Times are Changing - 15 Things Your Kids Will Never Have The Luxury of Experiencing

"Back in my day we never did that, we had is so much harder." Regardless of the generation this has been the typical way we look at the younger generation. Here is a list of things that the kids of this generation will most likely never experience.

1. Calling your boyfriend/girlfriend on a land line

Then: You always dreaded to make the call, not because you didn’t want to talk to your girlfriend, you just didn’t want her dad to answer. Inevitably though her dad would pick up and it was like trying to get past the gatekeeper. The best was when you were in the middle of the conversation and you would hear the faint sound of someone picking up on the other line trying to listen in, or your parents yelling at you that its time to get off the phone.

Now: Kids can text and call at all hours of the night and you would never know until you get the phone bill.

2. Keeping enough change in case you had to call from a payphone

Then: You got out of practice early and your parents weren’t coming for another 45 mins to pick you up.  You looked for some change in your pocket and found the nearest payphone, when you called though the line was busy and couldn’t get through, you tried again 10 minutes later only to have the line keep ringing cause your parents didn’t have an answering machine. So you sit around and wait,  after half an hour since practice would normally been over you figure they forgot you again so you will just walk home.  Five minutes after you walk in the door, they pull in the driveway and start to chew you out for not calling or being where you should’ve been.

Now: Kids can call or text their parents the moment they need a ride. No need to wait around, no need to wonder.

3. Looking up something in an encyclopedia

Then: Assigned a book report on lemurs and spend the whole day out of class in the library looking up in the encyclopedia, and academic books, citing references and organizing your thoughts on paper.

Now: Check Facebook, and Twitter, type lemurs in Google, scan Wikipedia and a couple other articles, copy and paste them into your document, reword it so it sounds more like you.  Check Facebook again text your friend sitting next to you to see how their report is going, finish report, class in now over.

4. Waiting for Saturday morning to watch cartoons

Then: Wake up at 6 am and watch until 12pm all of the good “classic” cartoons.  If you woke up late or had to go do something with the family, your cartoons for the week were shot.

Now: Watch anyone of the several 24hr cartoon channels, any time you want.

5. Be kind Please rewind

Then: Finished watching a movie in front room, hit the rewind button and hear the motor wind up, eject movie.

Now: Put in a DVD, Blu Ray, stream movie online, watch on mobile device. No rewinding required.

6. Sending a letter to someone

Then: You wanted to send grandma some pictures of your birthday party and tell her thanks for the present.  You wrote a letter, included the pictures, maybe a drawing or two, and put it in an envelope with a stamp and sent it on its way.

Now:  Email it, post it online, get it there instantly. Mail is only for bills, and ads.

7. No communicating with your friends at home on a family vacation

Then: It was summer and time to go on the annual vacation.  Your parents loaded up the car, the kids, maybe the dog, and headed out of town for the week.  You drove around in a bored stuper, no movies, or phone, so you played to alphabet game using license plates. When you got home, you would go to your friends to tell them about your vacation and catch up on what you missed out on.

Now:  Go on vacation, put a movie in, and drive away. Kids are texting their friends constantly keeping everyone updated on their status and keeping tabs on those at home too.  When they get home, no need to update their friends because they’ve been updated in real time the whole vacation.   

8. Blowing on a game cartridge to get it to work

Then:  The game would randomly stop working so you would pull it out and blow in the cartridge and put it back in and voila fixed. Even without internet we all knew how to fix it.

Now: If the game stops working either wipe off the disc, or reset the device, definitely not as cool.

9. Waiting for your internet connection to dial up

Then: Tell your computer to dial the local ISP and listen to the beeps of the modem trying connect. If mom picked up the other line, you would get disconnected, and if someone was on the other line talking you had to wait for them to get them off.

Now: Internet is always on, fast and quiet, even on your phone.

10. Waiting all night to download a 3MB song from Napster

Then: Find a song that you wanted, wait until night when no one would be on the phone, dial up the modem, and start downloading the 3MB song. Wake up in the morning and check to see if your song was done only to find out that something happened at night and interrupted the download, well maybe again tonight.

Now: Download anything you want in less time time than it take a dial up, to dial up.

11. Playing with other kids actually required getting together and going outside

Then: You would go outside and play from sun up to sun down, using your imagination and getting a few bumps and bruises along the way.

Now: Stay inside where it’s climate controlled. Watch movies, play video games, and get a couple of snacks throughout the day.

12. Using a paper map to navigate directions

Then: Mom’s yelling at dad to stop and ask for directions, “I don’t need directions, I know where we are,” as he squints at the map.

Now: Mom is yelling at dad to stop and ask for directions, “I don’t need directions, I know where we,” are as he is trying to program the GPS.

13. Using a phone book to look up a number

Then: Need to call someone, look it up in the phonebook

Now: Scroll through contacts to make a call, if you don’t have their number, ask them on facebook.

14. Acutally putting forth effort to get to know someone instead of social media stalking

Then: If you wanted to get to know a girl, you had to go up and actually talk to her. Go out on a date, or hang out with friends.

Now: If you want to get to know a girl, you stalk their online profiles, check pictures, likes, friends, and then send them a text or message.  No face to face time required.

15. Record a show to watch with a VCR or miss it completely until rerun season

Then: If you wanted to watch a show on TV but you weren’t going to be home you would set up your VCR to record it. If it messed up, then you would have to wait until rerun season. Oh an there is that annoying blinking clock 12:00 taunting you.

Now: Watch whatever you want, whenever you want. No crappy definition, or blinking clock either.

Although times change it doesn't mean its worse, it just means its different.  It can be a challege for parents because their kids are going through different experiences than they did and they might not know how to relate.  The best thing to do is to pay attention to what is going on in a kids life, be willing to listen, and even though things are different the problems aren't all that different.