#prenostalgia

Because, as any good (quasi-) Gen X-er, my body is made up of roughly 55% nostalgia. 

I was 12 years old in 1994. A little blip between a very insular childhood and an adolescence which would look nothing like the big-haired, hoop-earringed and glamorous life that I had parsed together from various examples around me (the older girls from dance class and Muchmusic, natch). Yes, '80s pop culture had imprinted on me profoundly, but that would stay dormant for awhile. 

I was, as most 12 year olds are, a bit of a blank slate. Unlike(?) most 12 year olds, I was plagued by the unbearable lightness of my own being. Among the symbols of said blankness: an un-decorated room I shared with my sister in our new house, and an empty notebook given to me for my last birthday. I had been informed by my parents and teachers that I had a bit of a knack for writing, but I honestly had no idea what that meant. My inability to put anything in that notebook weighed on me.

If I had known what an idea was, I would have realized that I actually had a couple of them. But they had yet to be awoken or validated by any outside forces, so did I really? Being a child of the late 20th century, I would look to popular culture to fill in a good number of my cranial vacancies; for better or for worse, both consciously and subconsciously. You might say that 1994 took my mind at its most fecund point and-- you know what? Nevermind.

I was a child who longed for the freedom and wisdom that seemed to come with adulthood; a history that could be measured in years as vast and valid as twenty behind me. I remember what it felt like to look forward to looking back, as though it would somehow legitimize the space I was taking up on this dark globe.

And now I realize that I'm here. And it's just as I imagined! Fullness and regret, richness and poverty, rooms full of stuff. Teaching the kids about things that used to matter, getting the kids to teach me about slang. 

I am here to tell you that I have seen some retro lists in my time, and 1995 cannot hold a candle to the year that preceded it. I considered it, of course, because I soon realized that my plan of 94 blogs in the last 94 days of 2014 was not gonna happen, and the Internet loves easily digestible landmarks to help organize its memories.

I'm choosing to ignore this though, and power on like I have every right to: about the things I saw, the things I missed, and the things that changed me.

Because, as any good (sort-of) millennial, I am comprised of nearly 45% (metaphorical) selfies.