Back in My Day ...

So, today is the 40th anniversary of the original Star Wars movie.

I was 12 and I clearly remember going to see it.

I know I’m an old fogey, but how much things have changed since then.

Back then, which seems like yesterday to me, not only was there no internet, there were no personal computers.

No email!

No online shopping!

Not only were there no cell phones, there was no voice mail (or even answering machines, remember those?). All phones had cords -- and rotary dials, which my kids (18 and 21) don't even know how to work. They've never heard a busy signal. Phone book? Pay phone? What are those?

And you actually called people. No texting.

Cars did not have seatbelts or, if they did, they were ignored. Here’s some happy thoughts: cars now pollute at only a fraction of what they did back then and, removing the lead from gasoline in the 1960s and '70s was one of the best public-health moves ever made; some theorize that children's IQs are 6 points higher now and crime rates are lower because of it.

My children did not believe me when I told them cartoons were shown only on Saturday mornings. We only got three channels on our television and those channels turned off, remember the waving American flag?,  at midnight. Never mind recording a show, there was no such thing as a DVD or even a videotape. Wizard of Oz was shown on television once a year, period.

Banks closed at 3. Stores were not open on Sundays. And NOTHING was open on a holiday.

Pretty much every adult smoked and no one ever jogged. (Weirdly, we are fatter now than we were then.)

Wow.

What have I missed?