt!"

Well, I must be older than some rock formations because I got all 25 correct! And I didn't have to think hard about the answers. I mean, who couldn't remember when telephone numbers had a name attached? Our phone in Everett was BA-yview 8728 (yes, that's only six numbers). We were BAyview because we lived on the bay side of Everett. The other phone number was Riverside.

After reading that article, I decided that if my kids ever slow down long enough I would tell them this:

Coming to Seattle from Everett was an all-day event. There wasn't Interstate 5 to make the trip. We took Highway 99, which went through small towns and pastures starting just south of Everett until you came to the Big City — Seattle. This was before the Space Needle and really tall buildings. I went up the Tallest Building West of the Mississippi River at the time: the Smith Tower.

I remember the tower had a glass elevator and uniformed guys who ran them by cranking a lever to point to whatever floor you wanted. The guy would announce which floor you were on. We went to the top floor. It may not be a big deal now, but to kid from Everett who never saw a building over three stories, the view from the Smith Tower was beyond words.

When I was older, say 11 or 12, I went to Seattle with a friend whose older brother could drive. We only wanted to see one place, and that was the Public Market. This was before the Market went upscale. It was a mess in those days, just what would attract a kid from Everett.

At the entrance to the Market, there was a "barber college." That's what they called the school where they taught hair cutting and you took your chances getting a haircut by someone just learning. It cost 50 cents, and the guy cut with big, bulky hand clippers that pulled the hair out.

Inside the Market, people were selling things that an Everett boy never knew existed. There were fruits and vegetables from around the world. And skinned animals hanging from hooks in butcher's shops. I think there was a pawn shop stuck in the bowels of the place because I brought back a big silver ring that had a skull with ruby eyes. You couldn't find anything like that in Everett.

The Seattle trip would give you something to tell your Everett buddies for weeks.

Flash forward a few dozen years and my tales can make eyeballs roll to the back of people's heads. So I end this column with The Senility Prayer that's been making the rounds on the internet:

God grant me

The senility to forget the people I never liked.

The good fortune to run into the ones that I do

And the eyesight to tell the difference.

Steve Johnston is a retired Seattle Times reporter. His e-mail address is stevejonst@aol.com. Paul Schmid is a Seattle artist.

Buy a link