I was a military brat in the 70s & 80s and I gotta say: every place we ever lived, there were always a couple kids like this in the neighborhood. Their presence is completely honest to the blue-collar 70s suburbia vibe, to me.

I miss going a day without thinking any of those things, much less several times a day.

I think it was truly a moment of, "Maybe she'll know what to do/say, since this looks weird" but it still left her holding the bag. What would be the right thing to do? "Hey, could someone come look at this card & make sense of it? We're old!"