In the 80s

In the 80s, life was simple. There were only ten or twenty TV stations. MTV played music videos and disc jockeys actually spun records of their own choosing.

We didn’t worry about ingesting chemicals or eating processed foods. We just gobbled down whatever was tasty. If we wanted the news, we either tuned in to the local television network or we picked up a newspaper.

We didn’t have personal computers and smart phones. The closest thing to Twitter was the water cooler in your office or the jungle gym on your school’s playground. Yes, to discuss what was going on in the world, we actually had to talk to people in person. When we missed our favorite TV shows, we were just plain screwed. There was no Tivo, no Hulu, and no iTunes.

We didn’t have as much and didn’t know as much, which totally explains why looking back on the 80s, everything seems so innocent.

In the 80s…

Yes, life may have been simpler in the 80s but it wasn’t quite as convenient either. Things were weirdly and totally different. Want proof? You got it:

• In the 80s, Michael Jackson was a sex symbol.
• Bert and Ernie’s relationship was completely platonic.
• An egg represented your brain. A fried egg represented your brain on drugs.
• We knew all the words to the Oscar Meyer wiener commercials (Oh I wish I was an Oscar Meyer wiener).
• We turned up the collars on our blouses, jackets, and polo shirts.
• We were perpetually gagging on spoons.
• We learned grammar by watching Schoolhouse Rock.
• We wondered where the beef was.
• We toted around walkmans that weighed several pounds so we could listen to our favorite mix tapes on the go.
• David Hasselhoff was cool and drove one bad-ass, talking car.
• We wore leg warmers even if we weren’t dancers.
• A Commodore 64 was considered advanced technology.
• We wore three or more pairs of socks and bought shoes two sizes too large to accommodate them.
• Donkey Kong had such realistic graphics!
• Everybody had a keyboard (the music kind, not the computer kind).
• We honestly believed either Debbie Gibson or Tiffany would be the next big princess of pop.
• Atari was cutting edge in the 80s.
• People used typewriters.
• Everyone had big plans for listening to Prince’s “1999″ on the eve of the new millennium… in 10 or 20 years.
• You had to listen carefully to a song (over and over) and take notes in order to get all the lyrics.
• Every family had a station wagon.
• There were only two flavors of coffee: regular and decaffeinated.
• The movie TRON had the best special effects ever.
• Teenagers had keg parties when their parents were out of town. If nobody’s parents were out of town, they brought the keg out to some rural road.
• Everybody danced in the 80s.
• Pretty much everybody knew where the phrase “kiss mah grits” came from and they also knew what it meant.
• Luke and Laura’s wedding was just as important as any other wedding you were actually invited to.
• We wondered who shot J.R. (and everyone knew who J.R. was).
• Obtaining a Cabbage Patch Kid seemed like the most important goal in life.
• Being a Material Girl didn’t seem like a bad thing at all.
• Gummy bears were a strange, new candy.
• Everybody was reading Deenie by Judy Blume because there was supposedly swear words and sex in it!
• Reebok tennis shoes were super cool.
• There was no underlying meaning when someone suggested you drink a little Kool-Aid.
• Getting in and out of your car via the windows (rather than the doors) seemed like a good idea.
• Star Search seemed like a possible vehicle for launching your music career.
• We pegged and rolled our pant legs, and not because they were too wide or too long.
• “Psych” meant “just kidding” and had nothing to do with one’s mental state.
• We wore bright, florescent clothing and accessories with absolutely no shame.
• We tried desperately to master the moonwalk.
• We could remember listening to 8-track tapes and cassettes seemed state-of-the-art by comparison.
• It was assumed that people would be living on the moon and astronauts would have visited Mars by the year 2000.
• There was nothing chauvinistic about the fact that Smurfette was the only female Smurf.
• Every other word we said was “like,” “totally,” or “like totally.”
• In the 80s, punk rockers were shocking.
• We bought and used large quantities of Aqua-Net aerosol canned hairspray.
• We actually wanted our MTV because they actually played music videos.
• Guys who pierced their ears were either way cool and edgy, gay, or both.
• Everybody, and I mean EVERYBODY, owned at least one Rubik’s Cube.
• Rotary phones standard. Push-button phones were futuristic.
• Nobody could figure out how to program a VCR, so all the digital VCR clocks read 12:00 and flashed incessantly.
• You could wake up with bed-head and that was considered presentable.
• Ronald Regan was just an actor from the olden days.
• Ronald McDonald might actually make an appearance at your local McDonald’s.
• There were cartoons on TV that made getting up early on Saturday morning worthwhile.
• People still communicated by handwriting letters and putting them in the mail.
• Watching movies at home, whenever we wanted, was a novelty.
• If we wanted a song, we either tape-recorded it off the radio or we had to buy the whole album.
• It was cool to write all over your shoes (and some clothes) with magic marker.
• Only pirates and convicts had tattoos in the 80s.
• Nobody worried about the end of the world or taking care of the planet.
• To get money out of the bank, you had to walk in during business hours and sign your name on a withdrawal slip.
• If you placed a call to a company, a real, live human being would answer and they would actually help you.
• M&Ms melted in your mouth, not in your hands, and the green ones made you horny.
• The U.S. had a comprehensive space program and people cared about it.
• Pluto was still a planet.
• The U.S. still manufactured goods, like clothing, cars, electronics, and so on.
• Porky’s was like the dirtiest movie ever made.
• Mickey Roarke was a sex god.
• “Bad” sometimes meant “good.”
• Our lunchboxes featured our favorite TV characters.
• A valley girl was not a girl who lived in the valley — it was a way of life.

The 80s

Sometimes, it’s hard to believe how far we’ve come in just a few, short decades. We look back at the 80s and wonder how we got by without all the technology that we have today. We’re a little embarrassed about what we wore in the 80s and the things that impressed us back then seem absurd now. But it was the 80s — we didn’t know any better. And life was good.