Hankering over past times.

Judging by the thread about 50’s Christmas presents, when so many of us seemed content with bath cubes and an annual, I wish that we could go back to when a simple gift at Christmas was enough.

Now most things can be dropped in the weekly shopping trolley, not much can be seen as a treat, whether it is food, chocs, books, anything really.

But then, I attend an aquacise class several times a week. Such things were never heard of years ago, and even if they had been, my mum would never have spent money on things like that.

Times change.

yes I hanker too, nowadays christmas in my own home is down to me. A few small presents to myself will do, some good films to watch and simple foods.

I too miss the time when Christmas was simpler.
I miss the time when the children lived at home.

I am grateful though that I have a comfortable house and I can afford to heat it.

I do not hanker after anything. Life was not simple in the past. We were just too young and ignorant to understand what went on behind the scenes in everyone's lives, including our parents and family.

M0nica

I do not hanker after anything. Life was not simple in the past. We were just too young and ignorant to understand what went on behind the scenes in everyone's lives, including our parents and family.

Ignorance is bliss?

I miss my parents and my dog. As a child I enjoyed a wigwam that Mum made and a paddling pool that was an old wartime collapsible army bath. I now treasure my children, grandson and friends that I have made along the way. Grandson still loves a big cardboard box as I did as a child. Yesterday it was a shop, a house, a truck and a hot air balloon.

NanKate, I, too, wish for "the simpler things in life". Life now is much more complex than 78 years ago.

I hanker after lovely family christmasses. Hoards of us in grandmas small house, simple pleasures but oh the memories!

When I think of our grandparents retirement , so different to our busy lives. The were happy to relax, and take life easy.

Don’t get me wrong, I love all my activities and social life but they were content and happy.

No hankering here.

I miss my Grandparents and parents very much but that is the circle of life

I treasure each stage of life and hold it dearly

I don't think Christmas was simpler in the past; it was certainly much harder work; I am thinking of my early childhood in the 1950s. Everything was cooked from scratch, shopped for in town, carried home on the bus, cooked in a very cramped kitchen and stored in a pantry or the meat safe. And the washing up!

Life was basic but we appreciated it because it was as good as it was going to get. I don’t hanker after it now because it was a struggle for my mum and dad just to give us a simple Christmas.

M0nica

I do not hanker after anything. Life was not simple in the past. We were just too young and ignorant to understand what went on behind the scenes in everyone's lives, including our parents and family.

This: generally life has got better for women and hopefully the days when the likes of Enoch Powell could pour their evil words out publicly are over:

I do hanker rather about having a younger and healthier body....

I hanker about the loss of a responsive NHS and available GP's

I have a mixture of memories some happy some very otherwise, and prefer to live in the present with its daily gifts and snags, and an enormous one is having the internet.

Being able to chat or Zoom to friends and loved ones faraway - priceless.

Wyllow3
People can pour their evil words out publicly all the time and they do, on social media, so it’s now much worse really.

I miss simpler times as well, so much stuff now is supposed to be done for our convenience but it’s really not.
I’d like to walk into the railway station and buy a ticket and jump on a train easily and cheaply like I used to do.
I’d like not to dread having a medical emergency, having to wait hours and hours for an ambulance, and having got one having to wait hours and hours outside the hospital in one.
I fear going into any hospital with the way things are.

There never was a golden age in the past although people maunder on in that vein. Even ancient Egyptians claimed life was better in the past. So I don't hanker after things past. Our problem is creating a better future which seems hopeless under the Tories.

I don't really hanker but I loved the 60s. The music, the fashions. I loved it all.

Not sure I hanker after much. I love modern advances - I can have daily, short chats with my dc and dgc, my friends, my elderly aunt etc.

As for medical emergencies - I recently had a medical emergency. DH rang 111, paramedics appeared, I was transported to hospital, admitted immediately, treated and discharged.

My recovery has not been as straightforward as it might have been and the care from our gp practice has been brilliant. Home visits etc etc.

There have, of course been areas where things could have been better - was this not always the case?

No newspaper has asked for my story or that of all the people I met in hospital who couldn't praise the NHS enough.

I don't hanker after the past. Life is easier now in many ways.

Life is so transient the only reality we have is the present and I try to live here.

kittylester it’s refreshing to hear a good news story regarding the NHS I am sure there are many more, but as we all know bad news travels quicker and receives more coverage in MSM and elsewhere.

Life wasn't always more pleasurable in the past, remember the visit to the Dentist? The school Dentist was worse, luckily my mother opted out for me. They made an appointment for a relation and said they needed two extractions instead they took out six of their second teeth all at the front and they wore dentures from the age of 12.
I am pleased we have technology that lets us talk face-to-face with friends and family even in other countries.
I try to live for each day.

The school Dentist was worse, luckily my mother opted out for me. They made an appointment for a relation and said they needed two extractions instead they took out six of their second teeth all at the front and they wore dentures from the age of 12

I had a disaster with the school dentist aged about 10. My teeth were crowded and he extracted 2 of my front teeth which were my 2nd teeth, to make space!! This altered my bite and my teeth have cost me a fortune as an adult in order to have a decent smile.

Oh yes the dentist. He took all of my teeth out when I was 11. Life changing.

I hope you're feeling better kitty.

I certainly dont hanker after my childhood as I had a miserable one in many ways. Each day was like treading on glass so as not to anger my father or provoke one of my mothers "wobblers" (panic attacks)

The time I think of mosy nostalgically was when i was in my early 20s and had just got my own flat. I had my feedom and no one was entitled to tell me what to do. I was at the beginning of my career as a librarian and the world seemed like my oyster. It was the mid 1960s and a fun time to live. I wore the latest fashions, had a group of single friends my own age and enjoyed the lively Liverpool club and music scene.

When I look back I think of a song by Bob Dylan where he reminisces to when he and his friends used to gather in the back of a bar, joke and drink til morning:

"I wish, I wish I wish in vain
That we could sit simply in that room again
Ten thousand dollars at the drop of a hat
I'd give it all gladly
If our lives could be like that"