According to Hofmann: A horror story for the kids

It seems like every generation has to show the next generation how tough they are.
For example, my parents would often tell me how they didn’t have TV, shoes or breathable air when they were my age. I’m sure their parents probably told them they didn’t have cars when they were young or domesticated animals as pets or developed the muscle capability to physically smile.
I first thought that I would never resort to such nonsense, but as I go through the realization that I’m pretty much seen as a joke to my 9-year-old stepdaughter and after observing her and her friends in their natural habitat, which is on their cell phones, I found a story so unbelievably spooky that it also makes me look like the toughest guy on the planet.
That’s right, kids, settle around the campfire for the story of “The Night Before Cell Phones!”
Let’s go back to when I was in high school over 20 years ago and, yes, I know that makes me, like, super old to them, but that time certainly did exist, and it wasn’t all about the movie “Titanic,” pagers, The Rachel hairstyle and the establishment of the North American Free Trade Agreement. There existed a dark underbelly for my generation that kids today cannot comprehend.
Back then, my friends and I would hang out like you rug rats now do. We would go to the mall that’s not there anymore to buy stuff that you can now digitally download, check out girls from a distance and follow those girls to their cars, tail them as they drove to their next destination and then to their home where we would make sure they make it to bed okay as we sat in backyard trees with binoculars trained at their bedroom windows — not creeping on their social-media profiles like you lazy punks do now.
Ah, it was such an innocent time. I only wish I would have taken more photos.
But the point is, to organize such an outing, we didn’t have anything like a group text to organize everyone. No, we had to pick up a phone attached to a wall or at most a cordless phone hooked up to a wall — there’s always a wall involved somehow–and we had to press actual physical buttons on those phones which is why my generation has arthritis of the index fingers and thumbs.
Now, if you think one call is all it takes, then you’ve never planned to go out with more than one person in the 1990s because if you’re going out with three friends, after you call the first person, you call the second person with the details of the plan, but then the plan doesn’t work for the second person, so then you have to start over with the first person. When speaking to the first person again, you make the second draft of the plan and inform the first person to call the second person to confirm with them so you can call the third person and give them the details.
What then happens is the third person doesn’t like the second plan, so you and the third person come up with a third plan and you call back the first person just to find out that the first person and the second person came up with their own third plan, and then you have to cancel everything because it’s suddenly 2 a.m. as you wasted six hours trying to figure out what to do.
That’s right, children, your Friday night was…Ruined!
You stayed home with your…Parents!
Your parents were watching reruns of…”The Lawrence Welk Show”!
His special guest star was…Bobby Vinton!
On the rare occasion where everyone agreed on a time, location and getaway route, we would need directions, but we didn’t have a GPS map app because there were no cell phones. We also didn’t know how to read a map like our tough-as-nails ancestors did because we were too busy playing video games to better prepare for the technological tsunami that you now take for granted.
However, hope wasn’t lost because we had map websites through dial-up Internet service where we could print out step-by-step instructions after logging on and waiting 40 minutes for information to download, but even that had its pitfalls as the maps were normally wrong, didn’t account for construction or believed your vehicle could go through buildings to get to a destination.
When those pitfalls happened, you had to stop at a…Gas Station!
There, you needed to talk to a…Person!
You had to ask them for…Directions!
And if you wanted to use the restroom, they gave you a…Key!–well, which they still do, so that’s not as scary, but you get the point.
In conclusion, children, not only did you learn about the dark ages, you should know that I was tough enough to survive. And if that story doesn’t curl your toes, then stick around for the tale of “Growing Up Without Cable TV!”
According to Hofmann is written by staff reporter Mark Hofmann of Rostraver Township. He hosts the “Locally Yours” radio show on WMBS 590 AM every Friday. His book, ”Stupid Brain,” is available on Amazon.com.