WHERE, INDEED, IS THE BEEF?
Back to Hughesville: A Personal Memoir of the Eighties
Being a teen in the eighties wasn’t all popped collars, hair spray and shoulder pads
I got nothing against you Gen Z’s, but I think we had more fun back in the eighties when we could drink and fight and fornicate publicly without some fumble-wit monetizing it on TikTok.
Those days are long gone now, and my memories are getting foggy, so let me give you a little taste before they vanish completely.
Man, we had some fun.
My first girlfriend was Sloane. We only went out for about three weeks, and I was lucky to get that because she was the most popular girl in our high school. Every day there’d be five or six guys standing under her bedroom window holding boomboxes over their heads, blasting out Peter Gabriel. The boomboxes were never in sync though and it sure pissed off her dad.
Sloane dumped me for a weird kid in a vest who looked like he was about thirty. That didn’t work out either though. He ended up in prison, doing nine years for grand theft auto, identity theft, and wrecking a parade, which is a felony in this state.
I never saw Sloane after that but I heard she got knocked up by some dance instructor in the Poconos. When he was locked up for statutory rape she moved to England. Some people just have terrible luck.
We had more sex in the eighties. Partly that was because we used to hang out face to face, not through our devices. Partly it was because if a girl was drunk or passed out or it was dark and you convinced her that you were her boyfriend, it was ok to have sex with her. Back then, “Me Too” was something your buddies standing in the doorway would say.
Sure it sounds horrible now, but those were the rules in the eighties and we all turned out fine. The guys, I mean. Some of us became Supreme Court justices or Presidents.
Music-based fitness was a big thing. We used to have Jane Fonda’s Workout parties, and our parents had Henry Fonda’s Workout parties. All you needed were some neon legwarmers and a headband, although most people wore something on their torso.
The second kind of fitness routine was the montage. It was efficient because you could get in a full workout in the time it took to play a power ballad about being in a danger zone or having an eye like a tiger.
Being a teen in the eighties wasn’t all hair spray and shoulder pads. Our school could be a violent place and you had to watch your step. This one kid who moved from New Jersey thought he was a tough martial arts guy, and he’d bully my buddies because they were in a different karate club. When they tried to fight back he showed up with some Japanese dude who was like seventy, but man, he sure could fight.
Imagine a guy that age beating on a bunch of high school kids. Crazy times.
We also knew an Aussie guy, he was a little older but we’d hang out with him sometimes. He was real friendly. When we saw him in the street, he’d pull out this big machete that he carried in a holster on his back, and say “Now, that’s a knife.” We always laughed because if you didn’t he’d try to cut off one of your fingers.
Most Saturday mornings I’d go to the school and sit in the library with my friends, and the vice-principal would cook us waffles and bacon. I don’t remember why.
We had a great time dancing and smoking weed, and figuring out who we were, the way that kids do. Usually, I was the nerd or the tough guy, but one week I got to be the sad goth girl that gets a makeover. That was the year I went to the prom with Jake.
Those sure were good times. It makes me a little bit sad to think that a lot of my friends from those days are dead, and the rest are on Facebook. But sometimes you just gotta pop your collar and get on with life.
