Barbara J. Hamby

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The Oldies, Some of Them Goodies

Maybe it’s time to dredge up some of the jokes and quaint sayings that were going around when I was a child. They didn’t receive the wide distribution that email jokes enjoy, but instead had access that was limited to radio, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, etc. I remember some sort of publication my dad had (or maybe even wrote), I’m not sure. A saying that caught my fancy appeared there: Cross sword grass with blue grass and when the wind blows, it’ll cut itself, or words to that effect.

My email inbox daily contains many jokes, moralistic essays and sayings. Most of them have been around more than once, some many times. I generally click on each one so I won’t miss a possible new healthy laugh. If email has accumulated for a week or more, I sometimes delete most of them, but that’s unusual. Once in a while, I remember to contact correspondents before I’ll be away for a week or more, to ask them to hold off on jokes.

Why don’t some of us in curmudgeonhood (a new word I coined recently) start circulating obsolete sayings and jokes? Most might not be appreciated by younger generations. How different would that be from all our responses to what is circulating now? Next, I wonder if you or I can remember them?