I like 1970. I like 2022. But Which is Best…?

There are several pages on Facebook that offer the chance for people to go back in time and celebrate life in days gone past. Most towns have their histories celebrated by way of old photographs and reminiscences of those who were there.

I am a member of at least two of these groups; one about the History of Eastbourne, another about old Tyneside. Maybe you are a participant in this kind of group, and marvel at that picture of the old library, or see where that road used to go before they built the office block? I find them interesting, so I keep at it. But they have their drawbacks.

One such page asked the improbable question, “I’m going back to the Seventies. Does anyone want anything?” This was a blue touch paper to many. The replies included:

“RESPECT FOR THE POLICE!”

“GOOD MANNERS!”

“DECENT TV PROGRAMMES!”

“A PACKET OF SPANGLES!”

OK, that last one was me, partly because I like to lighten things up when I can, but also to make a point. Many of the people on those sites seem to think that the past was not only a “different country,” (to quote LP Hartley), but a much better one. Well, call me contrary if you will, but I’m not so sure they’re right. But it set me thinking, what would I want if I really could go back to my childhood and bring something back with me?

(You’ll have to imagine a wobbly image now, with a fading voiceover saying “…if I could go back…back…back…”)

…And here we are, in Brodrick Road, Eastbourne, in 1972. What’s that sound? It’s Slade Alive! drifting out of the upstairs window of the council house opposite the bus stop. 15 year old me is playing it again! But I’ll not take the LP. It would be a waste of an unique experiment if I managed to bring back something that you can still buy in HMV today. So I’ll go and have a word with that strangely mystical, intelligent and handsome young lad to find out what he thinks is the best thing about living in the 1970s.

Turns out he’s not as mystical, intelligent or handsome as I remember. He is very well mannered though, and offers me a glass of Corona Cream Soda, so that dispels the myth that people weren’t particularly ill-mannered.

He shows me an Action Man, complete with a broken ankle which was sustained when he “fell” out of the bedroom window after an experiment that went horribly wrong. There are Subbuteo teams everywhere, including Crystal Palace, who up until 1972 had never won anything. You should see his face when I tell him that the next fifty years are just as barren. It’ll save hime a fortune with Paddy Power though.

I ask him about school. He actually winced. Get this, kids; teachers were allowed to assault you whenever they felt like it. I said he should complain to the school welfare officer. “The what?”, he replied. It seems that he was so frightened of the teachers that he didn’t actually start learning anything until he left school and managed to pick his subjects. Goodbye Maths and Metalwork, hello History, English, Drama, Poetry, Foreign languages and Geography. Perhaps he’ll become a writer, you never know. But we both agreed that schools are better nowadays than they were then, so that’s one up to the 21st Century.

As for clothing, well they do say what goes around comes around but I’m still waiting to see someone in yellow flared cords, a purple shirt and navy and white tank top that our 1970s host paraded around on just one occasion in 1970. No photos exist, thankfully. He thought it was the biz, but one look from his friends when he opened the door to them convinced him otherwise.

We did however generally hang on to our clothes a bit longer than we do now, although that awareness appears to be changing. I think we’re now in the era of “anything goes” – well, my generation is, anyway. But I suspect even that has its limits and I don’t expect my 1970 ensemble will be reappearing anytime soon.

Younger me suggests we go into town to have a look around the high street, and because he wants the new Mott the Hoople album. So we hop on a yellow and blue bus, grabbing hold of the pole on the open platform at the back. It grinds its way into the town centre, belching out diesel fumes on the way. Another point to the 21st Century.

In town I notice that everyone looks where they’re going. I don’t try to explain that by 2022 we will all have a computer in our pockets – or hands – that has all the information that you could ever need whenever you want it. It will tell you the news, teach you a language, connect you instantly with people on the other side of the world, and record videos, photos and sounds. I also don’t tell him that we only use it to look at pictures of cats or start arguments with strangers on social media while we bump into each other on the much busier streets because we all have our heads down and can’t detach ourselves from it. One up to the 1970s? Or maybe a draw, not sure which.

We pass several shops that are no longer around. Debenhams, Rediffusion, Dewhurst (The Master Butcher), BHS, and C&A (which took with it, when it went, a very rude joke). We end up in Woolworths where my Host buys a vinyl copy of “Mott” for a pittance.

(The joke about C&A – which I’m not going to repeat here, so please don’t ask me – was rather offensive about ladies from Essex. Now that is something that’s changed. We can no longer make jokes that offend people, we have to be kinder. I’m on board with that. One of the recurring themes from the question about going back to the seventies is that folk would like to show each other more respect now. But now that we do, we often hear from the same group that people are too easily offended. A bit of a contradiction I think).

Sorry, that was almost serious. Back to the LP a that my Host just bought. Vinyl is making a comeback, which is a great thing, but I’m a bit miffed that I no longer have a record player. He will go back to his house in a Brodrick Road, put the album (sorry, LP) on too loud, and listen to it until he’s learned it word for word, in order. No shuffling for him.

He says goodbye and hopes I have a pleasant journey back to 2022. (See? Good manners). He will hop back on the No9 bus and enjoy the journey back to Hampden Park.

Nobody seems to be in as much of a rush as I am nowadays. But then they also don’t have the choices or comforts that I have. So I think I’ll call it a draw, knowing that each day I wake up is a victory over mortality and I’ll try and get the best out of it. I will make my mystical way back to today, my once in a lifetime opportunity over.

Damn! I forgot my Spangles!