Growing Older
By Beryl Darrah
This is a story about growing older.
It is not an autobiography, although it is autobiographical. It
is not a story about my life, although all of the things contained in
these pages are things and events that were part of my life. My
name is Beryl Darrah, and I just celebrated ( or commemorated) my
sixty-fifth birthday. That officially makes me a senior citizen,
and the passing of that day also no doubt bestows on me that mantle of
wisdom that seems to surround everybody over that age, at least in
their eyes. And, I am one of the lucky ones. In a few more
years, the magic age will be sixty-seven, so I feel fortunate to have
beat the “wisdom deadline” by two years. I also feel fortunate to
be able to retire at sixty-five and not be forced to work an extra two
years in order to start enjoying the meager fruits of my labor.
After spending over two thirds of my life in the field of education and
coming into contact with the “younger generation” on a daily
basis, I am increasingly aware that I have seen a lot of things,
been a lot of places, and witnessed a lot of changes. I could
probably teach an entire history class which covers just my life
time and never run out of material to talk about. And I am
talking about material that took place before most of my students were
even born-----and even before some of our teachers were born, for that
matter. It is strange to be talking about something which is so
familiar to me, and then look at the person I am talking to and see the
blank, lost look in his eyes. Although it may seem like yesterday
to me, it is ancient history to them.
One day our secretary and I were talking about morality in
government. It probably had something to do with invading and
occupying Iraq. Or maybe it was about the recall of the
California governor. Who knows. At any rate, the subject of
Watergate and Nixon resigning as President of the United States came
up. Our music teacher, who was in the office at the time, was
also a part of this conversation. After we had both talked about
the abuses of power during that era, we looked at him for his
comment. He looked down rather sheepishly and said, “I wasn’t
even born yet.”
That may have been the point in my life when I started thinking about
everything that has happened in the past six and a half decades: Of the
revolutionary changes that have taken place in the lives of our country
and its people. Probably as we are living life day by day, we
don’t stop to think of the impact that events, inventions, changes, and
developments are having on our lives and our future. They just
sort of take place. We read about them in the newspaper or hear
about them on television. We incorporate them into our daily
lives without much fanfare or thought.
It is sort of like seeing a person every day over a long period of
time. We really can’t or don’t see the changes that take place in
that person, because they are so subtle, so normal,
so gradual. We just sort of grow and change with
them. It is always a shocking and revealing experience to
look at our school yearbooks from 15 or 20 or 30 years ago.
Cute little kids are now overweight and ugly. Awkward, chubby
kids are now graceful and good looking. Sweet, docile kids are
loud and opinionated adults. Obnoxious trouble makers are now
responsible and mature parents and citizens. And that is just the
kids. It is perhaps even more interesting to look at the pictures
of teachers with whom I have worked for the past twenty or thirty
years. We have aged together. The changes have
been gradual and almost unnoticeable on a day to day basis.
It is sometimes rather shocking to look at pictures of these people
when they were “young”. Was this really the person
that I worked with twenty five years ago? And, speaking strictly
for myself, it can also be somewhat embarrassing. I look at
my old yearbook pictures from the first year that I taught. I was
young, skinny, long haired, no beard or moustache. And it really
doesn’t get any better as I progress through my curly hair phase.
Maybe that is because that is when I started gaining weight.
But, my point is----things change. And sometimes a person has to
be reminded of these changes, either by a young music teacher or
even by going back and looking at pictures.
I look at myself as a product of the 50’s and 60’s because that covers
my junior high, high school, and college years. And it also
covers the years when I was “starting out” on my own. My first
job, the army, and my Vietnam days. But I also spent my
first twelve years of my life in the late thirties and the
forties. Those were my “unconscious” years, lived in
a state of abandon, oblivious to almost everything that did not affect
my immediate daily life. And that is the way it probably should
have been.
There are times that I wish I could be hypnotized (by somebody I trust
completely) so I could recall more about my early
childhood. I certainly didn’t keep a diary, heaven forbid!
Or tell myself, “I had better jot down some notes so I can remember all
of this in sixty years.” No, I just lived life day to day, rarely
being concerned about what was going happen more than an hour in
advance. As long as I had my trusty six-shooter (a toy, to be
sure!), my bicycle, or a ball of some kind, a few trees to climb---and
somebody to play with, I was usually content. Of course, we had
to take time off to listen to our favorite radio shows. The
adventures and excitement of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Gene
Autry, Hopalong Cassidy, Sky King, Sergeant Preston. The
comedy of Burns and Allen, Bob Hope, Amos and Andy, Our Miss
Brooks, Jack Benny. And Saturday morning programs
such as Archie, Blondie and Corliss Archer.
The radio shows of the 1940’s and 50’s were written and presented as
family entertainment. They were wholesome and harmless.
Even the so-called “adult” shows such as The Shadow, True Detective
Mysteries, Dragnet or The Green Hornet were basically
non-violent. Of course, a crime had been committed. We
often heard it being committed, but, being radio, never saw it being
committed. The purpose of the program was always to illustrate
that “crime does not pay” and that the person who committed the crime
will always be brought to justice in the end. Crime or
criminals were never glorified. The hero was always the “good
guy”---the cop or the sheriff or the marshal who apprehended the crook
and brought him to justice. And they always
did. The heroes were characters worthy of being emulated by
kids and adults alike. Rarely, if ever, was violence portrayed
merely for the sake of violence.
On Saturday afternoon many parents dropped their kids off at the local
theater while they spent the afternoon shopping and
visiting. This was place where boys and girls could be
entertained in a safe environment while the parents went about their
business. Not only was this a safe place physically, but it
was also offered “safe”, age-appropriate entertainment to keep
them entertained and occupied. The usual offering of cowboy
movies and melodramas were not only exciting, but they also taught and
reinforced a not-so-subtle message. Crime is wrong. The bad
guys will always be caught and punished. The good guys always win
(and they are usually gracious in winning).
Actually, as I look back on these Saturday afternoon movies, I can
recall very little violence. Very few people were actually
killed. Usually somebody was shot in the arm or the leg.
Even the “bad guys” were rarely killed. Roy or Gene or Hopalong
(or whoever the good guy was) was always fast enough and skillful
enough to shoot the gun out of their hands before they tied them up and
took them off to jail. The “good guys” were not so much
interested in revenge, as they were justice.
These were the years not so long after World War 2 and (a short
time later) the Korean War had ended. Maybe this pretty well
symbolized the position of the United States in world affairs and the
attitude of the American people toward American involvement in foreign
involvement. We had defeated the Nazis in Germany and a fascist
dictatorship in Japan. We were the “good guys”. We entered
the war to defend our friends and allies. We fought to overcome
and defeat the evil and destructive forces of wicked and immoral
men. We had no thought of territorial conquest or national
gain. Ours was a noble mission of restoring the
peace. Of bringing the “bad guys” to justice. Of helping
devastated nation back to normal again.
Such were the lesson gained on a Saturday afternoon at the
movies: Defend what is rightfully yours. Protect the poor
and less fortunate. Stand up for your friends. Make sure
justice prevails. Don’t take what doesn’t belong to
you. Help those who need it. Follow the Golden Rule.
What a contrast from television and movies of today!
It would be difficult for me to pinpoint exactly where and when
television and movies got totally “out of control”.
In today’s society movies and television programs without the
obligatory scenes of gratuitous sex and/or violence are doomed to
failure. They seem to be expected and even demanded by the
general public as a prerequisite for success. Movies that
today are rated PG-13 would never have been allowed in theaters in the
forties and fifties, let alone be shown on prime time television.
The this is a symptom of today’s society: the content of our
movies and TV programs seems to mirror society in general.
Everywhere from the pulpit to pundits, sex and violence in the
various entertainment media is denounced. PTA and parent groups
demand investigations into the movie and TV industry----but yet they go
home and turn on the same TV programs and go to the theater and watch
the same movies they are denouncing.
The moguls who control the movie and TV industry are not stupid.
They know what sells; they know what programs people like to
watch; they know what people like. And they aim to
please. These people are bright enough to know that as long as
ten of millions of people tolerate, if not outright demand, sex
and violence as their preferred subject of entertainment no laws or
regulations are going to be enacted to prevent it. They know that
politicians rarely support laws which may result in their defeat at the
next election.
The question continues to be asked, and the issue continues to be
raised: Does sex and violence on TV and in the movies have any
correlation to the amount and degree of violence in our society?
Is their a cause and effect relationship? It depends, I
suppose, on which study a person chooses to believe.
But, in my opinion, there is very little doubt that the people of the
United States of America are dangerously tolerant, if not actually
addicted, to watching violence as a pastime and as an acceptable and
preferred form of entertainment. Consider the tragedy at
Columbine High School a few years ago. When the news hit the TV
airwaves, the people were shocked, outraged, angry. The people
demanded to know why this had happened. What had gone
wrong? How can it be prevented? But, it wasn’t long before
movies were being made about this subject. TV shows were being
generated. We were actually watching, and supposedly being
entertained, by the very act of dreadful violence that we had so
recently condemned.
How long will it be before we start making movies about the World Trade
Center tragedy----or at least the same general concept? We
have already taken almost every major news story involving a
rape, murder, child molestation, sexual abuse, spousal
abuse, airplane crash, disastrous fire, and kidnapping and
have made it into some form of popular entertainment.
I suppose what I started out to say is that this is a major change that
has taken place in our society in the past several
years. The wholesome family entertainment which was
popular in the forties, fifties, and part of the sixties seems to be a
thing of the past. But, who knows, maybe there is a “pendulum
theory” at work here, and maybe someday the pendulum will start to
swing back the other direction.
Basically, many (or most) of the details of my childhood have long been
forgotten, or at least shrouded in the thick mist of nostalgic
fog. But the details are not important anyway. I can still
remember many of the important things.