The not so good old days

Mamie Agree good film and good reminder of how grim things were!

We watched the film of "The L-shaped Room" the other day and it really brought back the horror of attitudes to single parents or "unmarried mothers" and immigrants. I thought the film held up very well forty something years later.

Think there are always pros and cons to a lifestyle /era and certainly the conveniences of modern domestic life: vacuum vs carpet sweeper, automatic washing machines vs hand wash & mangle, wider range of food vs meat & 2 veg etc are welcome BUT families were often closer ( though pros and cons there too I suppose!!), most jobs were more secure, the world 'felt' safer (but media communication was not as intrusive as now so people did not always know what was going on everywhere in as much detail as now! ) I suppose there was less choice and sometimes today too much choice can feel overwhelming!

Not to mention the fact that divorce was not at all easy to come by.
The 50s were also really pretty grim if you were black, gay or got pregnant out of wedlock.
Domestic life even in the absence of male domination was no picnic - my grandmother used to do all ours (my mother went out to work as a teacher - equal pay had just come in - the men of the family were all dead).
Get up and light the coal fire, make breakfast in a small and inconvenient kitchen, do all the washing on a monday, carry all the shopping herself, make all meals from basic ingredients, bath once a week and an outside toilet.