My oldest needed to memorize the Preamble tonight for a test tomorrow. I sang the Preamble as I remembered learning it from Schoolhouse Rock. Then we watched the original version on You Tube about 50 times and by the end, she had it down pat. She was happy and went off to bed humming the tune.
Then I sat down and watched about two hours worth of various School House Rocks. They were great! I was instantly transported back to 1975 (or thereabouts) and to an era of time when life was simpler. Maybe it wasn’t so simple in reality. But it sure seemed that way.
In those days, we had only three channels, and maybe 2 more that came in variations of fuzzy or less fuzzy, depending on the tin foil balls you put on the antennas and their respective directions. There weren’t any music videos that showed every part of everyone’s bodies and there certainly wasn’t Hannah Montana and her parent-less friends teaching bad attitudes and smart alec retorts. We actually had to sing the songs and make up our own dances and scenes to go with them. We used our imaginations. And we never would have dreamed rolling our eyes or flipping our hair to our parents for fear of a smack or being grounded “for life”.
We used to play outside, for hours, unattended, only to be called in at dinner time. Now, I would never dream of letting my kids out of my sight because of who might steal them or hurt them. Or maybe they might get hurt all on their own. And you can forget riding your big wheel up and down the street with all the cars around or playing kickball under the street lights glow. It’s not going to happen. That carefree era has long been gone.
But I wish it weren’t. Because it would be good for them. Those days, it gave us strength, and confidence. And we learned so much.
I wish they could have the same kind of carefree days I had as a child. But they can’t. The world is so different now. So we’ll keep watching Schoolhouse Rock and that will have to be as close to the 70′s that they will get. Until I crochet them a multicolored hat.
