Only

I was a crazy teenager once. I lived in high heels, jeans and a leather jacket for three years. I listened to heavy metal and classic rock. We raised each other back then. I’m glad I wasn’t raised by the web. You wanted to know stuff, you had to read books. I was made a sandwich, and given a dollar a day, that bought me a soup and a mint Aero bar. Grade nine and ten, school was just a place to be. It almost cost me my graduation. When school was out, loads of us hung out at a local middle school on the hill. Weekends were at the bottom of the bluffs, up to no good. Police used to come in to shore from the lake and kids would scatter up the cliff.

Grade eleven and twelve I found football and helped manage our team. I needed every single credit to graduate. I joined drama and did a co-op course in physical education helping special needs. Kids were still segregated then. I befriended teachers, lost friends in car accidents and seen more alcohol poisoning then I care to see again. Television shows had a moral to the story. We had assemblies with real people that told stories of real obstacles in life. Nobody sugar coated anything. Abuse, neglect were family secrets that you only guessed about. Canadian Human Rights Act was formed in 1977, but the revision in 1985, I remember.

The children of yesteryear are not vastly different then the next. They have changed, but every parent of every generation can attest to the amount of change in the next generation. I try to picture my Gram having teens in the sixties. Each generation has it’s own set of uniqueness. You have the good, bad and the ugly in every set. You have different skill sets, different fails and successes. Each one brings evolution of the human race. You are part of the process, a stepping stone. You are responsible, either by example or creation of all future generations. For this reason, you are important. Your actions, attitudes and reactions are all being watched. Be the difference we need.