It seems to me that parents quit being parents sometime in the 80's. I know in my generation you had to move, or you would get stuck cleaning the basement or some other despicable task. If you lived in a neighborhood with kids, usually a pack was running around outside summer or winter. Now I guess they are indoors playing video games and ordering pizzas. In my case, I would take a book and disappear into a quiet corner so at least I would have pleased Barbara Bush.
I know my parents were maybe a little too out there with the food thing (making yogurt, baking whole wheat bread and serving more vegetables than meat) and there were no fast food restaurants in our town until I got to high school. Even then when we went out for open lunch we went to somebody's house and ate a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Eating in a restaurant was absolutely a special occasion.
At the same time as obesity is at all time high, there are more gyms, fitness clubs and public venues for active fitness than ever before. Even the rehabilitation centers that used to be for heart attack or injury victims are open for wellness memberships. I can think of at least 7 places to work out in my small town of 20,000people. The YMCA is teaming with people on a Sunday afternoon. Maybe an hour at a gym doesn't really replace the natural activities that were commonplace like walking or riding a bike to school or work, playing hopscotch, tag or Red Light/Green Light, and cleaning one's own house. Fitness isn't something you do at a certain time in a certain place, movement should be a part of every hour of the day. I don't think elevators, escalators, and drive through windows were solely installed for the disabled.
There is also a surge in grow your own and store bought organic foods, food co-ops and farmer's markets, an interest in veganism, a decrease in "supersizing", and yet there are more fancy cupcake shops, greasy burger joints and super high fat ice cream stores than ever.
It's hard to understand the conflicting messages and conflicting trends with so much knowledge and information at hand about what is healthy. With McDonalds now offering Oatmeal, maybe we are at the tipping point, and the scales will start to angle down again. I'm just afraid the oatmeal will quietly disappear and the McDonalds will say, "See we did our part and nobody wanted it" while others continue to sue and regulate the food industry, the schools and anyone else they can blame for their own poor choices. Meanwhile, I sound like a an old coot so I will get off my soapbox, but really it is an interesting paradox. And that's the point I was trying to make.
Me in front of a big juicy burger joint, you can see the fat has attached to my thighs.
2 comments:
Wow--that is a diatribe. I think the problem with raising kids is summed up perfectly by that Highlander commercial, where the snotty kid is feeling sorry for the kid who has to listen to his parents sing or is embarrassed because his Dad picks him up in an old station wagon, meanwhile the brat is sitting in his gas guzzling SUV with his own DVD player and headphones on advising parents on why they shouldn't embarrass their kids and they should have Highlanders etc. OMG. Isn't the point of having kids to finally get to embarrass them like we were embarrassed?--Dad, I'm talking to you with your black stubby socks and sandals and many more things. Basically, kids make the decisions, not parents, from what I've observed. It's sad, but I think the 1st ladies do need to tell parents what to do because they have no clue. BTW, there were fast food restaurants--Sandys, remember? And we got a McDonalds pretty early on because I remember eating there in grade school once a year when the exterminator came. Once a year? Many kids eat fast food every day and at a minimum, once a week. I went to Hardees in HS at lunch and ate a small burger with fries and a water for about $1.25--about what a school lunch cost.
Um, who's having a diatribe? Maybe SOME children didn't get to go to Sandy's or Henry's with their MOTHERS while their older siblings were in school, and so they forgot such places existed.
Adam used to have to share his Happy Meal with me. I got the bun and half the fries, and a sip of pop. But that was more of an economic issue plus his appetite was really poor.
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