2.3 kids and a white picket fence

This delightful photo was snapped almost 30 years ago. That's right, three decades ago. There's my Dad, my Mom, my younger sister and myself. I was five when this photo was taken and so much has happened in the past 30 years.

My parents divorced about six years later, my Mom remarried, had another kid, got divorced, again, was then involved in a 6-year relationship that produced my younger half-brother. Most recently, my Mom had a battle with breast cancer. Thankfully, she won.

My Dad, well, my Dad is a different kind. He never remarried and continued to work every single day. Occasionally, he found time for a round of golf.

My sister grew up, became rebellious, grew out of that, married, and now has 2.3 kids of her own. Her white picket fence is a 6-foot high concrete wall with barbed wire. But they have a swimming pool, which is nice.

Me, well, I grew up - sort of - moved to the Middle East, emigrated to the United States, went to college, moved around the U.S., and am now plonked down in Pittsburgh, ready to settle down and put down some roots.

In these past 30 years, we have seen many advances and changes. We now have flatscreen TVs, microwave dinners, cell phones, the internet, global leaders have risen and fallen, terrorist attacks have increased and various epidemics of AIDS, N1H1, Bird Flu and all sorts of wonderful things have plagued the earth.

Life growing up as a kid in the 'good ol' days' was wonderful. Your biggest concern was whether or not your parents would let you stay up past 9pm to watch the next episode of "V". You were good the whole week so you could use that as ammunition when you launched your pleading campaign with all sorts of nonsensical reasons why they should let you stay up and watch it. But if they said, "No.", then that was that. No amount of pleading would change their minds.

Or you beg and plead with your Dad to drive faster on the way from Friday night shopping at Pick 'N Pay so you'd be in time to watch MacGyver.

We were still young enough to find it gross when couples kissed on TV.

Those were the days when my Mom wore her hair flipped back, when my Dad drove a Triumph, and we were content to watch a black and white tube TV.

Where have the past three decades gone?