17 Outdated Behaviors From The Past That Would Be Considered Incredibly Strange To Do Today
As we age, certain things we could do back in the day would be considered weird AF to do today. So when Reddit user u/Red_Baronnsfw asked the r/AskOldPeople community, "What's one thing normal at your time but is now bizarre to even think about?" Many people provided their thoughts. Here's what they said below.
1."Smoking in hospitals and on airplanes."
"Or even better — in restaurants."
"At the Denny's near us, you had to walk through the smoking section to get to the non-smoking section. Made the concept of everybody being in the same room anyway worse."
2."Anytime you answered a phone, you had no idea who was calling you. Not knowing one single person's phone number — except my vet's office of 30 years. For some reason, it is the only number I still remember. Not including Jenny's number, of course."
3."Paper maps. You had to figure out your own route to where you wanted to go, and road trips seemed more of an adventure back then."
"Navigating by paper map wasn't all that hard. Folding the stupid things back up was the boss fight."
4."How utterly unsupervised we were as tiny children. I remember taking care of my brother by myself for the full summer while my parents worked starting at eight; he was four."
"Yes, and my parents would leave us four kids in the car while they stopped for groceries. It seemed like they were gone for a while, but I'm not sure now. At least long enough for everyone to be dared to honk the horn, run the windshield wipers, and, if we were really brave, get out and run in a circle around the car."
5."The Yellow Pages."
"And phone books in general. If you knew someone's name, you could find their address and phone number. And if you did not want your name and number in the book, you had to pay extra to have an 'unlisted number.'"
6."Just not knowing. If you were meeting up with a friend at a certain place and time, and they didn't show up, there was no way to follow up. If you didn't know whether a certain celebrity was alive or dead, you asked a friend and hoped they were right. Where is the closest veterinarian? What does it mean when my car makes a beeping sound? What year did the Hundred Years War end? What should you do if you break a toe? Pre-internet, all of these things were mysteries, and you had to hope you had smart friends or a very well-stocked library nearby."
"Applying for jobs was the worst. You'd have to submit your resume in paper, then go home and wait for a call that might never come. Meanwhile, you could be out looking for other jobs."
7."Arriving at the airport shortly before takeoff, checking your luggage with minimal to no hassle, and boarding your flight."
"And your family or friends could come right to the gate with you."
8."Always carrying dimes, later quarters, when on a date, in case things went sideways."
"Phone booths. Dude, every now and again, I need one still, and they are gone!"
9."The sounds younger people will never know of listening to your modem connect to the internet. It was such a specific, strange series of noises that is instantly recognizable to anyone who lived during the time of dial-up modems."
10."The milkman. Milk, eggs, cheese, and other dairy-adjacent items are delivered to the house weekly. And the milk and OJ were in the glass, returnable bottles."
11."Vehicle gas cap located behind the license plate."
12."Photos were expensive, rare, and it took time to even see how they turned out. You took pictures, dropped your film off (e.g., at a photo booth/stand with a person in a grocery store parking lot or at a film processing shop), then waited for the film to be developed and printed (roughly a week). It costed extra to expedite."
13."Calling the movie theater to see what was playing and what the showtimes were."
"And it took soooooooo loooooong."
14."The Dewey Decimal System was the only way to find a book."
15."Running to my mailbox hoping to get a letter from my girlfriend away at college. Or finally getting that cool thing I mail ordered eight weeks ago."
16."Having to actually get up off my butt to change the TV channel or to answer the phone hanging on the wall."
17."Rushing to the bank on Friday to cash my paycheck."
"Yes, having to get money from a teller. No ATMs. Get money on Fri, or else you are screwed for the weekend."
Older people, was there a thing that was considered normal at your time but is now considered bizarre to even think about? Tell us what it was in the comments below.
