Picture it:

White Flint, 1986.

You are in middle school.

You just started the new school year and you and your best friends spent the afternoon on your kitchen telephones calling each other trying to figure out whose parents would be willing to pick up a half dozen girls and drop them off at the mall—and which parents would agree to pick up and drive everyone home afterwards.

You got all dolled up to essentially walk around the mall all night…hoping to run into “boys.”

You grabbed a quick dinner at The Eatery. This was the old one—before the renovation. Everything was brown and the lighting was pretty dim.

If a cool movie was playing, you might buy tickets and then shop before it started.

You went directly to The Limited to see what new Forenza items were in. Sweater weather is coming. You need the cool new sweater in multiple colors…and matching socks…and a tube skirt or leggings.

You popped into Laura Ashley because you loved the smell of the store and dresses even though your friends preferred the Liz Claiborne perfume in the cool triangle bottle.

You wandered across the hall to Belle France and I Magnin to drool over the fancy dresses with balloon skirts and ruffles. You grabbed a bunch of dresses to try on as you crammed into dressing rooms giggling until the staff shoved you out the door.

You popped into that cool store on Via Rialto on the first floor that was the epitome of the 80s. They sold stationery and jelly bracelets and stickers and those plastic necklaces with charms.

Your friend who was a bit more mature and worldly dragged the group into the store that sold silver jewelry and wood boxes and scarves from India, China, wherever…and it reeked of patchouli.

You shopped in the poster store and music store. The boys were usually in the music store.

Then it was time to take the cool glass elevator up to the movie theater…with the boys. They bought the popcorn and drinks while you and your pals saved seats. If you were lucky, you sat next to a boy and held hands.

When the movie ended, everyone waited outside on the covered walkway to the parking lot on the 3rd floor where the parents pulled up to pick up the carpool. You didn’t realize it then, but your parents loved listening to you and the girls gleefully recount your night as they dropped each girl off at her house one by one and the station wagon (or minivan if you were rich) got quieter.

When you got home, you immediately called your best friend if you were lucky enough to have a phone in your bedroom. Or if you were really lucky, a boy called YOU.

The 80s were magical. If you weren’t there, I don’t think you can imagine it. It truly was a shared experience for your age group. Sigh.

Music
Clothes and style--lots of options and subcultures and many were very cool.in different ways. Everything from punk to Ralph Lauren. I loved looking at all the ads in Vogue and read Mademoiselle every month.
Urban living and parties, having fun
Martha Stewart
Spy Magazine
Weird era with good and bad but it was fun

Myrtle Beach was just incredible back then. Truly a great place to vacation.

Video game arcades
Malls were a thing
Rubik’s Cube and Cabbage Patch Kids
Parachute pants
Some great TV shows and movies, although not all of them have aged well. Thursday Night was Must See TV.
Pizza Hut actually had excellent pizza. In fact most food in restaurants was better because it was prepared in house instead of shipped frozen from some warehouse.
Feathered hair.




BUT …

Constant threat of nuclear annihilation (mutually assured destruction)
AIDS
Everyone still smoked. Even on airplanes.
Leaded gas in the early 1980s — pollution was bad
Acid Rain
Stranger Danger

So there was good and bad.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote: Music, I loved the preppy fashion (Laura Ashley, CP Shades, Pappagallo etc) Great books about the era, Writing and receiving letters,

You can still write letters. The USPS still works (for now).

+1 My friends and I still do this. 80s kids!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hypercolor t-shirts. L.A. Gear shoes (with the 2-color leather twists on the sides). Swatch watches. Ecto Cooler Hi-C.

That weird, clear phone you had to have enough ______ points to buy, and using it to kick your sibling(s) off the dial-up bbs.

Early nintendo (duck hunt!) and being able to rent video games (early Blockbuster!)

Yeah, the 80s were actually pretty great...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pacman

Oohh PacMan tables at old school Pizza Huts. Hot spots for hanging out for everyone under 50 in those days. Many had to put no-loitering signs in parking lots.

My kids didn't believe me when I told them Pizza Huts had tablecloths and candles.

Anonymous wrote:Hypercolor t-shirts. L.A. Gear shoes (with the 2-color leather twists on the sides). Swatch watches. Ecto Cooler Hi-C.

That weird, clear phone you had to have enough ______ points to buy, and using it to kick your sibling(s) off the dial-up bbs.

Anonymous wrote: Music, I loved the preppy fashion (Laura Ashley, CP Shades, Pappagallo etc) Great books about the era, Writing and receiving letters,

You can still write letters. The USPS still works (for now).

Hypercolor t-shirts. L.A. Gear shoes (with the 2-color leather twists on the sides). Swatch watches. Ecto Cooler Hi-C.

Dating girls with big 80's hair. Linda, we had fun.

I graduated HS in 1985 and college in 1989. I loved going to minor league baseball games where I lived (the Durham Bulls before and during the Bull Durham craze, the Charlotte Orioles before Crockett Park burned down), spending time at the mall with friends or alone, often times just browsing, Myrtle Beach with friends in the summer, driving to NYC to Orlando to Atlanta and crashing on someone's couch. I worked a lot but had so many friends. I never felt lonely and never felt FOMO.

Music, I loved the preppy fashion (Laura Ashley, CP Shades, Pappagallo etc) Great books about the era, Writing and receiving letters,

No social media. No cell phones.

yes, letter writing.