Retreat to the 1980's

I've been dipping into the 80's in my mind recently...

They seem to represent the best years of my life - full of naivete and excitement. I can still picture many of the formative events in my life that took place between 1980 and 1988. Legos. The beach. Skateboarding. Dungeons and Dragons! BMX. Ostentatious sports cars gleaming in the sun... Fireflies on the side of the road. My first sexual encounter. My first love...

I feel a pressing sadness in recent days, probably due to an unexpected streak of meaninglessness in life and work. Don't get me wrong - I love my job! But the gristmill that is day-to-day life grinds you into obscurity, despite sustaining the comfort of an average suburbanite. Today, I read obituaries in the newspaper. But my thoughts drift back to the tail-end of the 1970's when I stared at a KISS poster my cousin displayed in her room, wondering what kind of person would listen to such demonic music! And why a poster of Andy Gibb was platered right next to that? And did Andy Gibb really only wear tennis shoes in all his photo shoots? Too late now, as he is dead from a cocaine overdose.

So many vivid memories at the turn of my life, when passing the threshhold of manhood was still such a mysterious event. I honestly couldn't explain the electricity in the air back then to kids of the 90's (or even of the new Millenium) - it was a mix of danger and excitement. Will you live past Friday? Who can remember the proliferation of cocaine use and the Soviet nuclear threat? Strange indeed.

And now, reaching adulthood, life is no longer a mystery. It is a dirty, easily-repeatable experiment in base emotions and boredom. If you can learn to be a productive citizen in American society, then you may learn something about what makes you tick. For many, the ultimate lesson is lost. They wander in the fog of the past and hide from the threat of the future. Not sure that is what most people really wanted out of life, kids or no, but it facilitates the "zombie lifestyle" that permeates this country today.

Hope some of us wake up and one day the rest notice.