Snail Mail

Does anyone remember these? If you were born after 1970 you weren't old enough to experience these educational gems that were sent to you through the mail. Mid 70's were around the time they were showing up in the mailboxes of America. They were packs of 4x6 cards having to to with various topics, sports, animals gardening, food recipes, Olympic hopefuls(?)...They would arrive wrapped in cellophane in packets of 20 or so and with them was a order form used to obtain more packets in a series of these cards,...on the off chance you had completely taken leave of your senses.

The 70's was a funny time, the 60's was renewal, awareness, the 80's was self importance, the awakening of technology, at least we cared, granted it was plastic shirts with about 11 zippers on them but at least we cared alittle. The 70's, Americans stopped thinking all together I think. We suffered oppressive temperatures outdoors while wearing cool, breathable 3 piece polyester leisure suits, all the while letting heat escape through our heads by growing a pound of hair and wrapping it with sideburns the size of a small cat.

The information super highway was a dirt road. The time it would take for you to agree to receive more of these cards,...filling out the order form, putting your check inside, mailing them (I remember you had to use your own envelope), the company receiving your order, processing it, then sending them to you, would probably take at least a month to..whenever. What's hilarious is I remember my parents decided to not order any of these cards, and about 8 or 9 months later they sent us the rest of the complete set!,...like nobody wanted that crap and they were just dumping them! Today you can get the same information contained in a complete series of these cards in the time it takes to click a mouse a few times. Seconds compared to months.

Now, it's not fair to compare what was available to us back then to what is available to us today. It's not fair, but it is fun.