This comment from author Ellen Glasgow will make little sense to anyone under 40: "No idea is so antiquated that it was not once modern. And no idea is so modern that it will not someday by antiquated."
Take the land-line telephone, for example...! Or as Henny Youngman would quip, take my wife, please....! Or for those of you under 40, take Henny Youngman...!
OK, lets hang some numbers of the point here. Someone in the government conveniently reported the following up-beat, be-glad-you're-alive-today mumbers:
* The remote Brazilian tribes had no more than about 300 products like baskets, arrows, and bowls; today residents of any big city have access to about 10 billion
* Anthropologists estimate hunter-gatherers earned the equivalent of $100 a year; today's average in urban America is $40,000
* Our homes have doubled in size from 1950 to an average of 2200 square feet
* Since 2000, crime rates have dropped, our air is cleaner, and we have four times more leisure time than in 1880
This giddy, anonymous statistician titled his report: These are the good old days!" Like you, I have some dear friends who have access to zillions of products, earn well over $40,000, stride in homes easily more than 3000 square feet. However, I've never asked them the question I ask myself every night slipping into bed: Are these the good old days for you...? If not, when...? Where....? Why....?
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Everyone believes THEIR days were the good old days. They're all wrong! MINE were.
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