Growing up in the 20th Century

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE

1930s, '40s, '50s, '60s and '70s!!

First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank While they were pregnant.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then, after that trauma, we were Put to sleep on our tummies In baby cribs covered With bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, And, when we rode our bikes, We had baseball caps, Not helmets, on our heads.

As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes..

Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter, and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren't overweight.

WHY?
Because we were always outside playing...that's why!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day.

--And, we were OKAY.

We would spend hours building Our go-carts out of scraps And then ride them down the hill, Only to find out we forgot the brakes.. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem..

We did not have Play Stations, Nintendo's and X-boxes. There were

No video games, no 150 channels on cable,

No video movies or DVDs,

No surround-sound or CDs,

No cell phones,

No personal computers,

No Internet and no chat rooms.
WE HAD FRIENDS
And we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, Broke bones and teeth, And there were no lawsuits from those accidents.

We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping-pong paddles, or just a bare hand, and no one would call child services to report abuse.

We ate worms, and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and -although we were told it would happen- we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team.

Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment.

Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors ever.

The past 50 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas..

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

If YOU are one of those born Between 1925-1970, CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.

While you are at it, forward it to your kids, so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.

Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ?

~~~~~~~

The quote of the month

By

Jay Leno:

"With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"

Very well stated, Mr. Leno.

People Find Me to be an Interesting Character; Find Out How I Got Here...


My memoir contains the underlying message that women in abusive relationships can change their lives. I did it; anyone can do it. That the Law of Attraction is real; The main character falls in love as a teen and never gives up on that love; 17 years later she marries the man she fell in love with so many years before. Prior to their reunion, she survives not one but two abusive marriages and saves herself from a life of misery.


This is my life story! I'm sharing it with you. I promise that if nothing else, you will be entertained.




Try Before You Buy... Read the first few chapters here, for FREE!

Walk with me on my journey. Forever and Always...
Allow me to share with you my challenges and triumphs; never a dull moment. Life hasn't been easy, but it is one I wouldn't change. Every hill I had to climb brought with it a lesson; I'd like to share them with you.

Censorship In the Land of the Free



Trina L.C. Sonnenberg


In a day and age where everyone is giving lip service to the Constitution, I am amazed at the censorship being permitted by our government. Actually, the government is responsible for this censorship. What I am referring to is the ban on books by public schools and libraries. I just read a list of currently banned books and it blew me away! Some of these books were required reading when I was a high school student.

I am not talking about cheap dime-store romance novels here, but classics. I cannot get over the fact that books by authors such as Ernest Hemingway ( A Farewell to Arms) and Truman Capote (In Cold Blood) are banned from these public places.



Here is a partial list according to AARP, of books currently banned in the United States school/library system: (not in all states, but even one is too many for this kind of censorship)



1. Uncle Tom's Cabin (Harriet Beecher)

2. All is Quiet on the Western Front

3. A Farewell to Arms (Hemingway)

4. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)

5. Of Mice and Men (John Steinbeck)

6. Animal Farm (George Orwell)

7. To Kill a Mocking Bird (Harper Lee)

8. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

9. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (Tolkein)

10. James and the Giant Peach (Ronald Dahl)




Can you belive this? I can't One of my favorite books is on this list: To Kill a Mocking Bird. That book was required reading when I was in 8th grade!



In an age where we should be encouraging our youth to read, the censors have taken away most of what is interesting to read. Even Judy Blume has been banned. Most girls I grew up with depended upon Judy's books to get through puberty.



You can certainly tell that Christian zealots have had a hand in creating this list. There are books on it that are listed as irreligious. Books like: The Origin of Species, The Lord of the Rings and The Last Temptation of Christ.



I would honestly like to see these religious zealots keep their noses out of our public school system. If my child is wanting to read something that I don't think he should read, I am the one who should have the power to say so, not the school boards of the U.S..



Copyright &copy 2010

The Trii-Zine Ezine



About the Author:
Trina L.C. Sonnenberg

Publisher - The Trii-Zine Ezine - Your Trusted Source for Internet Business and Marketing Information. EST 2001. ISSN# 1555-2276



Author of: My Journey A Lifetime of Verse, ISBN: 978-0-61516405-2

Forever and Always... A True Love Story ISBN: 978-0-567-4311-3

Back in the day, teens had to think about VD; not Valentine's Day, but syphilis and gonorrhea. The term STD had not yet been coined, and AIDS was just coming onto the scene (1981). Now though, there are many more sexually transmitted diseases than ever before in history, even is the days of Sodom and Gomorrah, when people supposedly had sex with everyone.

Now teens have to deal with the fact that having sex could actually kill them or give them an incurable disease like herpes. As a teenager, I never thought of sex as being deadly, not even if my mother found out. I only needed to be concerned with preventing pregnancy. I didn't know anyone who had contracted VD.

Not only are teen pregnancies on the rise, but so are teen HIV infections. (So much for abstinence only programs.} More girls are getting pregnant on purpose to escape their families. There are groups who have actually made pacts with one another to get pregnant.

In 1980, there were 921,696 pregnancies among 15- to 19-year-old girls. That is almost a million kids having kids. In 2008, the number of teen pregnancies was 138,920. (These are U.S. stats.)

During the 1990's, pregnancy rates have dropped significantly and my guess is it is because kids are aware of the AIDS epidemic around the world. Although the next set of stats calls my theory into question. However, the pregnancy rate for girls ages 12-4 has been on the rise. In the United States, the average age for intercourse is 15.5, younger than any other industrialized country.

During the 1980's, more than eight new diseases were identified.

"A CDC study was released today at the 2008 National STD Prevention Conference that reported that, among 800+ girls ages 14-19 examined in 2003-2004 for chlamydia, HPV, herpes, and trichomonas, nearly 26% had at least one of these sexually transmitted infections. 1 in 4. Seriously. And they didn't even count HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis%u2026"

Today 1 in 4 girls ages 14-19 has been infected with at least one STD. There are now 25 identified STDs according to the CDC.

-In the U.S., 1 in 4 sexually active teens become infected with an STD every year.2 Some common STDs are chlamydia, gonorrhea, genital warts (also known as HPV - human papillomavirus), and herpes. (Facts in Brief: Teen Sex and Pregnancy, The Alan Guttmacher Institute, New York, 1996).

The rate of crime has also risen among the teen population.

Smoking has dropped off a bit, and many attribute that to the increase in the price of tobacco products. However, teens still smoke.

Teen and child pornography has been rising to astronomical levels too. When I was a teen, boys looked at PlayBoy magazines, they didn't spend hours online looking up free porn sites, and the male adults in the population weren't making headlines for participating in kiddie-porn.

How to Find Ways to Prevent Domestic Violence and Abuse
Domestic violence and abuse is a prevalent problem in our communities, as well as globally. It has existed since the beginning of civilization because the problem is not just nurture, but also nature. Aggression and violence is part of the innate makeup of the human race and it is a choice we all have whether we want to manifest it in our behavior or suppress and control it. The definition of domestic abuse is when one person in a relationship or marriage (spousal abuse) tries to control and dominate the other person by using intimidation, guilt, shame, fear or physical control. Domestic violence is defined to include physical violence as well as domestic abuse.

There once was a time when movie ratings meant something. That seems long ago and far away though. Things have changed: there once were only four ratings for movies: G- PG-R-X Now, however, the powers that be have added a PG13 rating and adjusted the allowable content as well. Sex and violence is apparently more acceptable for a younger audience than it once was. You'll find one or both of those ingredients in most PG13 rated movies, when in the 80's, Saturday Night Fever had to be edited, because of sexual content, to receive a PG rating. You had to be 17 to go to an R rated show, and the producers of that movie wanted to reach a wider audience, so they made a second version of it. Today though, rather than making two versions of a movie, they added another rating that would allow for some sex and a lot of violence.

Movies 20 years ago had violence; there's no doubt about it. Jason came into being back then, but those movies were total fantasy, and you had to be 17 years old to see them. Now-a-days, you only have to be 13 years old to get the same dose of blood and gore.

In the 80's sci-fi was the big deal, now horror is. The gorier the better.

Trina L.C. Sonnenberg


Just before Christmas, I was desperately in need of some feel-good music. I am not one to listen to Christmas music, and I'm not real into the popular music of today, so I took it upon myself to purchase a Christmas gift for myself. I knew what I needed and went to Amazon.com to get it.

What was it I bought? Well, some may know this about me, but most may not... My all time favorite song is, 'Sugar, Sugar' by, The Archies, circa 1969. As a kid, I never missed a Saturday morning airing of Archies Funhouse.



I did a search for that song on amazon.com and found a bunch of full albums by The Archies and purchased, 'Absolutely the Best of the Archies'
. I can't stop listening to it. It has been just the ticket for my feel-good music needs.



It is like being transported to a time when life was simpler. I turn the volume up as loud as I dare, and dance around, singing all my favorites at the top of my lungs; I am five years old again. It is awesome! It is amazing that I know the words to these songs after all these years.



What's the deal with feel-good music? Well, I was beginning to feel stressed out, like I usually do during the year end holidays. I thought that I'd feel better after decorating for Christmas, but that was actually the source of my mental discomfort. The fact that I was going to be decorating this house for the 12th Christmas was an unhappy reminder that I was still not living in my new house. (Whaaa... I know...) But it was upsetting to me. So, I didn't decorate. I printed a picture of a Christmas tree and tacked it to the living room wall, and then I placed gifts on the floor, under it. My 12 year-old made me an origami flower and asked if I'd put it on the tree, so I got another thumb tack and tacked it to the picture.



I am grateful that my family has a sense of humor. They all thought my decoration was great! My husband's exact response was, "It works for me." The kids got a kick out of it, which was a relief. I still don't know what my mother thought, but perhaps that is for the best.



I've been listening to this CD ever since Christmas morning and I have been feeling fine. I'm writing every day, I am solving the challenges that have been put to me - like my recent computer meltdown, and I have been enjoying every aspect of my life so much more. Life is what you make it, and right now I feel like I am making it the best I know how. I have so much to be grateful for and that's what my feel-good music gave me. It reminded me of just how good my life is. An attitude adjustment was just what I needed to de-stress.



More good news..! We will be moving into our new house very soon. All that needs doing is finish work. It has been a long wait - five years - but it will be worth it. It has been another amazing adventure in the lives of Jeff and Trina. And to think that 30 years ago, when we first met, I had no idea that I would grow up to live in the house that Jeff built. (And, it is the house that Jeff built. With few exceptions, he has taken this house from his mind to paper and into reality single-handedly. My husband is awesome!)



Am I telling you that you should go out an buy an Archies CD? Nope. You can if you want to. I am saying that music is a very effective way to change your mood; therefore, your attitude. If you're feeling stressed or overwhelmed by something, anything, listen to some music that you know makes you feel good. You know, something that makes you smile and sets your foot to tapping. Get up and dance! Sing at the top of your lungs. I promise, it will make you feel better.


Copyright &copy 2010

The Trii-Zine Ezine



About the Author:
Trina L.C. Sonnenberg

Publisher - The Trii-Zine Ezine - Your Trusted Source for Internet Business and Marketing Information. EST 2001. ISSN# 1555-2276



Author of: My Journey A Lifetime of Verse, ISBN: 978-0-61516405-2

This time of year gets me to thinking about my family. I miss my maternal grandparents and traveling to their home for Christmas day and dinner. My grandmother was a fabulous cook, and everything she knew gets applied to the dinner I make for my family.

I have a father, but I do not know him. He does not know me and isn't interested in knowing the oldest of his six children either. We haven't spoken in more than ten years.

My father was never a big part of my life after my parents' divorce (1971); however, we were close before then. I never got to spend time with his side of my family, except for the brief period I lived with my paternal grandparents. Growing up, the only family I really got to know was my mother's family.

I do not know four of my younger siblings, because their mother kept me secret from them until 1991, when I crashed my grandparents' 50th anniversary party. By then, my first born was already two years old. I was 25 years old. I had been married for five years.

You can't miss something you never had, which is true. I don't miss my father, I miss the fact that I didn't grow up with a father figure in my life, except for my maternal grandfather who is now dead. I was always envious of my friends who had daddies to run to. I didn't have one of those.

When I was in grade school, I used to consider telling my friends that my dad was dead, so they'd quit pestering me about where my dad was. Divorce wasn't yet a common occurence in society. Most of my friends had whole family units and couldn't identify with my life without a dad. I was often looked down upon because my parents were divorced; like it was my fault. But that was the way it was in the 70's.

I became a parent at the tender age of eight. I took care of myself after school, cooked meals, cleaned house and did the laundry. When I had free time I baby-sat for money. If that is, if I weren't looking after my younger brother.

It was almost as though when my father left, my mother did too. She was there physically, but that was about it.

I respect the fact that she worked full time to support my brother and me, but that was only 40 hours per week. We didn't get the rest of the time.

I couldn't resign myself to slavery, so I rebelled. I was hell bent that I would do things my own way, and I did. I began my growing by making mistakes and getting into bad situations; learning the hard way. Learn I did. I've got the lumps to prove it. (two divorces) In the end, I wouldn't trade any of it, because of the life it has led me to. I have never been happier than I am right now.

PHOTO:My Husband My Hero