Life Before Uncle Ben Was Racist

Some days I think back to what life was like before the Internet. Usually when it's raining and dreary outside. Today is one of those days. 

In my opinion, or should I say IMHO, things were better years ago, but maybe that's because I was younger. Not sure. All I do know for sure is that people called you on the phone and since you had no idea who it was you answered, so it was always a surprise. And it was always a human being, not a robot. 

People sent you birthday cards in the mail. They first had to go out and buy the card, and put time into reading a few and choosing the one that was just right. Friends were the special set of people you actually had met in person and could count on for things, and had shared adventures with, and sent you those cards. 

When you called a doctor's office, someone answered the phone right away. (There was no such thing as "hold" where you had to listen to commercials about how great the doctor was.) A real live person, usually female -- there were only two genders then -- they were called "receptionists."

You had to read books to know things. It was called "getting an education." Now you just go to Google and get answers and learn nothing. You may win the argument but you forget the fact immediately. 

And getting the books was fun, they sold them in bookstores. You could hang out in one for hours, instead of ordering a book from Amazon with just one click and miss stumbling upon a gem you hadn't heard of but desperately wanted to read.

Uncle Ben's Rice was a common dinner staple. Buying it did not mean that you hated black people, or that you thought they were inferior, or that Uncle Ben was your slave, or anyone's slave. You just thought he made good rice. Just like Aunt Jemima made good syrup, although we hardly ever had pancakes when I was growing up, for some reason it wasn't a Jewish thing.

Despite the fact that going to the dentist never hurts these days, I liked life better back then. But I'm stuck here now so I write this blog, which is a nonsense word that came into being fairly recently. There are others, most of which I don't know.

There's no punchline.