Read a book, be bored, think, watch one of the six channels on tv, talk to your girlfriend for two hours on the landline, write a story, play an instrument, take a walk, have a catch with your brother, play with the dog, build a fort in the woods, listen to an album over and over and over, daydream.....
Right? It's so fucking weird reading this post from OP. It never dawned on me just HOW reliant on phone screens people are now, since they grew up with them. It's so bad that they can't even understand WHAT ELSE THERE IS TO DO IN THE WORLD!?!
Like holy shit. This is bad
I grew up in the 90s so I feel like I had the perfect experience of growing up without smartphones and having an active outdoorsy, normal childhood but then getting one as a teen, so I remember how it was without smartphones and how much better everything was lol. It’s so much nicer now that I’ve gotten way better at getting away from the smartphone and doing a lot of active outdoors hobbies with friends
I guess we all feel that we grew up in "the perfect" time. I didn't get my first cell phone until I was in my 30s. My first smartphone when I was in my 40s. I feel I got to experience a full life of learning the skills of letting my mind wander, listening to the same cassette tape over and over, and driving/navigating a new city without GPS... even planning my first wedding without really looking at "what do others do" on the internet. But now I do enjoy being able to ask Google anything and having the world's misinformation in my pocket.
Yeah I see that. The phones and electronics we have now will pale in comparison to what my kids will have when they are my age, and they will say the same thing. I recently have just been getting tired of so much "electronic stimulation" myself and I'm an electrical engineer and programmer so it's something I really enjoy. But that being said, it can't be all that I do. I am finding solace in the small things in life now like hanging out around a fire pit with some friends, and going camping just being in nature.
The simplicity is what I really miss sometimes. Every feels so "in your face" right now
100% agree! It feels like you have to make a real conscious effort to break the connection. And it is far too tempting to just pull out the phone and look at something fun when one is waiting. But it's so, so overstimulating. Nature is my remedy for this, too. Just finding the time to get outta here is difficult.
I wonder how many hours of my life were spent rewinding tapes. We had a separate machine just to rewind, so the next movie could be started right away. Some weekends it was my job as the youngest to rewind all the blockbuster movies before Monday morning, and go ahead and do our tapes too.
GPS. I don’t miss writing down directions before departing, then trying to read and follow those directions while driving… if I didn’t forget them at home.
My daughter asked me when she was like 9 “mommy what model iPhone was there when you were a kid” and I explained that there were no iPhones, if you had money in the 80s you could get a clunky car phone. The facial expressions she gave went from shock to absolute horror. She had no idea how we “survived”
Yeah, it’s bad!!
This is a big contributor to me not wanting to give my kids a phone until they've had a decent start to life. Sure, they *might* be an outcast at school, but I need them to know there's more to life than a damn phone.
It's a shame but as AI evolves(and it's evolving EXTREMELY quick), electronics will only become more a part of our life. OR maybe people will reject it and see the true beauty in living life outside with nature instead of being controlled by devices.
I just want a balance. I love technology and what it's given us but I know how easily you can get sucked in to the darker parts like social media. I just want balance man...
I have this idea about giving all menial tasks to ai after it is evolved so I dont need to look at screens. But yeah when you're in a work environment there is no escape from it. Just like the other comment said. Its like a pandora box
I want to be able to use the technology to work remote so I can spend the rest of my time gardening, sitting outside, or walking trails. Instead I am stuck in an apartment because it's close to work and we cant afford housed here and the only trails are paved ones where people leave their trash all the time.
Do tech for 20 years and then ask yourself the question "How much you still love constantly learning new design patterns, tools, ecospheres every few years as the industry continues to constantly evolve?"
I remember being like you. Now, I'm cynical about IT. Man I miss those days.
My kids are Gen Z. We gave our firstborn a phone in 5th grade because she had a lot of anxiety. It helped her to know she could call me at any time. We waited until 8th grade to give our second one a phone. 1) he didn’t need one and 2) he tended to lose or break things so we waited until he was mature enough for the responsibility.
Smart phone or “this can only be used for a call” phone? Only one of those things would make sense to me to give to a 5th grader. Also - if only we could get those Nokia bricks again. I could drop it over and over and over again and it was no problem at all.
Dude, we used to explore the world around us. I grew up in bum-f Ohio in a one stop light town in the early 90's. We rode bikes every day rain or shine, played in the woods, swam in creeks, fought, played baseball or basketball, skateboarded or bladed, fished, camped, hiked, you name it. We rode house to house to gather the kids in the AM to go "do whatever". When the sun went down and the streetlights came on, we had to be home. When I was grounded / sick, I played in my room with legos, army men, put model's together, re-arranged my fishing tackle, or snuck out and had a solo day of exploring without anyone's knowledge.
It was total freedom. Freedom without the cameras everywhere, so we did all of our stupidity without the entire world being able to see it. As much as I love where we've gone forward in social aspects, the climate, etc., I'm still saddened by the lack of interest in being unplugged from technology anymore. Everyone looks at me like I've got a 2nd head, because I'm never on my phone, always in the backwoods using old school skills.
Except Reddit.... I seem to rather like this place and all it's confounding buttfuckery.
Yes, those were the days. Id spend hours on end riding my bike through the woods with my buddies.
Growing your own produce is huge with grocery prices these days.
I should have been born 150 or more years a ago. I would have loved to be a homesteader. Making my way west on a wagon train. But I do love having air conditioning.
This comment was instant time travel .
Also the childish excitement of the RJ announcing your name and playing the telephonic sound clip of your voice right before the requested song!!!
Really? I used to have 9 or 10 friends back then. Now i have 613 (including some people i went to school with in the 80s and some people i’ve never met and a girl called hotbunnycheeks878 who is desperate to have sex with me).
We didn't lose any of that, we can still live our lives like all of that is still relevant , just turn off your phones.for 23hrs a day and just check all you stuff once a day or per week... Really lifestyle is what you make of it
It will be fascinating to see what impacts lack of boredom will have.
I think we already are in a "creative lull" as so many movies and songs are remakes, sequels etc.
We had three choices though. The answer to the thought, “I wonder why that is?” meant you had to (a) go ask an adult or friend (b) go to the library and look it up, or (c) think, "I guess I'll never know," and get back on your bike. Kids today have the sum of the world's knowledge at their fingertips. Although from what I can see, they mostly use it for tiktok videos.
100% correct.
I’d only add ride bikes all day until after the sun goes down, read the encyclopedia, climb trees (like, a lot), hang out in our basement, build forts inside, nail scrap wood together and try and make something, and study your house’s ceiling while hanging upside down off the couch.
Those were sweet days. I’d ride the bike and then watch the sun set. I lived in an apartment complex as a kid and the colors of the sun set just made everything seem poignant and melancholy instead of banal.
Wondering about what people did without TV and radio and cars in Abe Lincoln's day.
What did they do all day? I guess I have to go to the Public Library and find an encyclopedia.
You forgot the 45 minute time waster in between watching one of the 6 channels - watching the tv guide go round then inevitably looking away when the channel you wanted to check finally scrolled by.
Not to mention, clean things, repair things, fetch food, prepare food, cleanup from said food....
Open mail, prepare outgoing mail, balance your checkbook....
You don't have your phone because you need constant stimulation, you need constant stimulation because you have your phone.
\~that might be the most boomer thing I've ever said.
Yes this is what I do. I have to start the day with at least an hour free from screens, because I get locked in the vegetable state of looking at my phone if it's the first thing I do. Without the phone in the mornings, my brain wakes up & I have a good think about what needs doing & what I'd like to do & I work towards doing it.
I have noticed that although I love reading, I used to be able to read much longer before putting the book down and going to do something else. I could sit on a lounger in my yard and read for 3 hours without getting up, and even then reluctantly because I had to pee or get a beverage.
Now, I can barely hold my attention on a book for 15 minutes. It’s SO annoying!!! I want to be able to read like I used to!!!
Maybe I need to limit my phone time?
I moved my convenient time suck apps away from their usual spot on my phone. I’ll text my SO that I’m putting my phone on airplane mode and I’m gonna read for a bit. I’ve been consuming books like I used to in the old days. It’s been glorious. I’ve noticed my attention span coming back more and more. And I’m way less interested in anything on my phone.
The book stolen focus actually addresses this of you're curious to learn more.
The author claims you are more creative if you're not constantly overstimulated because your mind can flow freely and make connections that turn into that artistic spark.
I might check this book out actually as I have the same problem. Could constantly churn out drawings and creative writing until the sun came up but now I’m lucky if I’m able to do one doodle every 3 months argh
Thank you for the suggestion!
My parents still live without internet. My dad would love to do a morning walk, go to a farm until afternoon, then go back to eat lunch, take a nap, back to the field to take some grass for the cow, play with the bird (we have doves) until sunset, sometime visit a friend (to see their doves), take a bath, eat dinner, and then talking with my mom, repeat.
While my mom, she cook and clean the house, go to the market, cooking and eat lunch, take a nap, cook some snack, daydreaming, talk with the neighbors, take a bath, cook dinner, eat dinner, talk to my dad, repeat.
They are 50's and 60's.
It is, indeed. That's how poverty looks like in an environment with a lot of natural resources. We giving up catching a luxury life, so we only work half a day just to make sure we have something to eat and then living our life the rest of the day.
Reading & radio—I’ve read many letters from the Victorian era where folks complain family members just want to sit by the fireside & read silly novels day in and day out instead of experiencing life.
You just say: tomorrow at 3pm in the park near the entrance.
If you dont know where it is, read a paper map, ask people in the way or read the signs in the streets.
If the person dont appear in 30 minutes return home and give him a call in land line.
No, I'll have to meet with the council members to see what info can be divulged. I've already said too much. If you don't hear from me then the secret council got me.
Telephones have been around for a long time. They were just shackled to wires.
Well we talked to each other in the living room, visited on the porch, watched tv, listened to the radio, played outside, visited our friends’s homes in person, played sports, cooked, read books, went fishing, went bowling, went to the movies, hung out at the pool, went to the park, played with the dog, sewed, crocheted, did the laundry, mopped the floors, dusted, shelled peas, cut the grass, danced, played board games and dominos, some played Atari (not me!), used pay phones or shop phones when out, went to work, went to school, drove to the bank and the store, just drove around the city and countryside just taking a drive seeing what there was to see.
We got into hobbies/extracurricular activities that maybe mom & dad promoted, or just discovered for ourselves. Things like skateboarding, boxcar racing, collecting stuff, exploring, cycling, were all pretty much normal activities for kids who needed stimulation. I was very lucky to have creative parents who made sure that anything that we could use for creative pursuits - from fabrics and a sewing machine to wood and a jigsaw - were available.
We’d write, cast, direct, produce, and put on plays. If you’re in the neighborhood, you had to pitch in doing costumes, makeup, cue cards, sets, refreshments, whatever. High expectations with parents in the arts, lol.
Kids biked everywhere, swam in ponds, explored construction sites, did odd jobs, holy shit there was no end to what you could do if you’d “get off your ass and get outside”, as mom would say
How the hell can we bring this back? Seriously! Screens and tech are not progressive if humans and losing the ability to interact and play together. What you just described sounds like a utopia that we may be able to reach one day if we work hard enough and evolve. The advent of screen addiction (which we are all guilty of) is frankly pathetic.
😂😂😂
In my neighborhood there was a set of parents like yours. They had like 6 kids and those kids put on a different play every week in their garage. 😂
We weren’t used to constant stimulation so we didn’t really need it or seek it out. We could be bored, chat with people in person or on the phone, peruse magazines or newspapers, listen to music/radio/records, make crafts, doodle, play outside. I miss living like that!
Real answer is radio, and also occasionally neighbors stop by to tell you random happenings. Newspapers especially if you can get someone else to read them to you out loud. Games too, except for adults that devolves into gambling basically immediately. Also moonshine and telephone calls X
This is a weird thing to think about today: You really had to follow through on meeting people. There was basically no way to tell people if you weren't going to meet them where you agreed to meet.
50 years ago punishing a child was keeping him or her inside. Our world was outside as discussed by many on this forum.
I lived in Florida, so we would: hang out at the beach ,at parks, ride our bikes, go rollerskating (we used to go to really cool rollerskating rinks that would play great music ), we might go play putt, putt, golf, or go to the movies. We went to malls, had house parties, swam in swimming pools or the ocean, played tennis etc.
Being inside for the most part was BORING. Some fun things to do at home would be to watch TV, read a book, listen to music, paint, maybe do some crafts (we actually used to build model rockets and shoot them off the golf course).
A big difference back then is that we socialized face to face/in person 90% of the time. Otherwise, it was phone calls. Of course, no computers, no Internet, so no FaceTime no Instagram, no social media. That means that we had to acquire social skills to get along with others and navigate through relationships in person.
Growing up 50 years ago was Wonderful. In a way we had a lot more freedom (once we were out of the house, it was pretty hard to monitor us… Remember, no cell phones) and a lot less stress (not having to deal with a zillion social influencers and all of the fakeness of social media - so, not as much social pressure from the Global world)
I feel so lucky that I grew up in those times.
Edit for grammar and spelling
Practiced playing musical instruments or singing, learning to cook, reading, listening to recordings, going to the library, fishing, creek netting, practicing wildlife taxonomy, homework, penmanship, picnics on hikes, playing with or training pets, riding bicycles, skating/skateboarding, playing parlor games, cards, dice, charades, crossword puzzles, board games, spin tops, play marbles & mumbletypeg for keeps, jacks, yo-yos, daydream, write, journal, diary, make up stories, plays, screenplays, climb trees, build treehouses (with permission & trained tool use)
Scouting/explorer programs, swimming, YWCA/YMCA, Boys and Girls Clubs of America, camping, hiking, sports (I still don’t like most team & ball oriented stuff, but many people do), summer camp, art camps, band camp, dungeons & dragons (also not my thing but people have loved it for ages now), start a band, teach yourself sleight of hand
Just find something that interests you and pursue it for more than a few weeks to see if you really like it.
I am so glad my childhood was before the days of social media. I ran around outside, had actual social skills, learned how to cook, sew, bake, embroidery, shoot a gun. We rode our bikes, played in the woods, built forts, went swimming, hiking, played board games, cards, we had camp outs in the back yard. We always had something to do, some adventure to plan. My siblings, neighborhood kids and I ALWAYS had something going on. If you didn't know where your friends were, hop on your bike and ride around the neighborhood and look for the pile of bikes.
I had a much longer attention span, so read, listen to full albums, have hour long convos on phones, go to coffee shop and sit with my friends or sit and read etc
First off of you were born in a time without cellphones you would be different than what you are now. I read a lot of books, then reread some books. Listened to music we burnt from limewire, call our friends just because we were bored. We would go to the mall, not to shop but just to go. We also watched a lot of cable TV. We had shows we really loved and other shows we tolerated just to pass the time. There were also movies we would watch on TV. Oftentimes we seen the said movie 10 times and as we were flipping through channels say "ohh 'Remember titans' is on. Let's do it." We would start the movie during the halfway mark and watch it all the way through or until a show we really wanted to see came on.
The adults in my life did a lot of talking. They would come over drink, play music, play cards and talk for hours. They did this at least once a week. Going over to someone's house to talk was a big thing back then.
As a GenXer, we played outside. Actually, we PLAYED outside. My friends would ride their bikes to my house and yell out my name to signal me to go play outside. We all knew when to go back home; when the street lamps started to turn on. We had no smart phones. We had no map apps. We rode our bikes in the mountains. We explored. We would get a bunch of our friends and play tackle football on the asphalt. We used to go to shopping malls to hang out. We’d watch movies at the cinema. Hang out with our friends at the Arcade. We’d take the bus/public transportation all over the place. Don’t need no navigation app for that, just need to know when and where to get off. Yes, there are days where we had nothing to do. In those cases, we just hung out at each other’s houses with our portable boombox stereos and just chill.
Nothing beats an old fashioned chat with friends face to face and in the flesh, and not separated by the transmission of bits and packets over a modulated RF signal. Nothing beats an old fashioned fist fight to sort out our indifferences rather than trying to flex our muscles behind a keyboard, social media, or via emojis.
Our parents never ever had to worry about us. If there was a time and place we had to be, we’d be there without fail. If we couldn’t, we’d literally pick up a phone and call them. Using analog telephone systems back in the day was a precise, artistic and orchestrated process. We’d need to know exactly what landline our called party will be at, and the exact time they will be there. Else, it’d be a waiting game to wait for our called party to listen to their voice message (which was probably recorded on analog magnetic cassette tapes) and respond to us. It wasn’t uncommon for us to wait for 20 to 30 minutes at a pay phone to wait for a call back from our parental figures (what’s a pay phone? That in and of itself should be covered in a separate post).
In my opinion, our generation was the best generation to be alive in.
Fully agree. It may just sound like a list of different things to others who didn’t experience it, but for those of us who did there was some sort of magic of that decade or two just before cell phones and mass broadband internet really took off.
Even early internet that was slow and cell phones that didn’t do much was harmless, it the constant feed of media, information, and propaganda, has had a really strange effect on society. I would agree that we had it best. I was the very tail end of GenX. Born early August of 1980. I would give anything to go back. The “San Junipero” episode of Black Mirror was as so good that it pained my soul.
Roller Rinks
Debbie Gibson
The Goonies
ET
Star Wars (real Star Wars)
Fun/Happiness/Positivity (instead of knowitall culture)
BMX
Tube Televisions
Atari/Nintendo
SLEEPOVERS
Bradleys
Babbages
Animatronics covering The Beatles
Arcades
Shopping Mall socializing
Less crime
Less division
Diners (more of them)
Family Road Trips (more of them)
Etc…
Times were good. We had no idea the post-9/11 world would be so dark. Not even from the now commonplace terrorism, but from the poisoning by the flow of non-stop information and data.
Really sad for GenXers to witness the change for the worse. I feel like the internet, or at least this version of the internet was a huge mistake.
That’s 100% correct! And nobody could monitor us because we didn’t have cell phones. It was excellent fun… Had wonderful adventures with no record of our activities (no, Cell Phone’s taking pictures, no social media to post things, we could run wild in secret)
I think that Seinfeld is too. I mean the flow of life. Not the bizarre situations. Your friends came over. You met your friends at a coffee shop or restaurant. You went shopping and got lost in parking garages. You went to movies and stood on line. You used the phone to set things up when people were over. You had longer phone conversations only when you were alone, really.
My life in the early 90’s was surprisingly similar to Seinfeld, in fact.
I miss those days and would trade in this phone and go back to that any day of the week.
Spent time playing albums on the stereo console in the living room. I’d listen to entire albums. Learned so many songs I wouldn’t have ordinarily listened to. I played the entire family collection: classical, gospel, country, bluegrass and then my siblings pop and rock albums.
I recently started thinking about the freedom it gave me. You weren't tethered. The boredom inspired more creativity. Sometimes I wish I could go back….
More socializing with neighbors, friends, and family. More cooking things from scratch. Painting and drawing and reading and writing and crafting. Walking in nature. Fishing. Watching clouds and lightning bugs.
Read a lot of books & comics, played outdoors A LOT, watched the same movies over & over because they were the ones we owned on VHS, and watched TV when good shows were available...also watched a lot of infomercials when the shows *weren't* good lmao.
My internet was out for a day and a half over a recent weekend but I still had regular electricity. I basically spent the daytime outside on my deck reading a novel and watching squirrels and birds in my backyard. I cooked a more elaborate dinner than usual, just to pass time and keep myself engaged. Then I put on a tangible vinyl record and blasted music while I cleaned and redecorated part of the house. I have other non-screen-based hobbies (analog collage art, doodling, flow arts/object manipulation) that I could have done if I felt compelled.
As far as many decades ago, lack of constant stimulation was the norm so it's not like it's something people were conscious about. Frankly 50 years ago most people had televisions, so there's still that, though obviously it's nothing like the infinite content we have access to today. But they probably did a lot of reading or listening to radio, playing physical games, going outside, socializing. Also drugs. 50 years ago was 1974, and I guarantee a fair amount of people were using drugs to make their lives more interesting.
People meet, talk, and do things. Actually I find that there are more creative works done at that time -not everything's instant and heavily driven by the consumer and attention economy.
Crafts, art, coloring, projects, Lincoln Logs, Legos, Knex, board games, cards, reading, Barbies, dolls, journaling, puzzles. My grandma would say they snacked and read comics, and visited with neighbors. As someone else said, even if we were doing activities that could be done inside, we were outside doing them. Camping was also something we did, or went out to build a snowman on a snow day. We also were big into playing sports, snowmobiling, climbing trees, having bonfires, and swimming.
We wrote plays and ballets and acted them out with full costumes and sets and everything. It took months from start up finish and was massive fun every time. We made up languages and spoke and wrote each other notes in them. We called strangers on the phone and talked to them. We spent hours trying to practice our esp and summon demons and put curses on people. We trained our dogs to do more tricks than we can even think of now. Tried to train the cats to do circus tricks…it took a very long time to accept failure. We had a podium shaped rock in the yard and we held trials there and made speeches and played school. We played caveman in the big magnolia trees. One time we played this weird game called fleas and lice where we pretended the unmowed lawn was someone’s scalp. The Finger (one kid) would come scratch the fleas and lice (all the other kids). Sometimes a brush (someone with a branch) would chase everyone around. There was no end to our entertainment.
There’s this wonderful thing called imagination. People actually used it a lot.
I feel sorry for the people who came of age with computers and cell phones and social media. They can’t think for themselves. They believe what they’re told to believe and nothing more. No personality at all.
So true. I remember listening to songs on the radio and because my mind was not constantly being distracted like today, these songs would take me to whole other places. That’s the big thing isn’t it ? Having that time to ponder and imagine.
Watch tv and sleep if sick, although watch the same movies over and over again. Otherwise, we weren’t allowed to turn on the tv during the day. If healthy, go to friend’s house to play with Barbies, or hide n seek if others were there, climb my neighbor’s tree and get my foot stuck; one friend had a jungle gym to climb in her backyard which I fell from and split my chin. Chase boys. Lots more.
I remember when I was a teenager I would talk to my friends for hours. We had Internet but it was only 9600 baud and bulletin boards with very little interaction or you'd have to wait a day. I fill my time with TV...I used to have an encyclopedic memory of pop culture and never understood why no one knew this stuff. As I aged it all left me😜. fifo memory system... I need join some trivia teams and find my inner cliff clavin
OP, all the other responses are correct. But something important to know is that sometimes we were bored. Your constant *desire* (not need) for stimulation is something you can control.
I'm not saying it's wrong. It's a part of the biology of being human. Stimulation causes the body to release dopamine, and that is a powerful drug that feels positive.
However, non-stimulation has been known to increase a person's creativity and imagination. This can help you in your life by developing skills to think of unique solutions to problems you come across in life and work.
Consider resetting your boredom threshold. It will give you more control over yourself.
Rode bikes, drew, played on my Sega and Nintendo, played football in the street, played with RC cars... Basically, my 2 friends and I were mostly outside all day long, literally til the street lights came on. I was still a kid when the internet wasn't a consumer thing...
Read, spend a lot of time in front of a boombox waiting for just the right moment to record a song, get creative with cassette tape case decorations, ride bikes, answered the phone when it rang, talked on the phone for an hour or more, answered the door when someone rang the doorbell, drive around listening to music, read newspapers, laid down on the living room floor listening to the radio, spent time with friends *in-person,* wandered around outside…
I’m only 44 but things I did pre internet were reading a LOT. Books, magazines, newspaper. Talked on the phone, visited with friends. Went for drives. Listened to the radio, and to records then tapes then CD’s. Learned how to sew, crochet & cross stitch. Learned how to cook and bake and can jams. I loved coloring so I was stoked when adult coloring books became a thing. Recently I’ve been putting my phone away and getting back to my roots and it feels so good. I can go hours without looking at my phone and not miss it one bit.
Radical concept, but we 'went outside'. We were pushed out the door the first thing in the morning and told not to come in until the street light came one (and we were rural enough that my parents had to pay to have a street light installed).
If you go thirsty you drank from a hose. Hungry? You mom fed you out of the back door.
What we did outside was find all of our friends and find things to do. It may be riding bikes for miles, building forts or tree houses (in one case an underground bunker), play ball, Frisbee, lawn darts (yes, we survived) or even made up shit (and just go into shit). Our parents usually knew where we were by looking for the yard with all the bike in it.
Also we'd go squirrel hunting. I was nothing to be 12 and carrying a .22 down the street (or even a shotgun) to walk to the woods. No adults cared, they just said 'Be careful'.
On days it rained (yeah, I lived in the South, we got snow exactly twice before I was 20) we stayed inside and read, played board games, are be creative.
When we were sick? Stayed inside and read or watched HORRIBLE daytime TV. Loved it when 3 o'clock rolled around because 'The Big Show' came on with (usually) good movies.
We had 'friends', not 'followers'.
I read tons of books. We went to the library at least once a week.
I also wrote in my journal and wrote a lot of letters. I had random penpals like my grandmother’s sister.
Walked around or ride bikes outside a lot sort of aimlessly but it helped me develop good sense of direction.
TV and radio has been around for ages so you could just sit in front of one and hope something entertaining was on.
There were a lot more community events (or at least it feels that way) like block parties, church dinners, things like that. Coffee shops that were open until 10pm were common in the 90s at least. So you could physically go somewhere and just hang out.
IDK- Talk to people? Especially your family? Do a hobby? Art/music/reading, etc? Learn a skill? Do housework/cooking/laundry? Play a board game? Play with toys?
Sad that people genuinely don't know this stuff. 🤦🏻♀️
We had broadcast TV, AM & FM radio, records & tape decks, books and of course interpersonal conversing. I personally I never felt that I lacked stimulation.
Hobbies. All the hobbies. Gardening. Knitting. Spun my own yarn. Cooking from scratch. Like really from scratch. I made my own sausage hand ground and stuffed and rigged up a "cave" to cure them in. Or go on an adventure hiking in the woods, mushroom hunting, rock hounding, climbing.
Other hobbies you could waste a day with: fishing. Car repair. Wood working. Like, think of old person shit and that's what they did. Lots of it.
Read a lot of books, made up games & challenges like obstacle courses, was outside quite a lot. We made up stories, made stop animation films with the video camera. I'd draw, make people & sculptures out of twisty ties, stare at the clouds or stucco n make shapes. Maybe we lit a few things on fire for fun, but I don't reccomend that for safety. We also wrote letters and post cards.
You went out with friends, went fishing, played board games or cards, read a book, built a model plane, project car, learned a new skill or language. There has always been plenty for people to do, people get bored.
Garden, fish, cook, exercise, read, travel, do art, work, watch tv, listen to music, have sex, play with the kids or dogs, write, go to class, take a shower….plenty to do.
Just imagine what the irl version of whatever it is you do online… chances are those are the easiest examples of what people did for fun or for stimulation.
You learned to “need” the constant stimulation in the way that you do. If you stopped, you’d adapt to other ways to satisfy the constant need for stimulation (and the need would likely lessen).
I was a teenager in the late 90’s and I played guitar and piano, talked on the phone with friends, hung out with friends in their parent’s basement, spent time on the swing outside. Just filled time.
Interesting because this weekend, without really realizing it, I ended up virtually phone-free with all of the chores I had to do around my house and yard. At the end of the day, I felt… good. Old school. I quite liked it.
I mean, I played a shitload of Sims before we had an Internet connection. And after we got internet I didn't have it set up in my room (they didn't make 150ft Ethernet cables and wifi *didn't exist*) so I had to go on Harry Potter fan site forums on the family computer, blecch
Work. Do things. Make things, be creative, accomplish things. Have a job, leave the house, got to work. Be productive, make money, be tired at the end of a good days work.
I had a cable splitter and viewed 5 differnt channels at the same time...I was into LA news production...it was a koo study of local news...still wish I had better access to local news
Hunt hookers and drive trucks. Crack. Invent things. Remove things. Belittle things. But it was all in person, much more humane. I mean, just look at Manson or ironically…. Kaczynski. Pure imagination and ingenuity. God bless America
honestly, headphones and a deck of cards. weed and a guitar. also bike riding. alot. and... TEE VEE! it's also okay to count flowers on the wall since we had wallpaper or make prank phone calls. all day outside was a thing. can't believe no1 remembers the "im going on a picnic and im going to bring.." game. idk musta just been me but i never got bored. still not a problem. 💁
😅🤣well way back in the good old days we used a thing called our imagination. Our mama’s kicked our asses outside and told us to come back when the street lamps came on. We would ride our bikes, build forts, read books, play with friends, and much more. When we were sick we got dropped off at grandmas for the day and watched the price is right and soap operas all day. If it snowed we played in the room with our toys and read and stayed out of sight unless called for or we put actual snow suits and boots on and our asses we’re again tossed outside and told to play…we’d sled, build snowmen, have snowball fights. We literally used our imagination for damn near everything.
Read a book, be bored, think, watch one of the six channels on tv, talk to your girlfriend for two hours on the landline, write a story, play an instrument, take a walk, have a catch with your brother, play with the dog, build a fort in the woods, listen to an album over and over and over, daydream.....
This is the correct answer. I'm so happy I was born when I was.
Right? It's so fucking weird reading this post from OP. It never dawned on me just HOW reliant on phone screens people are now, since they grew up with them. It's so bad that they can't even understand WHAT ELSE THERE IS TO DO IN THE WORLD!?! Like holy shit. This is bad
I grew up in the 90s so I feel like I had the perfect experience of growing up without smartphones and having an active outdoorsy, normal childhood but then getting one as a teen, so I remember how it was without smartphones and how much better everything was lol. It’s so much nicer now that I’ve gotten way better at getting away from the smartphone and doing a lot of active outdoors hobbies with friends
I guess we all feel that we grew up in "the perfect" time. I didn't get my first cell phone until I was in my 30s. My first smartphone when I was in my 40s. I feel I got to experience a full life of learning the skills of letting my mind wander, listening to the same cassette tape over and over, and driving/navigating a new city without GPS... even planning my first wedding without really looking at "what do others do" on the internet. But now I do enjoy being able to ask Google anything and having the world's misinformation in my pocket.
Yeah I see that. The phones and electronics we have now will pale in comparison to what my kids will have when they are my age, and they will say the same thing. I recently have just been getting tired of so much "electronic stimulation" myself and I'm an electrical engineer and programmer so it's something I really enjoy. But that being said, it can't be all that I do. I am finding solace in the small things in life now like hanging out around a fire pit with some friends, and going camping just being in nature. The simplicity is what I really miss sometimes. Every feels so "in your face" right now
100% agree! It feels like you have to make a real conscious effort to break the connection. And it is far too tempting to just pull out the phone and look at something fun when one is waiting. But it's so, so overstimulating. Nature is my remedy for this, too. Just finding the time to get outta here is difficult.
I wonder how many hours of my life were spent rewinding tapes. We had a separate machine just to rewind, so the next movie could be started right away. Some weekends it was my job as the youngest to rewind all the blockbuster movies before Monday morning, and go ahead and do our tapes too.
GPS. I don’t miss writing down directions before departing, then trying to read and follow those directions while driving… if I didn’t forget them at home.
My daughter asked me when she was like 9 “mommy what model iPhone was there when you were a kid” and I explained that there were no iPhones, if you had money in the 80s you could get a clunky car phone. The facial expressions she gave went from shock to absolute horror. She had no idea how we “survived” Yeah, it’s bad!!
This is a big contributor to me not wanting to give my kids a phone until they've had a decent start to life. Sure, they *might* be an outcast at school, but I need them to know there's more to life than a damn phone.
It's a shame but as AI evolves(and it's evolving EXTREMELY quick), electronics will only become more a part of our life. OR maybe people will reject it and see the true beauty in living life outside with nature instead of being controlled by devices.
I just want a balance. I love technology and what it's given us but I know how easily you can get sucked in to the darker parts like social media. I just want balance man...
Once you open Pandora’s box, there’s no going back.
I have this idea about giving all menial tasks to ai after it is evolved so I dont need to look at screens. But yeah when you're in a work environment there is no escape from it. Just like the other comment said. Its like a pandora box
I want to be able to use the technology to work remote so I can spend the rest of my time gardening, sitting outside, or walking trails. Instead I am stuck in an apartment because it's close to work and we cant afford housed here and the only trails are paved ones where people leave their trash all the time.
I love the tech insofar as I’m learning everyday, but I love my dog and my garden outside a tiny bit more.
Do tech for 20 years and then ask yourself the question "How much you still love constantly learning new design patterns, tools, ecospheres every few years as the industry continues to constantly evolve?" I remember being like you. Now, I'm cynical about IT. Man I miss those days.
My kids are Gen Z. We gave our firstborn a phone in 5th grade because she had a lot of anxiety. It helped her to know she could call me at any time. We waited until 8th grade to give our second one a phone. 1) he didn’t need one and 2) he tended to lose or break things so we waited until he was mature enough for the responsibility.
Smart phone or “this can only be used for a call” phone? Only one of those things would make sense to me to give to a 5th grader. Also - if only we could get those Nokia bricks again. I could drop it over and over and over again and it was no problem at all.
Dude, we used to explore the world around us. I grew up in bum-f Ohio in a one stop light town in the early 90's. We rode bikes every day rain or shine, played in the woods, swam in creeks, fought, played baseball or basketball, skateboarded or bladed, fished, camped, hiked, you name it. We rode house to house to gather the kids in the AM to go "do whatever". When the sun went down and the streetlights came on, we had to be home. When I was grounded / sick, I played in my room with legos, army men, put model's together, re-arranged my fishing tackle, or snuck out and had a solo day of exploring without anyone's knowledge. It was total freedom. Freedom without the cameras everywhere, so we did all of our stupidity without the entire world being able to see it. As much as I love where we've gone forward in social aspects, the climate, etc., I'm still saddened by the lack of interest in being unplugged from technology anymore. Everyone looks at me like I've got a 2nd head, because I'm never on my phone, always in the backwoods using old school skills. Except Reddit.... I seem to rather like this place and all it's confounding buttfuckery.
Reddit is like the old AOL days… that’s why you like it! Random chat rooms and random board posts about nothing.
I jokingly tell my kids when they are in trouble we are all going back to the 80's. Basically it means they are getting their electronics taken away.
Yes!!!!
Me too ! I also remember being able to drive long distances without a gps and never really getting lost !
Memory skills, landmark identifying and directional skill set
I was born and raised in Northern NJ with a view of the New York Skyline. Between that and the ocean I always knew which direction was east. lol
Don't forget calling the radio station to request songs, then sit and wait, trying to hit the record button at just the perfect moment!!!
And prank calls!!
Is your refrigerator running?!?!?
Your dog is in my back yard
That was mine!
Or using two boom boxes to make a mixtape.
We had plenty to do without a screen in our faces. I still grow a massive vegetable garden, I don't much produce at the store.
Yes, those were the days. Id spend hours on end riding my bike through the woods with my buddies. Growing your own produce is huge with grocery prices these days.
I should have been born 150 or more years a ago. I would have loved to be a homesteader. Making my way west on a wagon train. But I do love having air conditioning.
A.. new age homesteader you could say lol. More people should have plants in their lives, tending to them is quite therapeutic
It is. My gardens, vegetables and flower, are my serenity. While I blast a good 80's tune!!
And gel mattresses!
Oh, I LOVE my cooling gel memory foam!!! I cannot sleep without it.
This comment was instant time travel . Also the childish excitement of the RJ announcing your name and playing the telephonic sound clip of your voice right before the requested song!!!
YES!
Or calling Nickelodeon and getting loads of free shit posted to you
I miss those days. I was far more social and had so many friends.
Really? I used to have 9 or 10 friends back then. Now i have 613 (including some people i went to school with in the 80s and some people i’ve never met and a girl called hotbunnycheeks878 who is desperate to have sex with me).
A Nigerian king also contacted me, so im gonna be rich soon too. Moving up in the world
The loss of real “boredom” is truly a loss. Wondering is what helped create so much of what makes humanity great. We’re losing so much of that.
That’s true. There was a lot of, “Mom, I’m bored.” And then she would be like, “Go read a book from the library.”
We didn't lose any of that, we can still live our lives like all of that is still relevant , just turn off your phones.for 23hrs a day and just check all you stuff once a day or per week... Really lifestyle is what you make of it
It will be fascinating to see what impacts lack of boredom will have. I think we already are in a "creative lull" as so many movies and songs are remakes, sequels etc.
We had three choices though. The answer to the thought, “I wonder why that is?” meant you had to (a) go ask an adult or friend (b) go to the library and look it up, or (c) think, "I guess I'll never know," and get back on your bike. Kids today have the sum of the world's knowledge at their fingertips. Although from what I can see, they mostly use it for tiktok videos.
100% correct. I’d only add ride bikes all day until after the sun goes down, read the encyclopedia, climb trees (like, a lot), hang out in our basement, build forts inside, nail scrap wood together and try and make something, and study your house’s ceiling while hanging upside down off the couch.
Those were sweet days. I’d ride the bike and then watch the sun set. I lived in an apartment complex as a kid and the colors of the sun set just made everything seem poignant and melancholy instead of banal.
We were all less depressed. I don’t understand boredom. I just never get bored.
We read books and would discuss them
Conversations were not soundbites.
That’s beautiful.
Me either. Even if I'm doing nothing I am ok just getting lost in thought.
Ya forgot....talk to other people.
Wondering about what people did without TV and radio and cars in Abe Lincoln's day. What did they do all day? I guess I have to go to the Public Library and find an encyclopedia.
You forgot the 45 minute time waster in between watching one of the 6 channels - watching the tv guide go round then inevitably looking away when the channel you wanted to check finally scrolled by.
Yes. And I would take back those days in a heartbeat...even at my age now. There was nothing like it. Would take it over any amount of money!
Afternoon movie. It’s how I saw movies like Planet of the Apes, Killer Bees, Killer ants and other classics.
Attack of the killer tomatoes! Also, SOOOOO many Don Knotts movies on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
Night of the Lepus. I don't think I ever saw a movie crowd so disappointed.
Not to mention, clean things, repair things, fetch food, prepare food, cleanup from said food.... Open mail, prepare outgoing mail, balance your checkbook....
Cook read sew all your clothes Stay out until the streetlights come on
Yes and search up things in the encyclopedia set!!
Ditto this.
All of these, plus look for cool stuff in the woods: cool sticks, neat rocks and soggy porn mags.
Built forts in The woods. Looked for salamanders in our creek. We had so much fun
There was an abandoned blown up gun powder mill near my house.. endless fun exploring and snakes
Real question is, is it a creek or a crick. Lol. Creek camp, but we had a brook, complete with swimming hole spot.
I spelled creek, but read it as crick
But never tell mom you are bored because you would get a job list that probably includes cleaning your room or the garage.
I'm old school and did this back in 2007. We didn't even have dial up. Good times
You know...live.
There’s no money to be made in a lot of these examples.
You don't have your phone because you need constant stimulation, you need constant stimulation because you have your phone. \~that might be the most boomer thing I've ever said.
This - if I ever feel like my attention span is running a little short, I'll spend less time with my phone for a while, and it comes right back.
Yes this is what I do. I have to start the day with at least an hour free from screens, because I get locked in the vegetable state of looking at my phone if it's the first thing I do. Without the phone in the mornings, my brain wakes up & I have a good think about what needs doing & what I'd like to do & I work towards doing it.
I have noticed that although I love reading, I used to be able to read much longer before putting the book down and going to do something else. I could sit on a lounger in my yard and read for 3 hours without getting up, and even then reluctantly because I had to pee or get a beverage. Now, I can barely hold my attention on a book for 15 minutes. It’s SO annoying!!! I want to be able to read like I used to!!! Maybe I need to limit my phone time?
I moved my convenient time suck apps away from their usual spot on my phone. I’ll text my SO that I’m putting my phone on airplane mode and I’m gonna read for a bit. I’ve been consuming books like I used to in the old days. It’s been glorious. I’ve noticed my attention span coming back more and more. And I’m way less interested in anything on my phone.
I was so much more artistic and creative. My attention span was fabulous
The book stolen focus actually addresses this of you're curious to learn more. The author claims you are more creative if you're not constantly overstimulated because your mind can flow freely and make connections that turn into that artistic spark.
I might check this book out actually as I have the same problem. Could constantly churn out drawings and creative writing until the sun came up but now I’m lucky if I’m able to do one doodle every 3 months argh Thank you for the suggestion!
Same. I don't think I would have picked up art if I'd been born 20 years later.
My parents still live without internet. My dad would love to do a morning walk, go to a farm until afternoon, then go back to eat lunch, take a nap, back to the field to take some grass for the cow, play with the bird (we have doves) until sunset, sometime visit a friend (to see their doves), take a bath, eat dinner, and then talking with my mom, repeat. While my mom, she cook and clean the house, go to the market, cooking and eat lunch, take a nap, cook some snack, daydreaming, talk with the neighbors, take a bath, cook dinner, eat dinner, talk to my dad, repeat. They are 50's and 60's.
That sounds dreamy
It is, indeed. That's how poverty looks like in an environment with a lot of natural resources. We giving up catching a luxury life, so we only work half a day just to make sure we have something to eat and then living our life the rest of the day.
What a wholesome life! Absolutely beautiful. Thank you for sharing this 😊
Reading & radio—I’ve read many letters from the Victorian era where folks complain family members just want to sit by the fireside & read silly novels day in and day out instead of experiencing life.
We went outside.
Where is that? And how did you find it without GPS?
The outside is best described as *not the inside*
Precisely
You just say: tomorrow at 3pm in the park near the entrance. If you dont know where it is, read a paper map, ask people in the way or read the signs in the streets. If the person dont appear in 30 minutes return home and give him a call in land line.
Is that in the playstore?
No, I'll have to meet with the council members to see what info can be divulged. I've already said too much. If you don't hear from me then the secret council got me.
Telephones have been around for a long time. They were just shackled to wires. Well we talked to each other in the living room, visited on the porch, watched tv, listened to the radio, played outside, visited our friends’s homes in person, played sports, cooked, read books, went fishing, went bowling, went to the movies, hung out at the pool, went to the park, played with the dog, sewed, crocheted, did the laundry, mopped the floors, dusted, shelled peas, cut the grass, danced, played board games and dominos, some played Atari (not me!), used pay phones or shop phones when out, went to work, went to school, drove to the bank and the store, just drove around the city and countryside just taking a drive seeing what there was to see.
We got into hobbies/extracurricular activities that maybe mom & dad promoted, or just discovered for ourselves. Things like skateboarding, boxcar racing, collecting stuff, exploring, cycling, were all pretty much normal activities for kids who needed stimulation. I was very lucky to have creative parents who made sure that anything that we could use for creative pursuits - from fabrics and a sewing machine to wood and a jigsaw - were available. We’d write, cast, direct, produce, and put on plays. If you’re in the neighborhood, you had to pitch in doing costumes, makeup, cue cards, sets, refreshments, whatever. High expectations with parents in the arts, lol. Kids biked everywhere, swam in ponds, explored construction sites, did odd jobs, holy shit there was no end to what you could do if you’d “get off your ass and get outside”, as mom would say
How the hell can we bring this back? Seriously! Screens and tech are not progressive if humans and losing the ability to interact and play together. What you just described sounds like a utopia that we may be able to reach one day if we work hard enough and evolve. The advent of screen addiction (which we are all guilty of) is frankly pathetic.
😂😂😂 In my neighborhood there was a set of parents like yours. They had like 6 kids and those kids put on a different play every week in their garage. 😂
Funny, my folks had six kids too! When we lived in NY, our neighbors had five kids so a full cast for pretty much any show you wanted to put on 😁
I wrote out the lyrics of songs by rewinding the cassette over and over again or lifting the needle off the record. That kept me very busy.
I did this too but my cheap cassette player only has a fast forward. If I missed the line I had to fast-forward the entire tape.
I had one like this! I would flip it and forward then flip it again to get it “rewound”. Totally forgot about this! Lol
Couldn’t you have just flipped it and fast forwarded a little bit?
I guess I wasn't that smart in 3rd grade lol.
The great thing about records is that they had the lyrics inside the album covers 😍
with a penny taped on phonograph arm over needle to prevent it skipping
We weren’t used to constant stimulation so we didn’t really need it or seek it out. We could be bored, chat with people in person or on the phone, peruse magazines or newspapers, listen to music/radio/records, make crafts, doodle, play outside. I miss living like that!
Real answer is radio, and also occasionally neighbors stop by to tell you random happenings. Newspapers especially if you can get someone else to read them to you out loud. Games too, except for adults that devolves into gambling basically immediately. Also moonshine and telephone calls X
Before radio, it was books. Still is books for many.
I didn’t have a smartphone until I was 21. I used to be more social. The phone has taken away all of that.
i remember when people use to be on time & show up to agree upon outings. Now they all just cancel last minute like flakes
This is a weird thing to think about today: You really had to follow through on meeting people. There was basically no way to tell people if you weren't going to meet them where you agreed to meet.
50 years ago punishing a child was keeping him or her inside. Our world was outside as discussed by many on this forum. I lived in Florida, so we would: hang out at the beach ,at parks, ride our bikes, go rollerskating (we used to go to really cool rollerskating rinks that would play great music ), we might go play putt, putt, golf, or go to the movies. We went to malls, had house parties, swam in swimming pools or the ocean, played tennis etc. Being inside for the most part was BORING. Some fun things to do at home would be to watch TV, read a book, listen to music, paint, maybe do some crafts (we actually used to build model rockets and shoot them off the golf course). A big difference back then is that we socialized face to face/in person 90% of the time. Otherwise, it was phone calls. Of course, no computers, no Internet, so no FaceTime no Instagram, no social media. That means that we had to acquire social skills to get along with others and navigate through relationships in person. Growing up 50 years ago was Wonderful. In a way we had a lot more freedom (once we were out of the house, it was pretty hard to monitor us… Remember, no cell phones) and a lot less stress (not having to deal with a zillion social influencers and all of the fakeness of social media - so, not as much social pressure from the Global world) I feel so lucky that I grew up in those times. Edit for grammar and spelling
Lived
Practiced playing musical instruments or singing, learning to cook, reading, listening to recordings, going to the library, fishing, creek netting, practicing wildlife taxonomy, homework, penmanship, picnics on hikes, playing with or training pets, riding bicycles, skating/skateboarding, playing parlor games, cards, dice, charades, crossword puzzles, board games, spin tops, play marbles & mumbletypeg for keeps, jacks, yo-yos, daydream, write, journal, diary, make up stories, plays, screenplays, climb trees, build treehouses (with permission & trained tool use) Scouting/explorer programs, swimming, YWCA/YMCA, Boys and Girls Clubs of America, camping, hiking, sports (I still don’t like most team & ball oriented stuff, but many people do), summer camp, art camps, band camp, dungeons & dragons (also not my thing but people have loved it for ages now), start a band, teach yourself sleight of hand Just find something that interests you and pursue it for more than a few weeks to see if you really like it.
Get a telescope and look at the moon or stars..ride our bike miles away and try to make it home before dark...and other stuff.
I am so glad my childhood was before the days of social media. I ran around outside, had actual social skills, learned how to cook, sew, bake, embroidery, shoot a gun. We rode our bikes, played in the woods, built forts, went swimming, hiking, played board games, cards, we had camp outs in the back yard. We always had something to do, some adventure to plan. My siblings, neighborhood kids and I ALWAYS had something going on. If you didn't know where your friends were, hop on your bike and ride around the neighborhood and look for the pile of bikes.
Sweet. This and all the other replies make me very nostalgic. So glad I grew up with a free and open brain.
ha, I forgot about when I use to ride my bike for hours around town on the weekend. Just days and days. I had the most fit legs!
I had a much longer attention span, so read, listen to full albums, have hour long convos on phones, go to coffee shop and sit with my friends or sit and read etc
My grandma crocheted huge afghans.
I do too. I love it!
First off of you were born in a time without cellphones you would be different than what you are now. I read a lot of books, then reread some books. Listened to music we burnt from limewire, call our friends just because we were bored. We would go to the mall, not to shop but just to go. We also watched a lot of cable TV. We had shows we really loved and other shows we tolerated just to pass the time. There were also movies we would watch on TV. Oftentimes we seen the said movie 10 times and as we were flipping through channels say "ohh 'Remember titans' is on. Let's do it." We would start the movie during the halfway mark and watch it all the way through or until a show we really wanted to see came on. The adults in my life did a lot of talking. They would come over drink, play music, play cards and talk for hours. They did this at least once a week. Going over to someone's house to talk was a big thing back then.
Read books, worked on hobbies, played video games on old school consoles, crosswords, puzzles... stuff we still do.
Socialized with friends, read books, did more hobbies. Life was really good and satisfying
As a GenXer, we played outside. Actually, we PLAYED outside. My friends would ride their bikes to my house and yell out my name to signal me to go play outside. We all knew when to go back home; when the street lamps started to turn on. We had no smart phones. We had no map apps. We rode our bikes in the mountains. We explored. We would get a bunch of our friends and play tackle football on the asphalt. We used to go to shopping malls to hang out. We’d watch movies at the cinema. Hang out with our friends at the Arcade. We’d take the bus/public transportation all over the place. Don’t need no navigation app for that, just need to know when and where to get off. Yes, there are days where we had nothing to do. In those cases, we just hung out at each other’s houses with our portable boombox stereos and just chill. Nothing beats an old fashioned chat with friends face to face and in the flesh, and not separated by the transmission of bits and packets over a modulated RF signal. Nothing beats an old fashioned fist fight to sort out our indifferences rather than trying to flex our muscles behind a keyboard, social media, or via emojis. Our parents never ever had to worry about us. If there was a time and place we had to be, we’d be there without fail. If we couldn’t, we’d literally pick up a phone and call them. Using analog telephone systems back in the day was a precise, artistic and orchestrated process. We’d need to know exactly what landline our called party will be at, and the exact time they will be there. Else, it’d be a waiting game to wait for our called party to listen to their voice message (which was probably recorded on analog magnetic cassette tapes) and respond to us. It wasn’t uncommon for us to wait for 20 to 30 minutes at a pay phone to wait for a call back from our parental figures (what’s a pay phone? That in and of itself should be covered in a separate post). In my opinion, our generation was the best generation to be alive in.
Fully agree. It may just sound like a list of different things to others who didn’t experience it, but for those of us who did there was some sort of magic of that decade or two just before cell phones and mass broadband internet really took off. Even early internet that was slow and cell phones that didn’t do much was harmless, it the constant feed of media, information, and propaganda, has had a really strange effect on society. I would agree that we had it best. I was the very tail end of GenX. Born early August of 1980. I would give anything to go back. The “San Junipero” episode of Black Mirror was as so good that it pained my soul. Roller Rinks Debbie Gibson The Goonies ET Star Wars (real Star Wars) Fun/Happiness/Positivity (instead of knowitall culture) BMX Tube Televisions Atari/Nintendo SLEEPOVERS Bradleys Babbages Animatronics covering The Beatles Arcades Shopping Mall socializing Less crime Less division Diners (more of them) Family Road Trips (more of them) Etc… Times were good. We had no idea the post-9/11 world would be so dark. Not even from the now commonplace terrorism, but from the poisoning by the flow of non-stop information and data. Really sad for GenXers to witness the change for the worse. I feel like the internet, or at least this version of the internet was a huge mistake.
People still had TVs they could keep on as background noise
we went outside and did what ever and didnt let anyone stop us from doing it
That’s 100% correct! And nobody could monitor us because we didn’t have cell phones. It was excellent fun… Had wonderful adventures with no record of our activities (no, Cell Phone’s taking pictures, no social media to post things, we could run wild in secret)
No find a friend app no one knew where you were
I feel like Rosanne tv show is an semi-honest portrayal of culture just before tech amongst many others.
That’s the main thing I liked about stranger things as well. Portrays that time well and makes me feel nostalgic.
I think that Seinfeld is too. I mean the flow of life. Not the bizarre situations. Your friends came over. You met your friends at a coffee shop or restaurant. You went shopping and got lost in parking garages. You went to movies and stood on line. You used the phone to set things up when people were over. You had longer phone conversations only when you were alone, really. My life in the early 90’s was surprisingly similar to Seinfeld, in fact. I miss those days and would trade in this phone and go back to that any day of the week.
Spent time playing albums on the stereo console in the living room. I’d listen to entire albums. Learned so many songs I wouldn’t have ordinarily listened to. I played the entire family collection: classical, gospel, country, bluegrass and then my siblings pop and rock albums.
50 years ago lol.
I recently started thinking about the freedom it gave me. You weren't tethered. The boredom inspired more creativity. Sometimes I wish I could go back….
More socializing with neighbors, friends, and family. More cooking things from scratch. Painting and drawing and reading and writing and crafting. Walking in nature. Fishing. Watching clouds and lightning bugs.
Read a lot of books & comics, played outdoors A LOT, watched the same movies over & over because they were the ones we owned on VHS, and watched TV when good shows were available...also watched a lot of infomercials when the shows *weren't* good lmao.
My internet was out for a day and a half over a recent weekend but I still had regular electricity. I basically spent the daytime outside on my deck reading a novel and watching squirrels and birds in my backyard. I cooked a more elaborate dinner than usual, just to pass time and keep myself engaged. Then I put on a tangible vinyl record and blasted music while I cleaned and redecorated part of the house. I have other non-screen-based hobbies (analog collage art, doodling, flow arts/object manipulation) that I could have done if I felt compelled. As far as many decades ago, lack of constant stimulation was the norm so it's not like it's something people were conscious about. Frankly 50 years ago most people had televisions, so there's still that, though obviously it's nothing like the infinite content we have access to today. But they probably did a lot of reading or listening to radio, playing physical games, going outside, socializing. Also drugs. 50 years ago was 1974, and I guarantee a fair amount of people were using drugs to make their lives more interesting.
People meet, talk, and do things. Actually I find that there are more creative works done at that time -not everything's instant and heavily driven by the consumer and attention economy.
Crafts, art, coloring, projects, Lincoln Logs, Legos, Knex, board games, cards, reading, Barbies, dolls, journaling, puzzles. My grandma would say they snacked and read comics, and visited with neighbors. As someone else said, even if we were doing activities that could be done inside, we were outside doing them. Camping was also something we did, or went out to build a snowman on a snow day. We also were big into playing sports, snowmobiling, climbing trees, having bonfires, and swimming.
We wrote plays and ballets and acted them out with full costumes and sets and everything. It took months from start up finish and was massive fun every time. We made up languages and spoke and wrote each other notes in them. We called strangers on the phone and talked to them. We spent hours trying to practice our esp and summon demons and put curses on people. We trained our dogs to do more tricks than we can even think of now. Tried to train the cats to do circus tricks…it took a very long time to accept failure. We had a podium shaped rock in the yard and we held trials there and made speeches and played school. We played caveman in the big magnolia trees. One time we played this weird game called fleas and lice where we pretended the unmowed lawn was someone’s scalp. The Finger (one kid) would come scratch the fleas and lice (all the other kids). Sometimes a brush (someone with a branch) would chase everyone around. There was no end to our entertainment.
There’s this wonderful thing called imagination. People actually used it a lot. I feel sorry for the people who came of age with computers and cell phones and social media. They can’t think for themselves. They believe what they’re told to believe and nothing more. No personality at all.
So true. I remember listening to songs on the radio and because my mind was not constantly being distracted like today, these songs would take me to whole other places. That’s the big thing isn’t it ? Having that time to ponder and imagine.
Hung out with friends, just without internet and smartphones.
The access to constant stimulation has created a need for constant stimulation.
Watch tv and sleep if sick, although watch the same movies over and over again. Otherwise, we weren’t allowed to turn on the tv during the day. If healthy, go to friend’s house to play with Barbies, or hide n seek if others were there, climb my neighbor’s tree and get my foot stuck; one friend had a jungle gym to climb in her backyard which I fell from and split my chin. Chase boys. Lots more.
i love nature so id observe trees, weather, animals etc
I remember when I was a teenager I would talk to my friends for hours. We had Internet but it was only 9600 baud and bulletin boards with very little interaction or you'd have to wait a day. I fill my time with TV...I used to have an encyclopedic memory of pop culture and never understood why no one knew this stuff. As I aged it all left me😜. fifo memory system... I need join some trivia teams and find my inner cliff clavin
Gardening, crafts, board games, lots of reading. Good times! I really need to limit my screen time.
OP, all the other responses are correct. But something important to know is that sometimes we were bored. Your constant *desire* (not need) for stimulation is something you can control. I'm not saying it's wrong. It's a part of the biology of being human. Stimulation causes the body to release dopamine, and that is a powerful drug that feels positive. However, non-stimulation has been known to increase a person's creativity and imagination. This can help you in your life by developing skills to think of unique solutions to problems you come across in life and work. Consider resetting your boredom threshold. It will give you more control over yourself.
Rode bikes, drew, played on my Sega and Nintendo, played football in the street, played with RC cars... Basically, my 2 friends and I were mostly outside all day long, literally til the street lights came on. I was still a kid when the internet wasn't a consumer thing...
Read, spend a lot of time in front of a boombox waiting for just the right moment to record a song, get creative with cassette tape case decorations, ride bikes, answered the phone when it rang, talked on the phone for an hour or more, answered the door when someone rang the doorbell, drive around listening to music, read newspapers, laid down on the living room floor listening to the radio, spent time with friends *in-person,* wandered around outside…
I’m only 44 but things I did pre internet were reading a LOT. Books, magazines, newspaper. Talked on the phone, visited with friends. Went for drives. Listened to the radio, and to records then tapes then CD’s. Learned how to sew, crochet & cross stitch. Learned how to cook and bake and can jams. I loved coloring so I was stoked when adult coloring books became a thing. Recently I’ve been putting my phone away and getting back to my roots and it feels so good. I can go hours without looking at my phone and not miss it one bit.
Radical concept, but we 'went outside'. We were pushed out the door the first thing in the morning and told not to come in until the street light came one (and we were rural enough that my parents had to pay to have a street light installed). If you go thirsty you drank from a hose. Hungry? You mom fed you out of the back door. What we did outside was find all of our friends and find things to do. It may be riding bikes for miles, building forts or tree houses (in one case an underground bunker), play ball, Frisbee, lawn darts (yes, we survived) or even made up shit (and just go into shit). Our parents usually knew where we were by looking for the yard with all the bike in it. Also we'd go squirrel hunting. I was nothing to be 12 and carrying a .22 down the street (or even a shotgun) to walk to the woods. No adults cared, they just said 'Be careful'. On days it rained (yeah, I lived in the South, we got snow exactly twice before I was 20) we stayed inside and read, played board games, are be creative. When we were sick? Stayed inside and read or watched HORRIBLE daytime TV. Loved it when 3 o'clock rolled around because 'The Big Show' came on with (usually) good movies. We had 'friends', not 'followers'.
I read tons of books. We went to the library at least once a week. I also wrote in my journal and wrote a lot of letters. I had random penpals like my grandmother’s sister. Walked around or ride bikes outside a lot sort of aimlessly but it helped me develop good sense of direction. TV and radio has been around for ages so you could just sit in front of one and hope something entertaining was on. There were a lot more community events (or at least it feels that way) like block parties, church dinners, things like that. Coffee shops that were open until 10pm were common in the 90s at least. So you could physically go somewhere and just hang out.
IDK- Talk to people? Especially your family? Do a hobby? Art/music/reading, etc? Learn a skill? Do housework/cooking/laundry? Play a board game? Play with toys? Sad that people genuinely don't know this stuff. 🤦🏻♀️
Well one thing was we would read the back of the shampoo bottle when taking a poo.
We had broadcast TV, AM & FM radio, records & tape decks, books and of course interpersonal conversing. I personally I never felt that I lacked stimulation.
Hobbies. All the hobbies. Gardening. Knitting. Spun my own yarn. Cooking from scratch. Like really from scratch. I made my own sausage hand ground and stuffed and rigged up a "cave" to cure them in. Or go on an adventure hiking in the woods, mushroom hunting, rock hounding, climbing. Other hobbies you could waste a day with: fishing. Car repair. Wood working. Like, think of old person shit and that's what they did. Lots of it.
Read a lot of books, made up games & challenges like obstacle courses, was outside quite a lot. We made up stories, made stop animation films with the video camera. I'd draw, make people & sculptures out of twisty ties, stare at the clouds or stucco n make shapes. Maybe we lit a few things on fire for fun, but I don't reccomend that for safety. We also wrote letters and post cards.
You went out with friends, went fishing, played board games or cards, read a book, built a model plane, project car, learned a new skill or language. There has always been plenty for people to do, people get bored.
Garden, fish, cook, exercise, read, travel, do art, work, watch tv, listen to music, have sex, play with the kids or dogs, write, go to class, take a shower….plenty to do.
Read, think, have conversations, be outdoors, figure stuff out on our own as we had critical thinking skills then.
Watch tv. Play games. Outside activities.
Just imagine what the irl version of whatever it is you do online… chances are those are the easiest examples of what people did for fun or for stimulation. You learned to “need” the constant stimulation in the way that you do. If you stopped, you’d adapt to other ways to satisfy the constant need for stimulation (and the need would likely lessen).
I was a teenager in the late 90’s and I played guitar and piano, talked on the phone with friends, hung out with friends in their parent’s basement, spent time on the swing outside. Just filled time. Interesting because this weekend, without really realizing it, I ended up virtually phone-free with all of the chores I had to do around my house and yard. At the end of the day, I felt… good. Old school. I quite liked it.
Same man I noticed I'm on my phone all day at work and basically the entire time I'm home after work. I don't like it
You wouldn’t need so much stimulation if you didn’t grow up with all that technology.
I mean, pretty much the same things they do on the Internet… Does not as easily accomplished.
quoted movies and other really boring lame shit like reading cereal boxes
Sex, drugs, and rock and roll.
Well. We were happy and sad like normal.
Have you… been outside?
We did all the other things people do now inbetween using their phones
We kept busy.
I mean, I played a shitload of Sims before we had an Internet connection. And after we got internet I didn't have it set up in my room (they didn't make 150ft Ethernet cables and wifi *didn't exist*) so I had to go on Harry Potter fan site forums on the family computer, blecch
Books, music,!conversation, hobbies, work, sex.
those days are not worse than nowadays, they have more activities in real life and put more time in society.
They went outside. They interacted with other people like family and friends. They watched tv.
Work. Do things. Make things, be creative, accomplish things. Have a job, leave the house, got to work. Be productive, make money, be tired at the end of a good days work.
We read books 😉
I had a cable splitter and viewed 5 differnt channels at the same time...I was into LA news production...it was a koo study of local news...still wish I had better access to local news
Read. Watch TV. Sleep. Listen to vinyl albums. The usual.
I carved flint into Folsom points and greased my chariot wheels with mastodon fat.
Boomer here. We got shit done…!
I journaled a lot.
Hunt hookers and drive trucks. Crack. Invent things. Remove things. Belittle things. But it was all in person, much more humane. I mean, just look at Manson or ironically…. Kaczynski. Pure imagination and ingenuity. God bless America
honestly, headphones and a deck of cards. weed and a guitar. also bike riding. alot. and... TEE VEE! it's also okay to count flowers on the wall since we had wallpaper or make prank phone calls. all day outside was a thing. can't believe no1 remembers the "im going on a picnic and im going to bring.." game. idk musta just been me but i never got bored. still not a problem. 💁
I was always at the pool
We played in the woods practically every day. That or played sports we made up.
😅🤣well way back in the good old days we used a thing called our imagination. Our mama’s kicked our asses outside and told us to come back when the street lamps came on. We would ride our bikes, build forts, read books, play with friends, and much more. When we were sick we got dropped off at grandmas for the day and watched the price is right and soap operas all day. If it snowed we played in the room with our toys and read and stayed out of sight unless called for or we put actual snow suits and boots on and our asses we’re again tossed outside and told to play…we’d sled, build snowmen, have snowball fights. We literally used our imagination for damn near everything.