Ye Olde 1980's

This morning I was styling my hair and had a moment of panic. I was on my way to a career-related appointment and I started to stress that my hair was too big...that it was a bit too...1980's. 
My normally bobbed hair is longer than usual these days and I've let it grow. So there I stood, flipping Velcro rollers out of my hair at speed where they land like large chunks of confetti and I'm yanking the hair brush through my do' muttering,

"Beachy waves dammit, not BIG waves...NO BIG HAIR, do you really want to look like Stevie Nicks in her 'Stand Back' video!!!"

And it was at this moment where perhaps I'd inhaled a bit too much Aussie Frizz-Ease spray, that I had the first moment of nostalgic yearning for the days when bigger was better, when you could take a bad hair day and tease or crimp it into submission.

I shrugged it aside until 15 minutes later when I was shadowing my cheeks with blush and the 2nd moment came upon me,

"C'mon no slasher streaks...who do you think you are Pat Benatar?" (didn't mean for that to rhyme, sometimes things just gel)

Then as humans often do when confronted by their own inadequacy, I began to look for a scapegoat. And I found it, the 1980's.  "It's not your fault Jill, you learned hair styling and makeup in the 80's, it's natural that occasionally it rears it's ugly head!"

All of the sudden, I was tired of having to apologize for the 1980's like they were some black sheep member of the family. Tired of people saying, "you can't live in the past". So tired of the words 'dated', or 'ugh, this is so 80's looking'...

It even caused me to take a hard look at my style gurus', Jonathan Silver Scott and his twin brother, umm what's his name, Drew. For years now they've been on the leading edge of the destruction of all my childhood landmarks. Unlike when someone goes into a 1920's or 30's residence and goes mad for the Art Deco look, no one ever seems to go into a 1980's era home and says, "Oh wow, pink and teal, I love the use of color!" No one ever looks at the glass blocks and says, "I love these glass blocks, let's keep em!" In fact they are usually the first items sacrificed to the sledgehammer. But I remember, when all of that was new and current.  And sometimes...sometimes it hurts.

Nobody loves the decade that made me, that made the X'ers and lately it seems they are trying brick by brick to eradicate it from memory.

So today, because this is my blog and I can, I'm dedicating it to my 1980's and the things I most miss.
If you're a true 80's Toys r Us kid, get ready to be heart-warmed. Below is a boatload of nostalgia:

#1.   The original HBO Opening

 

#2. Bonkers Candy
*What I love most is how they unapologetically say it's 'artificially flavored'.

#3. Dallas TV show.
 Back before Netflix, you had to wait a week, or sometimes a whole summer to find out the end to a cliff hanger from the previous week. There was no such thing as binge-watching a whole season in one weekend. But it gave you something to talk about, and since there was no such thing as 'social media', you actually talked to people about it. Well maybe there was a very rudimentary 'computer geek' only Prodigy list-serve precursor to message boards, a sad sort of social media, but 'computer geek' types probably never watched Dallas, they were too busy playing D & D or text based computer games like Zork.

#4.  Laughing at NON-PC things.
Back in the day comedians like Sam Kinison and Andrew Dice Clay actually joked about taboo topics like world hunger, and Womens issues' and nobody went crazy. I still remember after 9/11, people gingerly asking, "is it okay to be funny again?". At the time when America could most have used a laugh, everyone was so worried about offending everybody that we began taking ourselves just too seriously. Frankly, I get so weary of having to worry all the time, if I say x or y, who might I offend.  *The below piece has a bit of salty language, but for crying out loud people, get a sense of humor!* 

                          

#5.  Jello Pudding Pops
 I am not sure what caused them to go out of favor. But as 80's kid living in Florida, there was something totally awesome about your dinnertime pudding being made into a frozen treat. And say what you want about Bill Cosby, what he did or didn't do, the Coz warmed our hearts in the 80's with Jello Magic.

#6. Saturday Morning Cartoons
Even though it worked out differently, I remember looking forward to watching Saturday morning cartoons with my own kids. No was more shocked than me when they just sort of disappeared from the air.  Note: This is long....but nostalgia-packed, feel free to rewind or fast forward as the mood moves.

#7.  MTV-When it used to play music videos
Back in the 1980's, you didn't have to hit You Tube in order to see the music/groups you liked best.

#8. Arcades
 The deafening sound of 50-80 machines all being played at once, the smell of un-washed bodies and stale pizza and the clink of the quarter in the slot. You remember that right?

#9.   Roller Skating Rinks
Before PlayStation, X-Box, the proliferation of Cable TV, computers, and helicopter parenting, kids used to get dropped off by their Moms at the roller rink on a Saturday afternoon. It was a perfect way to spend a day, you hoped for the Dazz Band's "Whip It" to play, you ate crap at the snack bar like cokes, candy and popcorn, and you wanted it never to end.

#10.   Big Hair
And here we end up back where we started, I miss big hair. You didn't worry about humidity and frizz so much, in fact you sort of welcomed it. And frankly, it was a totally awesome, gravity defying sight to behold.

So, there they are, just a few of the things I miss from the 1980's. 
I know life goes on and you can't stand still but every so often...it's nice to go back.
Now to go and make sure my beachy waves aren't frizzed out...