“Discover 32 Bizarre ’80s and ’90s Norms That Today’s Youth Can’t Fathom!”
This is more 90’s-early 00’s but the ability to just… not be reached sometimes? And that was okay?
It stresses me out that there’s this social pressure to be available at all times, and people get upset with you if you don’t respond to a text fast enough etc. but as a kid we’d call each other on the home phone sometimes and if you didn’t pick up it was just assumed you were busy and nobody was actually UPSET with you over it. Obviously I love being able to keep in contact with friends on a more regular basis, but the constant pressure to be accessible to people 24/7 or you’re some kind of bad friend is too much and it really does a number on my anxiety. I miss being able to call/text/message someone back at my leisure and not have to have a “good enough” explanation ready as to why I was “ignoring” that person.
Hanging out at the high school after school was out with no supervision. I was floored to learn kids can’t do that now. I spent hours sitting on the floor in some back hallway with friends, not wanting to go home, doing my homework, waiting for my ride to get out of practice.
Going through catalogues (remember Lillian Vernon?) to find things you like, then filling out the order form, mailing it with a check, and waiting 6 weeks to get your stuff. And during that 6 weeks you have no idea if they even received your order or not!
I feel like kids today will never know boredom like I experienced when I was a kid. We were poor and didn’t have any videogames, there was no Candy Crush on your phone, no Netflix, if your friends were busy you’d just have to make up your own game or watch one of the 5 videos you actually owned for the 347th time, but even that wasn’t always possible if your parent/s wanted you out of the house for a while. So you’d just walk around hoping to run into some kids you knew.
I also remember my sister and I would watch MTV, wait for our favourite music video to come on, then record it on VHS. We had two tapes full of music videos. I wish I had those tapes now, there were some bangers on it.
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