Growing Up In The 1980s Quietly Wired A Generation In Ways That Feel Rare Today
Lyudmila2509 | Shutterstock There's something about revisiting the 80s that feels like cracking open a window you forgot existed. The more traits we unpack, the more it becomes clear that what we gained from growing up then wasn't just a collection of fond memories, but a genuinely different way of operating.
When you really sit with it, you'll realize that the 80s didn't just shape how we played or what we watched. It ultimately shaped who we became. It directly influenced the values, the instincts, and the quiet resilience that most of us didn't even know we were building.
Growing up in the 1980s quietly wired a generation in ways that feel rare today:
1. People who grew up in the 80s had to search for books using an old wooden card catalog
When we checked a book out, the librarians would remove a card from inside the front cover to keep for themselves and write down the date that it was due back inside for us.
We would handwrite our reports or later use typewriters. The teachers still used chalkboards, and the worst sound in the world was nails scraping down the chalkboard.
The most exciting day at school had to be when our school purchased its first Apple computer, the year I started sixth grade: those three massive block-like pieces of equipment stood like prized jewels in a separate room where we would stare at them, watching the fluorescent green cursor blink in a screen of darkness.
We knew these computers were special, but honestly had no idea what they could really offer besides the chance to play Space Invaders. I don’t think the teachers knew, either.
2. People who grew up in the 80s didn’t wear helmets
We didn’t wear knee pads or elbow pads. We didn’t have booster seats. We wouldn’t get into trouble if we forgot to put our seatbelts on in the car. Sometimes, if we went out late, my parents would let us sleep on the floor in the back of our van, and we would roll around while sleeping, covered in blankets.
3. People who grew up in the 80s remember the dreaded busy signal when making a call
Kateryna Hliznitsova / Unsplash+
There was no call waiting until the later years. If you called someone’s house and they were on a call, all you got was a busy engaged signal. Teenagers everywhere got blasted for staying too long on the phone lest the family miss an all-important emergency call.
We felt like celebrating when cordless phones were invented. Shops were closed on Sundays. We walked everywhere or caught the bus. The milkman still delivered the milk. Moms would shop for groceries once a week, and other than topping up milk and bread, we had to survive on whatever we had in the house.
It was normal to send the kids to go to the shops on their own to pick up those extra milk and bread supplies. Milk cost 40 cents for a bottle when I was ten, and if we were given 50 cents, we could still buy a good supply of different lollies for 1 cent a piece with the change.
Chocolate and lollies were super special treats. Fast food or takeaway wasn’t a done thing. Everything was cash. There were no credit cards.
Moms had to put any expensive stuff they couldn’t afford straight away on layaway, and they would pay it off bit by bit over several weeks. At the shops, items couldn’t be scanned because there was no such thing as bar codes. Instead, the cashier had to manually type in the price that the item sticker said.
4. People who grew up in the 80s still had to manually wind their car windows down
People didn’t have house or car alarms — for the car, we later just had the old-fashioned steering wheel lock. You could leave the house and leave the front door unlocked.
The world, all in all, we still felt safe, even if it was false security. If you wanted to have a playdate with your friend, your parents didn’t have to pre-book or organize it. You just walked over to their house and hoped they were home.
We rode our bikes everywhere throughout the neighborhood. You had to write letters to your friends and family members overseas because phone calls were too expensive.
5. People who grew up in the 80s had pen pals they wrote to for years
We would pour our hearts out onto paper, and it would take seven days to get to the other side of the globe. It would be weeks before we got a reply. We learnt the art of patience by visiting the empty mailbox every day after school.
We had diaries that we kept hidden under the mattress of our bed. For some reason, we all thought that was the best hiding spot in the world when it was obviously not.
The school holidays felt so long and seemed to last forever. In the school holidays, my parents would leave us at home all day to our own devices. Latchkey kids were the norm.
Older kids often watched after their younger siblings. Parents didn’t think twice about whether we would be bored. They didn’t feel compelled to organize us play-dates.
Even if your mom were a stay-at-home mom, you would spend days happily playing at home. There was no rushing off every day at 9 am to go to fun parks, zoos, playdates, Gymboree, movies, etc.
6. People who grew up in the 80s had one prized possession: their Walkman
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If you liked a song and didn’t have the original cassette, you had to keep the radio on all day just to try and catch it again. We would wait all day just to record that one song on our blank cassette.
Then we would play the song back slowly, a few seconds at a time, to try and write the lyrics down. Most of the time, we got the lyrics wrong. With friends, we would all be singing along to different versions of the same songs.
We had to watch MTV to find out what songs had made it to the Top 40. If a song was considered too “rude,” like Madonna’s Justify My Love (yes, which was in 1990, but it stands out in my memory), the video clip was banned and wouldn’t be played.
We would spend afternoons just lying down in our bedrooms listening to our favorite songs over and over again. We had to rewind and fast-forward cassettes to the next song, and got excited if we stopped at the exact right place. They still sold records at the time, and that was what made up our parents’ entire music collection.
It seriously sucked if the little needle skipped because your record was scratched. All our favorite songs would later become indelibly imprinted on our minds. Hearing them now instantly takes us back to those good old days.
There was no such thing as camera phones or selfies. We had Polaroid cameras or the old-fashioned sort that would have either 24 or 36 photo films. Developing film was expensive.
We were careful about which photos we took with those films, and we never knew what the photos would look like until we developed them weeks or months later. The worst thing in the world was when we accidentally opened up the camera without rewinding the film, thus ruining the whole film in the process.
7. People who grew up in the 80s didn't even know what FOMO was
You had no idea what your friends were up to on the weekends. You had no idea if you were missing out on something important. If it wasn’t specifically shown on the news or written about in the newspaper, you were clueless as to what was going on in the rest of the world.
Kids were obsessed with the comic section of the newspaper. We collected other comics like Archie, Betty, and Veronica.
We were slightly scared of the word “war” because adults talked about the Cold War as though a bomb could be dropped on us anytime. We believed what the newspaper and TV told us because there was no way to prove they were wrong. The books were the best. I loved The Babysitters Club, Sweet Dreams, and Sweet Valley High series.
The TV shows were the best. We loved Growing Pains, Family Ties, Who’s The Boss, Full House, The Cosby Show, The Golden Girls, Alf, Married With Children, Happy Days, The Facts Of Life, and Different Strokes.
The music was the best. We had Madonna, Michael Jackson, Cyndi Lauper, Prince, Bon Jovi, Wham!, and the coolest girl bands like The Bangles and Bananarama.
We wished for Reebok Pumps, scrunchies, bubble skirts, and Hypercolor shirts. Clothing was still flammable. And yep, sometimes it would catch alight if you stood too close to the gas heater or fireplace. The fashion was crazy, and we didn’t care how bad we looked. To the contrary, we thought it was the coolest thing in the world.
Frances Vidakovic is the face behind InspiringMomLife and the host of the Inspiring Life School podcast. She helps overthinkers achieve their goals, without sacrificing their soul or sanity via digital courses.
