# We Didn't Have That Green Thing Back Then



## RadishRose (Jul 23, 2019)

Saw this on FB. Rather long but I found it interesting.


Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment,.
The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."

The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

The older lady said that she was right our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. The older lady went on to explain: Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.

But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day. Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household garbage bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags.

But, too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then. We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.

Back then we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 220 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days.

Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana.

In the kitchen we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.
When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.

Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power.

We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's $45,000 SUV or van, which cost what a whole house did before the "green thing."

We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?

      Please forward this on to another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a smart ass young person. We don't like being old in the first place, so it doesn't take much to piss us off... Especially from a tattooed, multiple pierced smartass who can't make change without the cash register telling them how much.


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## hollydolly (Jul 23, 2019)

Too true ( I read this earlier today somewhere as well) ... and all of that happened in my young days 60's , 70's and 80's... not the distant past!!


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## terry123 (Jul 23, 2019)

You got that right!!!


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## tortiecat (Jul 23, 2019)

That article is exactly how it was when I was growing up.
To-day is the 'throw away' generation and my children
and grand children are part of it.
I guess, in a way, I am also guilty as I put things in the garbage
that could be composted.  But I live on the 5th floor of an apartment
complex, so that is hardly possible. I do recycle what I can.
I blame governments and industry as well for many of to-days problems.
But getting into that is too complicated; just read your newspapers or 
listen to the news.


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## 911 (Jul 23, 2019)

My Grandma had an icebox when I was 5 y/o and the iceman came by with big cubes of ice to put in it.


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## Olivia (Jul 23, 2019)

To be fair, people back there in the fifties didn't have much choices in what they did (like collect a few cents for the glass bottles). I remember turning them in to get candy. There wasn't all these plastics and other stuff that was bad for the environment. I also remember living near the places that sold large blocks of ice.  I remember them very well. It wasn't like our grandparents were so environmentally aware.


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## Ruth n Jersey (Jul 23, 2019)

Great article and so true. In the early 50's when I was growing up my Mom did have shopping bags of heavy canvas. She always kept them in a tilt out compartment right below the refrigerator door. The space wasn't much good for anything else so paper bags and the like were kept there. 
To be fair we all burned a lot of coal during the winter which wasn't good for the environment but people didn't know any better back then and we had no other choices.


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## Aunt Bea (Jul 24, 2019)




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