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I don't feel bad for not recognizing her name, because she obviously didn't remember me either. A lot of the students were tagged with either full names or Luke Something, Julie Something half names. But I recognized the teacher, and the boy sitting on the front row in the classic mesh jersey is the boy I had one of my first crushes on. That would be Luke Something. So, I scanned the photo to find myself. Where am I? Well, you tell me. I'll give you two hints. I'm not wearing white. And I'm standing where they always put the tall people.
What's sadder than the fact that I've spent/wasted so much of my time on this observation is thinking about how much time it took to scan this photo and type in the names of all the people. Then I realize that people seem to be doing this a lot lately. I've seen countless photos with rolled up edges making their way to Facebook postings, embarrassing people with feathered hair and bad, 80s wardrobe decisions. (Did we really used to roll our jeans up at the bottom like that?) I can see the girl who posted this sitting at her desk, squinting her eyes at the little bodies in the photo, searching way back into her memory to try to place them, and then typing in each of their names or half names. I mean, how long did that take?
This is becoming Generation Nostalgia. Generation Retro. Generation Throw Back. Generation Are-You-Going-To-The-20-Year Reunion? Why is nostalgia so fascinating? We seem to be gripped with it. Look at what happened the second after we heard Michael Jackson died. I'm guilty of it myself. You bet your ass I downloaded every song he's ever written and burned them to CDs that I could listen to in the car.
Then there's the new Facebook status challenge. It says this "Stefani Zellmer is playing along: Social experiment: if you read this, even if we don't speak often, post a comment with a memory of you and me. It can be anything you want (but please use ~some~ discretion!). When you're finished, post this paragraph on your own status and you will be surprised by what people remember about you."
And of course everyone so far has said that the caveat to use discretion negates their first thought (thanks people). But people are writing things they remember about people and they're fun to read, even when you don't know the person. Just like it's kinda fun to look at pictures of people you don't even know.
Okay, so maybe it's not sad after all. I really did enjoy looking at all those faces from third grade, and was even more amazed that my memory isn't as bad as I thought. I remember a lot of those people, and even stories about them. (Mom, remember when you volunteered in my class and Luke Something busted his head open clowning around in the listening center?) WHY DO I REMEMBER THAT???
Maybe we're all just bored. Or maybe we're all just getting older and this is our way of clinging to our youth. What do you think? And more importantly, did you guess which one is me in that photo?
4 comments:
I know what you're talking about, Rockzee. I am always amazed how everyone now is so eager to put these pictures of themselves out there for the whole world to see. And - they readily put old pictures of ME out there, too. I wonder how much differently we all would have acted growing up had we known that ANY picture of us from our whole life might end up available for anyone in the world to see someday! So... this may be a bit before your time, but I recently wrote a nostalgic book all about growing up in the '70s. It's kind of fun... you can check it out here if you'd like: http://www.my70sbook.com. Long live the '70s! :)
Are you the girl in pink next to the teacher? I'm really surprised that your features don't jump out at me and I can instantly tell.
Blossom Lane. Your house with "minimal" landscape. We sat in your room at the end of the hall and palyed don't Break the Ice.
I also remember when Purple Rain came out and how IN TO IT you were. We were at the townhouse off of Buckingham. I also remember a trampoline ???
I love that commercial!!!! I laugh every time I see it.
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I find myself living the joke of my own telling on a daily basis as I stifle boredom and procrastinate throughout the day on Facebook. See the joke here in a commercial my husband and I recently wrote and produced. They say write what you know, right. Even though at the time it felt like the idea struck me out of some brilliant subconscious, I've since discovered that it came from my own actions. I will see a friend tagged in a photo and suddenly I am clicking through a collage of photos that were posted by someone I don't know. Until I realize it's someone I do know, or did know, many, many years ago, because there's a photo with me in it. Today I suddenly found myself looking at a photo of my third grade class. A girl I had gone to elementary school with had tagged another friend in a different photo, but of course I didn't stop there. Not recognizing her name didn't matter, I kept scanning her photos until I suprisingly landed on one with me in it.
I don't feel bad for not recognizing her name, because she obviously didn't remember me either. A lot of the students were tagged with either full names or Luke Something, Julie Something half names. But I recognized the teacher, and the boy sitting on the front row in the classic mesh jersey is the boy I had one of my first crushes on. That would be Luke Something. So, I scanned the photo to find myself. Where am I? Well, you tell me. I'll give you two hints. I'm not wearing white. And I'm standing where they always put the tall people.
What's sadder than the fact that I've spent/wasted so much of my time on this observation is thinking about how much time it took to scan this photo and type in the names of all the people. Then I realize that people seem to be doing this a lot lately. I've seen countless photos with rolled up edges making their way to Facebook postings, embarrassing people with feathered hair and bad, 80s wardrobe decisions. (Did we really used to roll our jeans up at the bottom like that?) I can see the girl who posted this sitting at her desk, squinting her eyes at the little bodies in the photo, searching way back into her memory to try to place them, and then typing in each of their names or half names. I mean, how long did that take?
This is becoming Generation Nostalgia. Generation Retro. Generation Throw Back. Generation Are-You-Going-To-The-20-Year Reunion? Why is nostalgia so fascinating? We seem to be gripped with it. Look at what happened the second after we heard Michael Jackson died. I'm guilty of it myself. You bet your ass I downloaded every song he's ever written and burned them to CDs that I could listen to in the car.
Then there's the new Facebook status challenge. It says this "Stefani Zellmer is playing along: Social experiment: if you read this, even if we don't speak often, post a comment with a memory of you and me. It can be anything you want (but please use ~some~ discretion!). When you're finished, post this paragraph on your own status and you will be surprised by what people remember about you."
And of course everyone so far has said that the caveat to use discretion negates their first thought (thanks people). But people are writing things they remember about people and they're fun to read, even when you don't know the person. Just like it's kinda fun to look at pictures of people you don't even know.
Okay, so maybe it's not sad after all. I really did enjoy looking at all those faces from third grade, and was even more amazed that my memory isn't as bad as I thought. I remember a lot of those people, and even stories about them. (Mom, remember when you volunteered in my class and Luke Something busted his head open clowning around in the listening center?) WHY DO I REMEMBER THAT???
Maybe we're all just bored. Or maybe we're all just getting older and this is our way of clinging to our youth. What do you think? And more importantly, did you guess which one is me in that photo?
Nostalgia
I don't feel bad for not recognizing her name, because she obviously didn't remember me either. A lot of the students were tagged with either full names or Luke Something, Julie Something half names. But I recognized the teacher, and the boy sitting on the front row in the classic mesh jersey is the boy I had one of my first crushes on. That would be Luke Something. So, I scanned the photo to find myself. Where am I? Well, you tell me. I'll give you two hints. I'm not wearing white. And I'm standing where they always put the tall people.
What's sadder than the fact that I've spent/wasted so much of my time on this observation is thinking about how much time it took to scan this photo and type in the names of all the people. Then I realize that people seem to be doing this a lot lately. I've seen countless photos with rolled up edges making their way to Facebook postings, embarrassing people with feathered hair and bad, 80s wardrobe decisions. (Did we really used to roll our jeans up at the bottom like that?) I can see the girl who posted this sitting at her desk, squinting her eyes at the little bodies in the photo, searching way back into her memory to try to place them, and then typing in each of their names or half names. I mean, how long did that take?
This is becoming Generation Nostalgia. Generation Retro. Generation Throw Back. Generation Are-You-Going-To-The-20-Year Reunion? Why is nostalgia so fascinating? We seem to be gripped with it. Look at what happened the second after we heard Michael Jackson died. I'm guilty of it myself. You bet your ass I downloaded every song he's ever written and burned them to CDs that I could listen to in the car.
Then there's the new Facebook status challenge. It says this "Stefani Zellmer is playing along: Social experiment: if you read this, even if we don't speak often, post a comment with a memory of you and me. It can be anything you want (but please use ~some~ discretion!). When you're finished, post this paragraph on your own status and you will be surprised by what people remember about you."
And of course everyone so far has said that the caveat to use discretion negates their first thought (thanks people). But people are writing things they remember about people and they're fun to read, even when you don't know the person. Just like it's kinda fun to look at pictures of people you don't even know.
Okay, so maybe it's not sad after all. I really did enjoy looking at all those faces from third grade, and was even more amazed that my memory isn't as bad as I thought. I remember a lot of those people, and even stories about them. (Mom, remember when you volunteered in my class and Luke Something busted his head open clowning around in the listening center?) WHY DO I REMEMBER THAT???
Maybe we're all just bored. Or maybe we're all just getting older and this is our way of clinging to our youth. What do you think? And more importantly, did you guess which one is me in that photo?