The foolishness that once passed for normal

When I was a kid, going anywhere meant piling in the family station wagon.

It was the classic family wagon — a '75 Pontiac Catalina, complete with wood paneling on the side. If you remember the beast the Griswolds took across the country in the original “Vacation” movie — that was pretty much our family vehicle.

The wagon had three rows of seats, but we usually only used one. My mom and dad would sit up front, but the rest of the seats would usually be all folded down, so my sister and I could move throughout the rear of the vehicle. We could bring our sleeping bags and stretch out, or sit cross-legged and play a board game, at least until we figured out anything with too many movable pieces just wasn’t a good idea on a car ride. Most often, I would sit at the very front of the folded-down seats, half hanging over the front seat, so I could see where we were going and talk to my mom and dad.

If anyone today allowed their kids to do what my sister and I did in the back of a car, they would no doubt be arrested for child endangerment. Today, pretty much any parent knows that kids need to be properly restrained when riding in cars — the younger ones in car seats; the older ones at least buckled up. There is to be no roaming aimlessly throughout the rear of a car over two sets of folded-down seats.

I’m not writing this to condemn my parents, mind you. Nor is this one of those “it didn’t kill me, so what’s the big deal” columns. I’m simply remarking how times have changed. Behavior once considered perfectly normal is now widely known to be somewhat irresponsible.

In some cases, it’s utterly amazing to think of the things once considered by adults to be perfectly OK for children, which later turned out to be incredibly stupid. Perhaps the best example of this is candy cigarettes.

I used to get these all the time when I was a kid. They weren’t even all that good, but they just seemed cool, I guess. Some of them had a chalky powder on them, such that if you blew on them, the powder would fly off, resembling smoke.

Looking back, it's stupefying to me that somewhere, somebody, thought these were a good idea — and that stores actually sold them, and parents actually bought them. Sure, it makes perfect sense to get kids thinking at an early age that cigarettes are cool. It's like, "Here, kids, you can practice with these. This way you'll be ready for the real thing when you're 13." They could just have well sold us candy meth and toy crack pipes while they were at it.

You hear a lot of lip-service these days about the decline of society, and that our moral judgment is going down the tubes. And while there may be some examples of that, I think there are just as many reasons to think we’re heading in the right direction.

I mean, I think it’s a good thing that my kids are growing up in an era when their parents have been given enough information to know that they need to adhere to certain safety standards while riding in the car. I think it’s a good thing that my kids are not seeing candy cigarettes that make it look like smoking is fun every time we check out at the grocery store.

In other words, we're making progress. It’s still not a perfect world, and there are new challenges for adults and children every day. But that's the way it's always been. We just tend to forget the ills of yesterday.

I’m glad we’ve learned from the stupid things we did in the past. But I also wonder what “normal” things we’re doing right now will seem incredibly stupid in 30 years.