Saw This On Facebook & Had To Share!!!!
Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to
the older woman, that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic
bags weren't good for the environment.
The woman apologized 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 f or future generations."
She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing
in its day.
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 truly 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 schoolbooks. This was to ensure that public property, (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribbling's. 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 throwaway 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
blades 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. 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.
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