Fashionably Nostalgic

Do you remember powder jackets from back in the 80’s? I begged for one for about a year before my mom finally relented. It was light pink and grey. I loved it. I wouldn’t take it off for anything. I was so proud of it. I just knew simply by wearing it that my cool quotient went through the roof; making it so that I commanded all attention whenever I walked into a room at the ripe age of 9 or so. We went on a field trip one day at school and I left it on the bus. I was heartbroken.

There were several things like that growing up. I coveted Polo shirts (you could tell the real ones from the knock offs by counting the legs on the horse) and Converse shoes. Jelly bracelets and friendship pins.

The uniforms at my Catholic elementary school took the coveting out of the classroom itself, but not out of the friendships. After school and on weekends, the competition would commence. We would spend hours trading bracelets and pinning the bead-laden safety pins on the backs of our Cons. We would go to the mall with our immature selves which would do nothing but further fuel our already very mature sense of want. We’d giggle and whisper about the boys we saw in the food court while oohing and ahhing over a pair of shoes.

Of course as time went on I went from ogling the shoes at Nine West to Doc Martens. And the powder jackets retreated in the face of leather motorcycle jackets which I passed around my artist friends to paint, thus making MY jacket one of a kind. Polo shirts faded to tartan miniskirts and eventually the jelly bracelets and friendship pins merged into tongue piercings and purple hair dye.

And now I’m watching my childhood come back into fashion. With the hot pink fishnet gloves and the leg warmers, the loud patterns and colors. Jelly shoes are even back. And they weren’t even comfortable the first time. Now I shake my head and sigh at the boys we see in the food court and wonder whatever became of my old powder jacket.