This is in appreciation of WAY BACK WEDNESDAY. Y’know, when we look back at incriminating photos of ourselves and cringe because LOL that fringe was the biggest mistake ever. Well here’s me celebrating all the things that were actually really good about being young and carefree and spotty. And in the possession of bad hair extensions.
I often stop and think blinkin’ ‘ell things were a helluva lot simpler way back when my biggest worry was what kinda skirt I was gonna wear to school and whether <insert boys name here> was gonna talk to me on MSN.
Here’s all the things that seemed like a breeze in the park way back then. Hands up if you can relate *hands up emoji*
1.Dating. Okay so it’s not like I have to deal with this little problem because I’m joint at the hip with my other half, but so many of my friends do have to go through the rigmarole of dating. Ergh dating. Gone are the days of receiving a note at the beginning of the day with ‘Will u go out wit me’ scrawled upon it. Accepting graciously *blush blush blush*. And then by the end of the day sending another note back saying ‘I wanna break up with u sorry’. None of this profile making, online dating, meeting in awkward bar situations. So. darn. simple.
2. Eating. Pot noodles, jammy dodgers and cones of chips on the way home from school. The biggest health scare we had to worry about when we were young was Sunny D turning you orange, and even that seemed quite jolly at the time. Now it’s like trying to get through an assault course avoiding foods with things I shouldn’t eat. E numbers coming out our ears and health messages here, there and everywhere. RIP turkey twizzlers.
3. Choosing clothes. All it took was a trip to Tammi Girl and we were sorted. Rara skirts, dolly shoes & army pants (with all those weird, freakin’ tassles..um hello?!). Uh huh, the epitome of cool and we didn’t even have to trawl around 128423 shops in Lakeside. Now it’s like flippin’ heck I gotta get with the Spring trends and grab me some pleated midi skirts, a half moon bag and a whole online shop of Ivy Park goodies. Can’t we go back to the days where every gal shopped in one store and we wore matching everything? Cute.
4. Communicating. The most high tech thing I used as a 12 year old to communicate was the odd text (‘meet me at the park at 12?’) and a 2 hour nightly phone call to my boyf which ran my parents phone bill up the freakin’ wall. Lols. Not forgetting good ol’ MSN. The hours I spent on that thing are incredz. Coming online and offline just so someone would notice me God dammit. Anywho, now communications comprise of every application under the sun. There’s no where to hide. If I ignore a pals imessage they’ll FB me. If I turn off my FB instant messaging they’ll whatsapp me. Delete that app and BAM there’s a Snapchat from my pal saying REPLY YOU WHORE. I can’t get away.
5. Make-up application. One trip to Boots gave me everything I needed as a 12 year old. Tons of crap black eye-liner that left me looking like a panda and the cheapest powder I could find. Nowadays it’s all like contour, contour, contour and make sure you wing that eye-liner like your life depends on it. FYI I still have no idea how to contour and my eye-liner couldn’t look more wonky if I tried. WAH.
6. Expressing feelings. As a 12 year old, all you had to do was find the perfect quote or song lyrics to fit your MSN Messenger screen name to express the woes of being a youngster. Then everyone in the world (or Year 7) knew exactly how you were feeling. The best ones created an air of mystery about you, for example:
٠·΄°˚o¸٠·΄°˚ *He* (never) -noticed- >her< u/n/t/i/l {she} w.a.s [gone] ٠·΄°˚o¸٠·΄°˚
Now however, I have to verbally express myself with some kind of eloquence. Minus all the fun punctuation. No fair.
7. Exercise. I was discussing this point with a mate the other day. We were like ‘how comes we didn’t gain weight when we were at school?‘ and then she had this massive, humongous revelation that blew our minds. We did two PE lessons, a netball match and a cross-country morning session without batting an eyelid every week without fail for 5 years. Oh and now we sit behind computers all day and wonder why we feel like our arteries are clogging up. Duh. Dragging yourself to the gym is so much harder when you don’t have a slave-driving teacher at the edge of the cross-country field screaming at you to ‘STOP WALKING’.
8. Keeping in touch with pals. Looking back, I seriously took for granted all those golden hours at school with my mates. Form time, lunch time and class time when you and your pals just KNEW that you could get away with having a gossip alllll lesson. Geography for example was all like MEH let’s chat instead *gossip gossip gossip*. Nowadays I’m lucky if I see my group of friends all together a few times a year. And yes, it’s mainly because I’m pants at keeping up communications and we’re all busy bees. But it’s still a bit sad. I say bring back PE classes & golden lunch hour gossips. We’d all be happier & healthier that’s for sure.
9. Finances. In the words of Lunchmoney Lewis; ‘I..GOT…BILLS. I GOTTA PAY’. And they just keep rolling in. Anyone relate? Back in the day all I was concerned about was having enough money to get myself to the park and back and enough to buy myself a ‘Favourite Chicken’ burger on a Saturday with my pals. Oh and enough money so that when the fair came to town I could ride the dodgems and try my hand at winning a giant stuffed monkey. Money didn’t seem like an issue at that age. My friend did get us this ridiculously bland job of sticking stickers on coat hangers once though. 10p a coat hanger. It was painful. I think I scoffed at it at the time but what I’d do for the extra cash now… lols.
10. Making plans. The options were drastically reduced when you were a youngster, thus making it far more easier to make plans. It was either PARK or TOWN or <INSERT NAME HERE> HOUSE. Y’know, that one person in the group that had cool parents who wouldn’t mind you crashing their house every weekend. Ahem, me. From one weekend to the next, we’d just choose from these three, simple options and occasionally take a wild trip to Thorpe Park or something. Now it’s far more complicated. Sigh.
11. Hangovers. Were you one of those teens that did some wild drinking at silly house parties (that always got disbanded)? Uh huh. Do you ever remember having a hangover? Absolutely not. And we’d be drinking the most vilest, cheapest things and yet I’d wake up in the morning, inhale a waffle sandwich and be as right as rain. Now when I drink I wake up and feel like my mouth is full of dessert sand and I have to stay horizontal for half the day before I can get going again. Clearly I ruined my insides at 16 and my body can never forgive me.
And that, my friends, is my WAY BACK WEDNESDAY post. I feel all nostalgic. Anyone wanna hit the park tonight and whisper about boys behind their backs?
If you’re not done reminiscing yet, how about checking out the post below?
13 THINGS WE ALL REMEMBER FROM SCHOOL TRIPS ABROAD
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