FacebookTwitter
Hatrack River Forum   
my profile login | search | faq | forum home

  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» Hatrack River Forum » Active Forums » Books, Films, Food and Culture » Ten Years (Page 2)

  This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2   
Author Topic: Ten Years
TomDavidson
Member
Member # 124

 - posted      Profile for TomDavidson   Email TomDavidson         Edit/Delete Post 
"do you want to talk about it?"

Just feeling old, Kamila. [Smile] I mean, people are talking about these bands from their childhood, and I was going out to college bars and writing 'zines about 'em.

Thirty's going to come as a bit of a shock, I think. I can feel it looming. I may run out to buy some fingerpaints and a Camero.

Admittedly, it's got to be worse for the handful of people on this board who came of age with Led Zeppelin.

[ March 24, 2005, 12:39 PM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]

Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
twinky
Member
Member # 693

 - posted      Profile for twinky   Email twinky         Edit/Delete Post 
I missed this thread the first time, somehow. I like it. [Smile]

quote:
1994 was really the last year music was good.
I didn't realize that until about 2001. Between 1991 and 1994 I wasn't really listening to rock, but now that's my favourite musical period. I didn't get on the bandwagon until everyone else was getting off (1995-1996ish).
Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
breyerchic04
Member
Member # 6423

 - posted      Profile for breyerchic04   Email breyerchic04         Edit/Delete Post 
I'm cheating because I blocked march of 1995 out, so I'm pretending I was on hatrack when this thread started, january of 1994, making me a second grader ten years before.

My second grade teacher had just left on leave because she was sick (later found to be rheumatoid arthritis), we had over 20 different subs that semester, finally finding one who liked us enough to not run out of the room in about an hour. We had just learned our first grade teacher died. He never said he was sick, it wasn't socially acceptable, he had left the school to write a book or something. The morning his obituary was in the paper, my mom told me, read it to me, and said he was a very nice man. At school that afternoon they sent home letters, not really explaining anything to us, and the words were too big, and mostly not words we knew. Things like Human Immune Defiency Virus, AIDS, Life Partner. The main point of the letter was to prove that we were not sick, this wasn't much (not sure how much) after the Ryan White stuff, and in the same state. People started saying mean things about this teacher, and I was very upset because he had supported me, fought to have me tested for dyslexia and ADD, which had made it possible for me to receive accomadations, and actually thrive in school. I don't think I had many real friends at this point, maybe a few, but everything was just too sad, and hard for me. That's probably why I have blocked third grade from my mind.

Posts: 5362 | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
saxon75
Member
Member # 4589

 - posted      Profile for saxon75           Edit/Delete Post 
So Tom, if you're just about to turn thirty, then ten years ago you shouldn't have been old enough to go to college bars.

I was a freshman in high school when Superunknown was released, although I don't think I got it until the fall. There are a bunch of albums I no longer have that I wish I could remember what happened to, and that's one of them.

Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
rivka
Member
Member # 4859

 - posted      Profile for rivka   Email rivka         Edit/Delete Post 
Ten years ago I was the mother of a one-year old. I was happily married, and working on my bachelors in chemistry.

I knew exactly where my life was going . . .

Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
ketchupqueen
Member
Member # 6877

 - posted      Profile for ketchupqueen   Email ketchupqueen         Edit/Delete Post 
10 years ago, I was looking forward to turning 12 and graduating from elementary school.

Wow.

Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
LilBee91
Member
Member # 7475

 - posted      Profile for LilBee91           Edit/Delete Post 
10 years ago I was 4. I don't remember anything. I think I might have been in preschool, but probably not. Both of my brothers were still in elementary school. I was reading already, according to my mother. I was probably about 3'5" and 40 lbs. Actually, I have no idea. Ya, that is about it. I feel so young [Razz]
Posts: 46 | Registered: Mar 2005  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
J T Stryker
Member
Member # 6300

 - posted      Profile for J T Stryker   Email J T Stryker         Edit/Delete Post 
10 years ago I was getting suspended from school for the first time... It was the 1st grade and I beat up some kid because he told me that I was going to hell for listeing to Def Leppard. Which I had just finnished touring with (the "Retro Active" tour).
Posts: 1094 | Registered: Mar 2004  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Brinestone
Member
Member # 5755

 - posted      Profile for Brinestone   Email Brinestone         Edit/Delete Post 
Almost exactly ten years ago I was moving away from Maryland to Colorado. I had some good friends in Maryland, and I didn't make friends in Colorado for about three years after I moved. I was eleven.
Posts: 1903 | Registered: Sep 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Icarus
Member
Member # 3162

 - posted      Profile for Icarus   Email Icarus         Edit/Delete Post 
Wow! I missed this thread last year--I must have been lurking when it was around. How very cool this is!

What's neat is that since this is the same period of time for all of us (albeit a two year span, now), I can remember a lot of the things people talk about, like the Blizzard of the Century and stuff!

Ten years ago, I was in my second year of grad school at Clemson. I knew I needed a job for next year, but I didn't think about it much. I interviewed with one school, a private Catholic high school in Greenville, SC that was only two years old and would be adding a junior year next year (they were adding grades one year at a time). Anyway, they were a Catholic school, and I was Catholic. They were going to be in serious need of teachers, and I had degrees in Math and English, had been teaching English for one year to college students, I could teach programming, because I had worked as a programmer, I could teach theology, because I had an extensive background in that, and I could teach Spanish, because it was my first language. It was obviously in the bag, so I didn't apply for any other jobs. (I didn't want to teach in a public school, because I have never taken any education courses and so I was not certified to do so. And I adamantly did not want to take any education courses.) So, of course, I did not get this job, and that really left me scrounging. But they didn't call me to say no, they just didn't call me. And I was so absurdly overconfident that I didn't worry about this. I figured they would get around to it. I waited. And waited. And waited. Looking back, after a year of teaching college kids, I must have come across as WAY too liberal, and smug as well. I didn't show deference to anybody back then. I respected people as equals until they proved my estimation too high or too low, and I guess bosses don't want to start as equals.

I had just broken up with the "love of my life" for whom I left seminary. Among other things, I was entirely too conservative for her. We had this huge fight over abortion. [Roll Eyes] That wasn't the breakup, but that was when I began to realize I was living with a stranger. Not because I didn't know her beliefs, but because she didn't know, could not fathom, and could not respect mine. There was a lot more to the breakup than that, of course, but that little bit is what poured out of my hands just now.

Anyway, I had spent the last four years or so being hit on by women all the freaking time, but never enjoying the benefits, because I was committed. I looked forward to being single and enjoying the single life. But I found that whatever magic charisma I had when I was committed dried up when I was single. Looking back, I can see now that I was trying too hard. I had lots of first dates, but very few second dates. So I tried something easy (now we're getting on toward November in the story) and called up one of the girls who used to hit on me back when I was in college. She still wanted me. She was more desperate than I was. She had one or two kids from her ex-husband, and she was looking for a man to fill that void. She tried really hard to have sex with me, and I kind of realized right there that I was being an ass, because I didn't want to have sex with her. Why the hell would I not want to have sex with a willing woman? Because I knew I wasn't romantically attracted to her; I just needed someone to feed my ego. I politely left her house, making the obligatory promises to call soon, and never did. Only time I ever did that, I think. I ran into her at a funeral five years ago. She didn't seem angry or anything, but who the hell knows? I sure felt awkward.

Going back to ten years ago . . . this was the last point in time that I was active in the Catholic Church. I was living in a college town, where the churches are more liberal and youthful as well. I was very active, as a lector and a eucharistic minister, and in the univerisity catholic student group. When I moved back to Miami in September (because I didn't have a job, and the power had been cut, the stuff in the fridge was bad and maggot-covered, and I had a warrant out on me for a bad check to Winn-Dixie, and I was two months late on the rent, etc. etc. etc.) I found I could not stand going to any of the churches there. I felt like I was surrounded by shallow hypocrites. Of course, that's not fair, but these are my recollections. Everything was about dressing beautifully and wearing lots of perfume/cologne and being visible but there was none of the joy I had experienced in Clemson.

But again, that was in the fall.

Spring of 1995 was, in retrospect (and this only occurs to me now) the last year of my childhood. (Which makes sense, as I was trying to recover my "lost childhood" at this point in my life, too.) It was an absolutely wonderful time. I was independent and active. I had a LOT of good friends. I was in awesome shape, and apparently good-looking to boot, though that would never have occurred to me; I was so stunned when I girl who was hitting on me while I was hitting on another girl at a grad student function said so, so matter-of-factly like I clearly would have to be conscious of this fact. I enjoyed what I was doing with my days. I wanted life to on almost exactly like it was forever. (The only changes I would make would have been to have a better dating life and to make more money so I could stop living hand to mouth. I saw the high school job I was sure I was going to get as a means to the latter.)

I'm thinking about it now, and it reminds me of the British living in colonial China right before World War Two in Empire of the Sun. (I love that movie, by the way, even though the critics did not.) This was the moment in time right before the bubble burst.

Six months later, I was basically starting from scratch, but that's okay. I was still pretty happy-go-lucky at this point in my life, because no matter what else happened, I had seen worse. And a year later, I was engaged!

I guess I can talk about that when somebody bumps this thread next year. [Smile]

Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Myr
Member
Member # 5956

 - posted      Profile for Myr   Email Myr         Edit/Delete Post 
Hmmm this is one of my favorite threads ever. [Smile]
Posts: 105 | Registered: Nov 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
TomDavidson
Member
Member # 124

 - posted      Profile for TomDavidson   Email TomDavidson         Edit/Delete Post 
quote:

So Tom, if you're just about to turn thirty, then ten years ago you shouldn't have been old enough to go to college bars.

*lays a finger aside of his nose* [Smile]

You know, though, while we're talking about 1994 as the last year music was good -- and I'd be inclined to agree -- I must say that there's been a pretty good upswing in the music industry in the last year or two, too. I've really been grooving on Jet, The Killers, Nellie MacKay, etc....I mean, I'm not about to run out and hug the editors of Pitchfork or anything, but I think we're finally seeing some good stuff hit the mainstream again.

That said, I could do with less nu-metal. But couldn't we all?

Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
saxon75
Member
Member # 4589

 - posted      Profile for saxon75           Edit/Delete Post 
I was thinking about it last night, and I think that the music of an era really belongs to the teens. I certainly feel a certain "ownership" of the early 90's music.

Music is never as magical and powerful and passionate as it is when you're 15. Early high school is the point when most people are really starting to discover themselves as individuals, and a big part of that is beginning to listen to music other than what their parents like. Plus the whole hormone thing is making all of your passions fly higher. A fifteen-year-old may not have the life experience to fully appreciate all the subtleties of lyrics or composition, but I don't think that matters so much; it's the passion, the newness that matters.

Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
saxon75
Member
Member # 4589

 - posted      Profile for saxon75           Edit/Delete Post 
By the way, Tom, just wait until people start talking about, say, Franz Ferdinand or The Killers as the music of their childhood. You think you feel old now . . .
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
Megan
Member
Member # 5290

 - posted      Profile for Megan           Edit/Delete Post 
I am also among those who missed this thread the first time around.

Ten years ago, I was 16, and a junior in high school. I was so competitive then that I'm not sure the person I was then would recognize the woman I've become. I was fiercely concerned about getting good grades, and about my cello-playing. I was on the academic team, and had finally found a social niche--one that also fed my competitive drives.

That was the year I got first chair in the All-State Orchestra, and managed to persuade myself that every other audition situation I'd ever been in was enormously biased. I'd also just come off a summer of playing in a really high-level chamber orchestra and Governor's Honors Program, and was an utter musical snob. I practiced an absolutely absurd amount of time each day, and got next to no sleep, and thrived on it.

I finally decided that the boy who had been my "good friend" since freshman year was a weenie and was never going to ask me out, so I shifted my crush to a nerdy theater type (who turned out to be gay). I spent huge amounts of time with my best friend Karen, doing absolutely nothing in particular. She consciously decided not to go to prom and had an anti-prom party for like-minded people (she called it "Morp"). We dressed in jeans and watched anime and Monty Python and went to McDonalds. It was more fun than it sounds like, now that I've described it.

In 1995, I weighed the least amount that I ever have in my adult life. I'd come off a militant diet over the previous spring and summer, having lost roughly 40 pounds. I would later find out that guys were in fact interested in me, but were too scared to ask me out (since, by this time, I had a reputation not only for being very intelligent, but also for being very, very sarcastic. Imagine Daria. Yeah, that was me.).

My college plans were in the preparation stages. I was definitely going to get a Hope scholarship to a state school that had a cello teacher with whom I wanted to study. It was about this time that I heard about that school's Presidential Scholarship, which ended up giving me a stipend to live on during college along with a $1500 grant to travel with during the summer--thus allowing me, along with the full ride that the hope scholarship provided, to make money off my undergrad. To get this scholarship, I wrote what I still consider to be one of my most interesting piece of writing--the scholarship essay topic was "What book has most influenced you and why?" My answer was the dictionary. [Smile]

Wow...how strange.

edited for wonky spacing

[ March 25, 2005, 02:00 PM: Message edited by: Megan ]

Posts: 4077 | Registered: Jun 2003  |  IP: Logged | Report this post to a Moderator
  This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2   

   Close Topic   Feature Topic   Move Topic   Delete Topic next oldest topic   next newest topic
 - Printer-friendly view of this topic
Hop To:


Contact Us | Hatrack River Home Page

Copyright © 2008 Hatrack River Enterprises Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.


Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classic™ 6.7.2