I have been knee-deep in the 90’s this week. I’ve just finished Chuck Klosterman’s The Nineties, which was amazing and reminded me about a lot of shit I eithe forgot or chose to block out. Honestly, either one is possible. AND, Ross and I watched the documentary on Netflix about Woodstock ’99. I do remember this shit show happening. I was 20 at the time and-even then-thought that idea about recreating the original woodstock was dumb. Us Gen Xers aren’t nearly as naive or as idealistc as some Boomers used to be.
I grew up in te real world. I remember being five and playing at a friend’s house where we came up with a plan on how to proceed if a kidnapper van rolled up on us. And we were very specific. If it was a van and not a minvan, with no windows on the side; one of us was going to get the license plate and the other was to go inside for an adult. We were FIVE. By th time 1999 came around, we were all jaded as hell and apathetic about it.
Watching that three part series, I looked at the line up of bands, the set up of the event, and I didn’t particularly remember it falling into one of the seven levels of hell, but I wasn’t suprised. There were alot of rage inducing bands, and 150,000 white frat bros. What the actual fuck did they think was going to happen? I’m seriously suprised there weren’t more sexual assaults happening. I feel like alot of the cluster that that event became could have been avoided if the lead organizers had simply listened to the people who worked for them that were under 25.
Anyway . . . the 90’s, at least the 90’s I remember were good? I guess. I remember Desert Storm going okay. TV was great. We had a balanced budget. Regardless of the things I remember (i’m guessing I’m at like 40%), the things that I don’t remember (like another 40%), and the things I do remember but are wrong about (the final 20%), the 1990’s shaped me and transpired during my formative years. However, I realize that I blocked most of it out. And for good reason, high school sucked and I don’t think there’s anyone who liked that period of their lives. If you do, therapy might be for you.
That being said, there was some pretty awesome shit that happened in the 90’s. Nirvana‘s Nevermind blew up conventional rock. Garth Brooks owned the decade and no one seems to remember that. Zima came and went. I don’t know of anyone who actually liked that shit, but everyone drank it. I, personally, had a lot of Co-Ed Naked T-Shirts and I wore them to school. No one cared or said anything. If you don’t remember what those were, see below.
In fact, I had this very shirt.
There was also some horrible shit that happened in the 90’s. All of Joel Schumacher’s Batman movies. Don’t kid yourself. Those are bad. Oklahoma City bombing. Columbine. Tiny daisy/Butterfly hair clips all in a row across your head (see any white actress in their 20’s during the decade and you’ll find a picture). The entire country losing their minds about Clinton getting a blow job. Considering what happened on January 6th of last year, a blow job seems like a stupid thing to lose your shit over now doesn’t it…
Did Monica Lewinsky deserve the vitriol she got or the embarassment? Hell no! (as an aside, follow her on Twitter. She’s hilarious).
But if you think that every sitting president since the dawn of the republic hasn’t gotten a blow job from someone, you are incredibly naive and don’t understand power structures.
Thinking back about the decade, I’m not sure what to make of it. I suppose there are good and bad about any period of time. The 90’s were weird and transitional. There were a lot of Boomers trying to hold on to a value system that no longer applied. The world had changed and moved on without them. Gen Xer’s who were pretty much forgotten but not really sad about it. Moving from analog to digital with the ease of their formative years when they learned to cook Chef Boyardee to survive until their parents got home. And millenials who were still to young to really appreciate the calm before the storm of the 2000’s.
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