9 Old-Fashioned Ways Gen X Entertained Themselves As Kids When They Were Bored
melissamn / Shutterstock As kids, my sisters and I were always full of energy. I don’t think anyone would have had the capacity to keep us entertained and out of trouble. My mom had a good strategy for this, though. She would throw us together with some activity and let us tire ourselves out.
My mom knew that looking at a screen wouldn’t wear out bundles of energy like us, so she raised us with the same games and activities she used growing up. That means I was raised primarily on old-fashioned Gen X forms of entertainment, and I loved every second of it.
If you are trying to find ways to entertain yourself and want to avoid the consequences of too much doomscrolling, you should try entertaining yourself in the way Gen X did as kids when they were bored, too.
Here are 9 old-fashioned ways Gen X entertained themselves as kids when they were bored
1. Playing solitaire with actual cards
Diane Labombarbe from Getty Images via Canva
Sometimes it feels like no one is available to hang out with. Without social interaction, it's easy to get bored and end up scrolling on your phone for hours.
However, Gen X kids didn't have the luxury of TikTok for entertainment. When they were stuck at home alone and bored, they had to play physical games to entertain themselves. Lots of times, that meant grabbing a deck of playing cards and settling down for many, many rounds of solitaire.
Playing solitaire clearly retains some of its appeal today. Apps simulating the card game are used by millions of people. However, to a Gen X kid, it might not offer the same satisfaction as setting up the cards, flipping them over, seeing yourself clear them, and shuffling them before starting all over again.
2. Talking to their friends on the phone
I know what you're thinking. This is something most people do currently, not an old-fashioned activity. However, I'm not talking about using a cell phone. I'm talking about a landline. Its long curly black cord kept you rooted in place while you chatted with someone. If you didn't have a phone in your bedroom, you had to speak to your friends in the middle of the living room or kitchen. My mom still talks about how cool one of her friends was in high school for having her own phone in her bedroom.
That cord also made it harder to catch every phone call someone made to you. If it rang and you were in another room, you might miss the phone call altogether if you couldn't run there before it stopped. And back before call waiting was a thing, you might also miss a call if someone tried to reach you when you or someone else in the house was already on the phone.
The struggle involved with getting in touch with a friend on a landline could make finally reaching them and getting to talk all the more exciting.
3. Reading print magazines
Print magazines were an exciting way to gain insight into celebrity life and the designer side of fashion for many Gen X kids. Without the internet, magazines were one of the few ways they could gather intel on the elusive world of the rich and famous.
Some popular print magazine publications at the time were Tiger Beat, Seventeen, and Cosmo. These magazines sometimes featured fold-out posters that kids could hang on their walls, bringing the magazines' exciting world into their bedrooms and letting their friends know exactly who they were the biggest fans of.
My mom never let me buy posters from the store, so I loved putting these posters all across my wall. I would even add my favorite pages from my magazine to the collage. Making an art wall from magazine pages and posters was a fun way to exercise your creativity and give your room an exciting new look.
4. Lip-syncing to the mirror in their bedroom
dnberty from Getty Images via Canva
Lip-syncing in the mirror was like putting on your own little concert at home. It made Gen X kids feel like they were capable of becoming bigger than any celebrity they could think of.
You could lip-sync to the music playing on your stereo or boombox, though not everyone had one in their bedroom, and not every Gen X kid felt comfortable doing it in the middle of their living room where their whole family could see.
The prevalence of cell phones has made lip-syncing in your bedroom or bathroom even easier. Now anyone out there can give it a try, and they all should. Research has shown it improves your self-confidence and just generally makes you happier.
5. Making mixed tapes for friends
My mom has told me many stories about spending hours waiting by her car radio for a particular song to play so she could add it to a mixtape she was making for her friend.
Sometimes, when the song came on, she would miss the beginning and have to wait even longer to re-record it. The only way to speed up the process was to call in to the radio show and request that they play the song again, but getting through was a long shot.
In the Gen X generation, kids could make mixtapes compiling their favorite songs so they could create their own unique playlist. They were able to play these playlists in their car or on the cassette player.
Luckily, making a playlist has become much easier with services like Spotify, which let you add any song directly to one.
6. Watching TV
Of course, people still watch TV. However, television and movies have increasingly begun to be viewed on personal devices like tablets or laptops.
Apart from going to the movies, cable television used to be one of the limited ways a Gen X kid could watch films and TV shows. If you didn't feel like leaving the house, cable television was most likely the only option. Different channels showed different things, but if a show you were into wasn't being broadcast at that moment in time, you were out of luck.
Not every household had multiple televisions. In these cases, a family would have to gather around the television and decide what to watch together.
7. Watching actual music videos on MTV
Music videos are still popular on YouTube. Major celebrities often still post music videos when they drop a new album. However, YouTube didn't used to be the place to go. MTV was the hub for music video and pop music enthusiasts alike. It was different than just watching regular TV because it was entirely focused on broadcasting music videos all day and night.
Popular artists would air their music videos on MTV or VH1, and millions of people would tune in. Millions of people tuning in meant a good music video could produce a lot of buzz around a particular artist. This encouraged some artists to create increasingly exciting music videos in order to get more people talking about their music.
With a constant stream of new and exciting videos to watch, MTV was an entertaining way to pass the time for Gen X kids alone or with friends.
8. Walking or riding their bikes to an arcade
Ramia Fahul from Pexels via Canva
Casually riding your bike around was more common for Gen X kids. In those days, many kids would ride their bikes to meet up with friends. Whether they were headed to the movies, a store, or the arcade, it was always a fun time. Arcades were a fun place for Gen X kids to hang out with friends. Kids would often talk to each other while they played. Most arcades even had two-player video games that friends could play together.
However, not every kid had a bike. Some Gen-X kids without a bike would have to walk to meet their friends at an arcade. Similarly, not every town had an arcade either. Sometimes, the closest place they could go to find a good round of Pac-Man was at the local 7-Eleven or liquor store.
Now, kids can play video games and chat with friends even when they are miles apart. Communicating over gaming headsets has made going to an arcade to connect with your friends unnecessary.
9. Asking to be dropped off at the mall
I think we can all remember the thick embarrassment of being seen with our moms when we were in middle school. It's a strange adolescent shame that I'm sure my mom couldn't wait for me to grow out of.
Many adolescent kids want to get away from their parents and go off with their friends. One way Gen X kids did this was by going to the mall with a group of friends. Back then, malls often had many security guards scattered throughout their enclosed hallways, which could help parents feel comfortable about leaving their kids to roam the floors without supervision.
With the rise of online shopping, more and more malls have been shutting down. Kids don't go to the mall as often with their friends because they can just order clothes online. However, anyone who grew up asking their parent to drop them off at a mall to meet up with their friends still remembers the excitement of being alone with a group of friends as a teenager, trying on fabulous clothing and wandering wild and free.
Lily Bell is a college student studying English and Publications who covers relationships, mental health, and personal narratives surrounding the human experience.
