Rusty Blades brought up something very interesting about unorganized, spontaneous "play." Do kids still do this, or is it all organized activities for them now? I used to have a group of girlfriends growing up and every day after school we'd go out and "play." Sometimes go on mystery adventures, other times play Chinese jump rope, or in the winter we'd build ice mountains! It was incredibly fun, inventive, spontaneous, unstructured and unorganized, but we really were able to use our imaginations and pretend.

I think this is what I like about pair skating so much, at least, a few times a week, I have an opportunity to get on the ice and "play!" All though there is a lot of hard work involved, come to think of it, it feels exactly like I was a kid and we would all go out and play after school! Maybe this is why I like skating so much!

I think it can't be the same for everybody. People have different gifts, talents and expectations. Besides, there are things we can't control, like health problems.
In my family, my parents taught my sister and me by example. I grew up in Europe, where it was normal for a woman to work, to have a career, perhaps a hobby and to raise a child. We knew that our mother had to work, not just for money, but for self-fulfillment. And we learned from her and from our father too.
I always wanted to have my own children, although I've been career-oriented too. So I never managed to get pregnant, because I got married late. However, I became a surrogate mother for my niece because my sister got married very young, and at that time, she wasn't interested in taking care of the baby. Again I tried to teach my niece everything I could do myself; I even got a part-time job as an elementary school teacher to be with her. Then my sister passed away, I got married and moved to the US. My niece and I are still very close, although we live in different countries. I took her to a rink a couple of times when I was visiting my family. She kind of liked it, and I wish she would start taking lessons, just like me, but you can't tell a teenager what to do. It's up to her, and, perhaps, one day, it will happen.
So just like some of you, ladies, I'm trying to think positive encouraging myself with the fact that I wouldn't be able to spend so much time skating if I had little children to raise. But I repeat: it can't be the same for everybody.

Rotary Phone



Black and White TV without remote (note the channel selector dial on the TV!!!)



And milk in metal bidon...



(I'm pretty sure lovepairs is getting kick out of seeing these items again!!!)

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Cheers,
jazzpants

11-04-2006: Shredded "Pre-Bronze FS for Life" Club Membership card!!!
Silver Moves is the next "Mission Impossible"
(Dare I try for Championship Adult Gold someday???)

Thank you for the support, you guys!!!

Ok, I am not saying I am "old" but I remember:

- when not everybody had a phone
- when an Operator answered and asked "Number please?"
- when the Operator knew everything that was going on in the community
- when the milk was delivered in a horse drawn wagon
- when only rich people had a television (and they were B&W)
- when trains were pulled by steam engines
- when the U.S. figure skating team was killed in a plane crash (1961?)
- when most radios were in the living room and were the size of a small fridge
- when radios had vacuum tubes and took 5 minutes to warm up
- before "The Pill"
- when Rock & Roll was "the devils music"
- when having a car was more rare than common
- when NOBODY had air conditioning
- when the rink had an ammonia refrigeration plant and struggled to hold ice when the temp got close to freezing
- when "custom" boots were hand-made specifically for you by a little old shoemaker
- when the men came home from Korea
- when gathering around the radio Sunday night was THE entertainment (I wasn't allowed to listen Saturday night because the Groucho Marx was too smutty!)

Now, what were we talking about? LOL!

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )

edit double

That's FUNNY! That TV looks IDENTICAL to the one we had! I remember when I was little, I didn't have enough strength in my hands to turn the rotating buttons with which you could select between something like 8 or 12 channels (of which a few were just blank noise) and then as I grew up, I could turn the buttons by myself.

Actually I was talking about these bidons:


Also a loud "check" on these:
Helps to have been born in the soviet Union though where this was normal till the 80's.
(actually, if the soviet union would've had a pill made available to the populaiton, I wouldn't have existed).

And by the way, in the Netherlands and Germany and stuff nobody's got airco either. We just suffer in summer. Much more environment friendly. Also dunno about your kids, but our kids do play outside. Unless they live in the big cities, where it's just not safe (and I'm not talking about cars).

I've never seen a house with air conditioning. (Though the office where I work has it.)

No, really.

The last forum I said this on didn't believe it, either. But there are more British people on this one

Always hovering?

I laugh, but I know people like this, who still do more for their late-teenage kids (and older, even into their twenties) than I do for my seven year old. I really don't think they're doing their kids any favours by tidying their rooms and sorting out their washing for them. It must be a hideous shock for kids brought up like this to go away to college, and suddenly realise that washing dishes doesn't do itself and clean clothes don't magically appear in drawers.

You ladies are hilarious! Jazz, I loved seeing those pictures, again!!!

Remember when appliances didn't talk to you, and tell you what to do, and how to manage your life, and what to wear in the morning.

I also like to watch the early "special effects" in movies, too. Like Godzilla, ect...so, simple and direct compared to computerized animation. Boy, have things changed!

I remember my grandfather telling me about how the ice man would deliver the ice for the refrigerator, and then he said "Boy, have things changed!!!"

I have seen one, and stayed in it, too, but then, that was in the USA! I certainly haven't seen one in this country.

I remember my daughter coming home from school in Year 7, when they did a bit of Food Technology, or whatever it's called nowadays, and saying, "Honestly, Mummy, I don't think some of the girls in my class know where the kitchen in their homes is, never mind what it's used for!

She could probably have been a good swimmer, only I wasn't the kind of Mum to help her join a club and get up at 5:00 am for training and all that. My brother & his ex-wife, on the other hand, have pushed their daughter to work at her dressage, to the point where she is now on the national team.

Who knows which of us was right - I don't. I didn't feel I could take that sort of decision for my daughter, but some parents do and will take it for theirs.

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Mrs Redboots
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I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Ice dancers have lovely big curves!

I just barely remember the ice man delivering big block of ice for the icebox and a few of my friends who lived in houses without electricity or indoor plumbing. Dad built our small house in 1950 so it had all the modern conveniences but it was still before school buses so we walked 1.5 miles to and from school (yea, up hill both ways, no boots, and all that stuff to!). The walk to school as a real "social experience". Being the farthest out, my sister and I would start out and the group would get bigger with every house and farm we passed. Strange how the kids who "had nothing" all did so well for themselves and developed into well-adjusted and productive adults....

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )

Neither have I. And I know a lot of offices that don't have it either.

I believe you, I've never seen a home with it either, unless you count those rotating propellor thingies.

I prefer 'child-free' to 'childless.' I cannot imagine having kids and also skating seriously; but then again I'm single and not even 25 yet. Most of my weekdays it's: skate, workout, go to work, come home and sleep...then do it all again the next day. I barely have time to feed myself, let alone a family! (Thank goodness for lean cuisine)! Raising children would be a big sacrifice... kudos to all you moms out there who manage to fit it all in!

No, no, I didn't mean parents who help their kids with their achievements even after they hit teenage and older. I meant parents who sort their almost-adult kids' dirty washing, sort their kids' clean washing, cook every meal, clear away all the plates, drive them to and from everywhere they want to go, run their bank accounts, write their job applications, take all responsibility for them being where they're supposed to be at the right time...parents who won't actually let their kids grow up, and continue to do everything for them just as they did when they were three. If what they're doing is the donkey work while said kid is training and growing up to a high level of excellence in their sport, that's different to doing everything for someone. I don't believe it's possible to get that good at anything if you're being led by the nose rather than motivating yourself. Though it's certainly easier if you have a lot of home support.

Haha funny. I actually write some of my mother's job applications.
(My Dutch is better than hers)

I have two kids and sometimes I have to bring them to practice. They don't really like skating much so they aren't good enough to join on a freestyle (and they wouldn't want to). So they sit and watch, sometimes for 2.5 hours, along w/ the skating moms and dads. It is a funny role reversal to see - my kids and the parents in the stands ... me and the little girls on the ice.

Sometimes I feel bad about dragging them along, but I have also promised myself that I'd never be that parent that just gives up my whole life to live vicariously through my kids. They have activities/hobbies, too, and I support them in those. But we don't go overboard - two things each is plenty to make a commitment to. Really, 1 thing in terms of serious commitment, then a bunch of dabbling if they enjoy a lot of things. I believe that by being an active, well-rounded person I am setting the best example for my kids. And I often tell parents of little skaters that they need to get the skates on and get out there, and I've even succeeded in a few cases.

Tim

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People dream of flying, birds dream of skating.

I am MARRIED to one of those kids and it isn't pretty Trust me, those moms ( and it is the moms ) aren't doing the kids any favours. I spend a lot of time trying to undo years of "helplessness" and it's a losing battle.
Good thing I'm not bitter Mmmmm ?

slightly off thread but I noticed that alot of my skating friends adore cats. It just made me wonder if there are higher percentages of cat lovers among the skating fraternity?

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Level one Field Moves......PASSED 05.06.08
Level one Free dance.....PASSED 02.10.08

GOALS FOR 2009

• Level One Compulsary dances.......PASSED 19.02.09
• Level One Elements.....................PASSED 10.07.09
• Level Two Free dance.................PASSED 19.02.09
• Level One Free...........................
• Level Two compulsory dances.......

Loving it, Loving it, Loving it!!!!!

I thought there was but after changing rinks I find myself exclusively among the canine set. Lawrdy even my costume maker is a dog person!

Dianne
(Who's fur baby is in doggie jail this week while Ma skates in another city - BAD MAMA!!!)

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )

Well, I'm originally from Australia, and believe it or not, most homes there don't have air conditioning either - and that's a much warmer country! When I was a kid, one of my friends lived in a house where they had an air conditioner in one room - but that's the only house there I've ever been in with air con, and they only put it on for half an hour at a time because of the cost of the electricity to run it.

I have two cats: Cakie and Muffin!

lovepairs, I too have a cat named Muffin.
Dad and I were just talking about home and kitchen appliances. He swears that the crock pot we have at home was bought right after he and Mom (God rest her soul) married and that was in February of 1964. I've tried to tell him that crock pots were not in existence then.

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Adult Nationals, 2009 "The Time of My Life"

My Muffin is a "Smoked Tabby." She has a white down coat underneath and then a black coat on top of that, so in one light she looks totally black, but if she's sitting in the sun she looks brown. The neat thing is that her coat is as such that it looks like she is wearing three strings of black pearls around her neck.

Do I sound like one of those adoring parents who thinks their baby is the cuttest thing on earth, but really nobody else does??? LOL!!! Most parents seemed to be hypnotized by their kids...I'm totally hypnotized by my cats!

When mom used to skate, she'd bring me along too. I also wasn't good enough to join in but I had inline skates that I skated around the rink on. Was good physical exercise for me.