Does it seem that in a bygone time, life was more ordered and compartmentalized? A sense of order doesn't equate with contentment, of course. If you were a boy you went to a "barber" i.e. a man. Would you believe that it wasn't that long ago, in the scheme of things, that it was "against the law" for a woman to cut a man's hair? "Dave the Barber" reminded me of this a while ago.
I was in my mid-20s when I realized I could consider a cosmetologist (woman) for cutting my hair. I proceeded to "bounce around" for years, never sticking with any one cosmetologist for very long, until I came back to "Dave" (Evenson). He seems not to have aged very much. He's fond of saying hello in Norwegian.
Hair isn't much of an issue for men sliding into their late 50s. You need it short to appear tidy and civilized, mainly, but we don't cultivate a certain look like in our "Wonder Years" youth (a reference to the maudlin TV series starring Fred Savage). Your hair had to be a minimal length to win basic acceptance among peers then, it seemed. It was among the many misguided trappings of the boomers' youth, up there with an inclination to smoke "pot."
We used to be compartmentalized in our meal habits. It's a relatively new phenomenon for restaurants to keep the breakfast menu active all hours. Pancakes for supper? Why not? There was a time when a waiter/waitress might stand there aghast if you inquired about breakfast fare after 11 a.m. I believe that Perkins restaurants were on the cutting edge of enlightenment.
The agrarian lifestyle of a bygone time demanded three enriching meals with breakfast having its own particular traits and expectations. Why? Simply for variety? For having a sense of structure or predictability? I don't know, but "bacon and eggs" was a staple associated with getting going in the morning, while somehow this fare was considered unusual to want the rest of the day.
In an earlier time there was no electricity on Minnesota farms - a deficiency felt at breakfast as explained by author Maurice Faust (Pierz native): "Toast could be made by putting a slice of bread into a wire long-handled holder and laying it on the hot iron top of the range. The process was tricky at best and usually resulted in a flaming torch. It was simply not worth the effort."
This quote is from the fascinating Faust memoir: "Remember - No Electricity."
I recall Perkins restaurants breaking ground by staying open all hours. I also remember when supply was woefully short of demand when it came to Perkins-style restaurants. It was common to enter such an establishment with taste buds crying out, and to join a crowd of people all on a waiting list to be seated. We would often opt to move on.
The free market in America ought to resolve a problem like this, and it appears to have been largely resolved now.
Most of us have memories of when the "bar rush" was a restaurant phenomenon, for those establishments offering the extended hours. We all laugh thinking of this. You'd act like a total idiot, and then the next day, when encountering someone else who was there, you'd share a knowing smile. I don't smile any more recalling times when I was an idiot. The idea of going to a restaurant at 1:30 a.m. now is about as alien to me as anything I can think of, inebriated or sober. I suspect that DWI laws along with some cultural shifts have rendered the "bar rush" as more a historical footnote in our culture than anything. (It's too bad Advil wasn't available in those old days.)
So women can cut men's hair and you can order eggs and bacon for supper. But where else has "compartmentalization" evaporated? Girls have the option of being serious athletes. Youth hockey is no longer just a "fringe" sport in most towns. Youth have so many more outlets for their constructive energy today - a shame when you consider that my "boomer" generation had such teeming numbers.
Girls sports had barely gotten off the ground when I was in high school. It was novelty at that time. It wasn't routine for girls to advance a basketball up the court, as turnovers and traveling calls were frequent headaches. I remember talking with an area referee, who's now deceased, who said the frequent traveling calls back then were depressing "but if you don't call it, they'll never learn."
They learned, all tight. I remember an area newspaper publisher (not of the Morris paper) who almost crossed the line to becoming offensive when, in the mid-1980s, he wrote of how impressed he was with how girls could play clean, competent basketball. Of course this was condescending. This old fellow meant well, of course, and everyone knew it. I was guilty of my own misjudgment when I underestimated the ability of girls, or even college women, to make three-point shots when that option was created. I never wrote anything offensive in that vein (I don't think) but I had those thoughts.
The overwhelming success of girls sports, along with the elevation of hockey above sandlot status, made it impossible for newspaper writers like me to keep up with it all. So they shouldn't be expected to. I have tirelessly suggested to youth sports advocates that they empower themselves by finding a voice, and blowhorn, on the world wide web. Progress in this regard has been surprisingly slow. Old notions are hard to knock down.
Even boomer parents who consider themselves to be so "with it" are deficient in this regard. They use the web for so many other things, but they feel they still have to get ink on their fingers reading about local school sports.
It looks as though the boomers will have to be upstaged by a younger generation. Actually the boomers are graduating into the ranks of grandfathers and grandmothers now. And I doubt they'll be experiencing many more "bar rushes."
-Brian Williams - Morris mn Minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com - morris mn
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