I was born in 1959. I read this about my year of birth...

Things can change a lot in 45 years. Here are a few things that Americans were saying in 1959:

I'll tell you one thing, if things keep going the way they are, it is going to be impossible to buy a week’s groceries for $20.

Have you seen the new cars coming out next year? It won't be long when $5000 will only buy a used one.

If cigarettes keep going up in price, I'm going to quit. A quarter a pack is ridiculous.

Did you hear the post office is thinking about charging a dime just to mail a letter?

If they raise the minimum wage to $1, nobody will be able to hire outside help at the store.

When I first started driving, who would have thought gas would someday cost 30 cents a gallon. Guess we'd be better off leaving the car in the garage.

Kids today are impossible. Those duck tail hair cuts make it impossible to stay groomed. Next thing you know, boys will be wearing their hair as long as the girls.

Also, their music drives me wild. This 'Rock Around The Clock' thing is nothing but racket.

Pretty soon you won't be able to buy a good 10-cent cigar.

I read the other day where some scientist thinks it's possible to put a man on the moon by the end of the century. They even have some fellows they called astronauts preparing for it down in Texas.

Did you see where some baseball player just signed a contract for $75,000 a year just to play ball? It wouldn't surprise me if someday they'll be making more than the President.

Do you suppose television will ever reach our part of the country?

I never thought I'd see the day all our kitchen appliances would be electric. They are even making electric typewriters now.

It's too bad things are so tough nowadays. I see where a few married women have to work to make ends meet.

It won't be long before young couples are going to have to hire someone to watch their kids so they can both work.

I'm just afraid the Volkswagen car is going to open the door to a whole lot of foreign business.

Thank goodness I won't live to see the day when the Government takes half our income in taxes. I sometimes wonder if we are electing the best people to Congress.

The drive-in restaurant is convenient in nice weather, but I seriously doubt they will ever catch on.

There is no sense going to Lincoln or Omaha anymore for a weekend. It costs nearly $15 a night to stay in a hotel.

No one can afford to be sick any more, $35 a day in the hospital is too rich for my blood.

If a few idiots want to risk their necks flying across the country that's fine, but nothing will ever replace trains.

I don't know about you, but if they raise the price of coffee to 15 cents, I'll just have to drink mine at home.

If they think I'll pay 50 cents for a hair cut, forget it. I'll have my wife learn to cut hair.

We won't be going out much any more. Our baby sitter informed us she wants 50 cents an hour. Kids think money grows on trees.

Dad

My Dad was in World War II. He passed away in August 2001, and before and after, I pondered that defining time in his life. I pondered it after 9/11, when people suddenly became super patriots, flags everywhere, spouting off about subjects they knew next to nothing about, emotions overtaking what sense they may or may not have had in the first place.

I read an excerpt from a book that sounds like it asks some good questions, and has some interesting things to say, called Homeland. In it, it questions why people react the way they do to defining events.

I love and appreciate America, but I also feel many actions we do can and has been wrong. We that live here should always question what's going on. If that makes me a troublemaker, then so be it.

My Dad loved America too, laying his life on the line many times during WWII. He came back quietly as most men did, no parades, no fanfare. He didn't fly a flag either, but neither did he get angry over it. He just went on with life. But one thing he always taught me not by empty words but by his example, is that you do what you can, you work hard, and you DO ask questions.