To ask what you miss the most about the past?

[Appalonia]

Been thinking recently about how much we've lost due to the internet, although of course there are lots of amazing things too. For me, I think I miss things like record stores, long conversations on the phone with friends, so many high street shops that are now gone forever, online shopping just isn't the same, especially as you can't try something on, mix tapes, seeing a film in a big cinema, bookshops, lots of independent shops, so much is commercialised now, department stores, in my city, there was only Debenhams and now that's gone, I miss going into town and browsing, there's nothing left other than pound stores, it's so sad.

What do you miss that modern life has robbed you of?

Life without the Internet .It has messed up everything.

I miss how I used to book holidays through The travel agents. I would go to a local one tell them what I wanted-somewhere hot with a great Sandy beach and good night life, but not Blackpool in the sun and hey presto! They would book me and my fiend (s) in, all done.
I miss being able to turn up at the airport and actually sit together on the plane without having to lay for the privilege. I miss receiving my paper tickets through the post. I miss not having to worry about checking in on line. I really miss not being able to take virtually anything I wanted in my suitcase, no weight limit at all. I miss buying duty free because it was much cheaper than buying at home. I miss being able to chuck everything in my case and only take a small handbag on the plane with me, without it costing me an arm and a leg. I miss the uncrowded foreign beaches and beauty spots.

Seasons. I really miss them. Hedgehogs. A variety of garden birds.

Sundays with nothing to do than eat a roast dinner and read the Sunday papers till Bullseye came on. It's become just another day now.
Going abroad and it feeling very different from the uk. I remember going to Magaluf as a child and everyone spoke Spanish and the food was 'exotic'. It was so exciting!
Limited viewing options and one TV so if there was something 'good' on, everyone sat in the same room at the same time and watched it together.

I guess blockbusters for the cheap second hand dvds you could buy

The city I live in used to have 4 record shops, HMV is barely hanging on by a thread now, pp tend to message rather than call, in the last few years Debenhams, Monsoon, Next, BHS, IKEA, Argos have all gone. I went to see the Whitney Houston film last week, there were only 6 pp in the cinema. There are no nightclubs and there used to be 5, loads of pubs, bars have closed down, and so much that I can relate to in many pp's posts. Yes it might be nostalgia, but I truly do think the internet has destroyed so much, and we will never get it back...

As suspected, it's not the internet. You just need to move.

So debenhams and argos has closed, so what? They were both shit. Before them is was C&A and Rumbelows. Before that it was something else, if you keep going you'd get to people complaining that the fishman wasn't calling his wares through the streets anymore and these new fangled indoor shops with counters were terrible.
Buisness open, businesses close. That's how it works. This thread is like a load of octogenarians warbling about how it was "in their day" and how everything is terrible nowadays....

Going to the library to research topics as a kid. I took my DD a few years ago for books on hamsters as we were contemplating buying one and she was doing a project for Rainbows on looking after a pet. Found one really awful book that had a page on hamsters. We ended up on the internet I was trying to avoid.

Innocence. I miss the innocence of not having adult worries and problems, when every day was exciting and life was so much easier because you didn't need to worry. I don't even remember when I crossed that line and stopped being carefree and became bogged down with worry and stress. In that respect I miss my childhood.

I miss all that except the travel agent part. The independent "proper" travel agents were good, but the chains like Lunn Poly were awful, they just employed kids who hadn't a clue and probably never been further than Benidorm!

No, even the "good" shopping areas are deteriorating, they're just a bit behind the others that have already declined. It's the way things are going. The ripple effect. The most deprived areas lost their shopping areas first, then comes the next slightly less deprived, and so it goes on until the more prosperous/successful ones start to decline.

Our town "lost it" about 4 or 5 years ago and is now a sea of empty/derelict shops mixed in with charity shops and bookies. The nearby city where people laughed and joked about our town is now the same - just took a bit longer to deteriorate. We went to our next nearest, bigger city, last week, and all the signs are there, a few derelict shops, one or two charity shops/bookies, etc - I'd expect it to decline further in the next couple of years.

When a few shops have gone, there's less to entice shoppers so they don't bother, hence fewer customers for the remaining shops, rinse and repeat and you end up with less and less.

They've just moved, most of them. Theyre in the retail parks and so on, and the high streets (if they are working properly) are full of coffee shops and little independent places and bars and pizza places etc.
Not so much in the UK cos everythings gone to shit, but in countries that are working....

The retail centres are pretty an awful way of organising shopping though. I admit I use them as the parking is free, but they are pretty soulless.

Listening to John Peel most nights.

Being members of the EU with the benefits it brought to the country and to individuals.

Apart from that, I think that looking back at the past with rose tinted spectacles isn't particularly helpful.

The excitement of Christmas Telly.

Going to get my hair cut and buying a hair magazine for a picture to show the hairdresser.

Going into town shopping - more exciting then, the hustle and bustle felt different.

Changing fashion and youth culture - everybody looks the same, there are no new fashions to create or music genres to come.

The library was the source of all knowledge. Loved it, still do.

Watercooler TV with million's watching the same thing at the same time.

Less pressure to be academic - people did all sorts of jobs. And mortgages were was affordable on the wages.

Less celebrity culture and blown up identikit plastic faces.

Porn was just from the magazines on the top shelf or the dodgy bookshop in town.

Oasis, Britpop
Clothes shops like C and A, Tammy Girl, Virgin Megastore, BHS.
Spending hours in Woolworths as a young teen buying cassette tapes, smellies and sweets and having change from £5.
Landline phones
Queueing outside a music shop to get the latest album release.
Nightclubs and dare I say being able to have a cheeky cigarette inside
The high street
10p pick and mix sweets
10p vodka night (my uni did this...you'd never get away with it now 😅).

The sense of optimism around the country in the late 90s. Seemed like endless sunny days and we were positive about the future. I used to think it was because I was so young, but it's been mentioned quite a few times on this thread .

Christmas was so much more exciting and magical back in the 70's/80's wish I could create that for my dd.

Oh my god, it's because you were young!

Like most of the rest of this thread. 🙄

@CaptainCorellisXylophone who asked for your opinion ??

@CaptainCorellisXylophone and @bringmetheheadofpastaalfredo - the OP specificially asked what people miss about the past, and most posters have entered into the spirit of the thread. She didn't ask about people who feel oh so superior and need to let us all know how cool and modern they are!!

I miss being free from anxiety!

I don't miss the magazines trying to push people into boxes. I don't miss the overt rampant misogyny. I don't miss inside smoking. I don't miss the limited range of unhealthy fast food. I don't miss having to pay so much money for music and film.

I do miss a world where Russia was no longer a threat. I do miss the feeling that the news wasn't constantly overwhelming. I do miss spira chocolate bars. I miss the high street, and the variety and range of shops. Funnily enough Germany and France high streets seem to have not suffered at all.

😍

My late teenage and early 20s years were just working in a non-discriot job and going to the pub then club with my boyfriend and a big circle of friends.

The idea of anyone the same age as ours doing the same now seems impossible when a four bedroom maisonette opposite is on the market for £1.3M!! And no, I'm not in London.

@magicthree and @lollipoprainbow, to be fair, @CaptainCorellisXylophone was actually being reassuring, wasn't she?! I think she is right that we shouldn't worry too much about things like the 'magic of Christmas,' because even if it doesn't feel magical for us any more, it surely does to our children, precisely because they are children?

I think that's a sensible reminder. A lot of the things mentioned on this thread are really poignant memories, but they are also things that are particular to us as children, and there's no reason to think our own children won't have equally lovely memories when they are our age. It's a nice thought.