Finding Ninee » Sharing our parenting and special needs stories with heart and humor.

What it Felt Like to Be a High School Freshman in 1982

foto share for ftsf linkup

Today, I created three new recycling bags of packing paper looking for a photo of my brother and I with my grandparents. I won’t give any more away because I’ll use that photo one of these weeks. Speaking of packing paper… I unwound a huge taped-up wad of it to find a charging cord, a sticky-note pad, and a pen that doesn’t work. Government inefficiency strikes again when moving across the country.

Anyway, it’s photo (or make that Foto for Finish the Sentence Friday) share week and I want to tell you about what it felt like to be a high school freshman in 1982.

I was at a loss not being able to find that photo of my brother and I, but gave up and decided to organize some stuff for my desk. One of those items is an old, torn, small yellow envelope containing most of the IDs I’ve had including my first driver’s license (if it’s not legal to own old driver’s licenses, never mind, it must have been something else).

I snapped a photo of my high school ID, freshman year. Wow, was I young. It’s funny how you don’t feel much older each year – you’re still YOU and all that. Fatter and more wrinkled, but YOU, ya know?

What it Felt Like to Be a High School Freshman in 1982

What it Felt Like to Be a High School Freshman in 1982

Being a high school freshman in 1982 felt like freedom and growing up. We had no cell phones and had to call our parents from pay phones if we were going to be late for curfew.

We listened to music that my nine-year-old is familiar with because it’s on my phone. It includes Survivor’s Eye of the Tiger (on Tucker’s playlist for his birthday and epic watergun fight celebration), Joan Jett’s I Love Rock and Roll, and Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder’s Ebony and Ivory (that Eddie Murphy and somebody did a great parody of once for Saturday Night Live).

Preppy was in, and my friend Carol and I decorated our lockers in plaid shelf-paper and alligators. I played on the tennis and volleyball teams, and my hair was feathered from bang to shoulder. My hair got more poofy as the years went by.

MTV had only been out for a year, and they played music videos all day long.

Our landlines were attached to the wall with a cord, and call waiting was new enough that I could trick my friend Gillian into thinking her other line was ringing. I played her songs using an instruction book and different numbers on the keypad.

I had gigantic stereo speakers and record set in my room, and listened to music in the dark, staring up at my cluster of holiday lights.

It was a couple of years before I went to a laser show, but the years blend together, as memories of concerts and teen angst.

Stereos were big in the 70

In 1982, we were wildly naive. We didn’t have our own YouTube Channel (my son’s). We didn’t have FaceBook.

Video games were only played at the mall using quarters unless you were like my friend Julie whose parents spoiled her with an Atari.

There were four channels on TV, and streaming was something that meant nothing, unless it maybe meant going rafting in the mountains.

what it felt like being a high school freshman in 1982

We were afraid of windowless white vans, and took a buddy with us when wandering around the neighborhood after dark. We were allowed to wander the neighborhood after dark. At 13. It’s true. We babysat other kids, too. By ourselves. With no cell phones or Snapchat to amuse us. We had to work for that $2.00/hour.

Malls were cool, and the only place we had to buy jean jackets and shoes. Yup, that’s right. Being a high school freshman in 1982 meant NO Amazon Prime! In fact, Amazon wasn’t even founded for another 12 years.

In 1982, if we wanted to listen to music wandering around the neighborhood after dark, we had to buy a Walkman (more than $100 and we made $2/hour babysitting). Most of us were left with our thoughts to amuse us back then.

With no seatbelts, often.

Unless we could sing, but who sings in public? At least, if you did sing in public back then, nobody would film you from her iPhone because those didn’t exist either of course.

We were the first to play Trivial Pursuit back then because that’s when it was released. We loved it, even though it made us feel dumb, and we couldn’t cheat using Google… because – you guessed it – Google didn’t exist back then! If we wanted to know something, we had to ride our bikes (with no helmets) to the library and figure out the Dewey Decimal system to look it up.

Honestly, I love my technology today. I love being able to type my thoughts into this WordPress site, click “Publish” and interact with people all over the world with social media, blogging, all of it.

But also? I miss the simplicity of the 80’s. I think there’s something lost today in not letting our kids wander around after dark with no cell phones (and hellz no, I don’t do that either).

What do you miss about the 80’s if you’re old like I am?

***

This has been a Finish the Sentence Friday post, where this week (week four) is “Share a photo foto, and the story behind it,” hosted by yours truly and my fabulous co-host Kenya Johnson of Sporadically Yours.

 Loading InLinkz ...


  • Kenya G. Johnson - My post was going to go another way too, and I won’t say to much because I’ll probably use it. But I was just thinking today as much of a techie as I am I miss having a cellphone that didn’t do a million things.

    This is so nostalgic. I think one of the reasons I enjoyed Stranger Things so much is because I could relate to being around that age at that time. And thinking about MTV and there was another video channel but anyway thinking back at the WHO was on MTV makes it seem like it was a premium channel.

    I miss the Casey Kasem countdown. That’s a throwback!July 26, 2018 – 9:40 pmReplyCancel

    • Kristi Campbell - It’s weird right? I mean we love how we get all into technology and the whole “LOOK WHAT I CAN DO!” which is awesome but also feels sometimes like cheating, in a way… I loved Stranger Things so much too, and I think their use of old technology was so cool. Have you watched “The Americans?” I can’t remember if I asked before but they did a great job of showing the 70’s fashion and tv and the rest of it too.
      OM WHO was on MTV!!!!! I miss Casey Kasem too!July 26, 2018 – 9:47 pmReplyCancel

  • Emily - I miss the simplicity of the 80s too and talk to my kids about it all the time! And, boy is your memory impressive — you totally jogged my memory of that SNL parody of “Ebony & Ivory” And that photo ID photo is awesome — so cute and yes, so YOU.July 26, 2018 – 10:14 pmReplyCancel

    • Kristi Campbell - OMG the Ebony and Ivory parody. “You are black, and I am white,” I MISS SNL back then. I don’t think Tucker gets the 80’s and what it was really like to not have YouTube… but I’ll keep preaching. xoJuly 26, 2018 – 11:38 pmReplyCancel

  • Pat B - This was so enjoyable!

    Love that picture of the young you.

    Those windowless vans struck a note of fear into the hearts of parents and made sure their children knew what not to do.July 27, 2018 – 12:27 amReplyCancel

  • Pat B - This caused some great reminiscing of the times. Love that photo of the younger you.

    Oh, the scary white vans, or vans of any color that did not have windows except for the cab. Parents warned their children of the possible dangers and what to do. Women didn’t park next to them in the grocery store parking lots at night.July 27, 2018 – 12:31 amReplyCancel

    • Kristi Campbell - Thanks, Pat. I still get a bit freaked out when I see one of those vans today. And I’d never park next to one even now! 🙂July 27, 2018 – 10:29 pmReplyCancel

  • Lizzi - Reckon I was a 90’s child lol. 1982 is before my time 😜

    Sounds idyllic in a lot of ways though, and I remember similar things but a bit more techy. Computers were debuting in schools and lots more people had them at home. I think I babysat for £5 an hour and considered myself well off, by the time I was allowed to (?1997). I remember making our own entertainment though, and the Dewy Decimal system, and pavement chalk and water fights and being kinda carefree.July 27, 2018 – 1:26 amReplyCancel

    • Kristi Campbell - Yeah yeah, before your time. Sigh. I’m OLD. I do think there’s something to kids making their own entertainment. I need to make Tucker do that more often when it doesn’t involve the iPad…July 27, 2018 – 10:31 pmReplyCancel

  • Kerry - Ah, the eighties. Love it Kristi. I hardly remember them, but the music lives on for me, in a big way. It mist have left quite the impression, but I know I’m definitely not the only one.July 28, 2018 – 9:36 amReplyCancel

    • Kristi Campbell - Even Tucker knows a bunch of 80’s music so some of it must’ve been good. Or maybe I just play it in the car a lot and now it’s familiar to him 🙂August 4, 2018 – 12:57 pmReplyCancel

  • Sarah Balding - I don’t have any recollection of the 80s as I was less than 2 years old when it ended. 😆I did get properly schooled in 80s music by my parents, so at least I got that going for me. My high school years were in the early 2000s, but I regale my 18 year old sister with stories of a time when you would drive places without a cell phone and had to rewind VHS tapes. I did not share any pictures from that time because I was obsessed with trying to perm my stick straight hair and failed miserably. 😂July 28, 2018 – 8:44 pmReplyCancel

  • Christine Carter - Ah… Those were the days, right? My gosh, it WAS so much simpler then. I’m glad I don’t go to high school these days. I can only imagine what I would have done with social media during those crazy, reckless, wandering years!July 30, 2018 – 8:46 amReplyCancel

Your email is never published or shared. Required fields are marked *

*

*

N e v e r   m i s s   a   n e w   p o s t !