In a few months, I will officially be closer to 40 than 30, which is just fine with me. Who cares about some silly little number of years I have spent taking up space on this planet? Age really is a state of mind, a concept that for me is validated every time I ride public transportation and see the infantile behavior that both MUNI operators and passengers exhibit. When I was invited to Julie's 50th birthday party, I was excited to go because I knew that it would be a celebration of her life so far, not a desperate attempt to convince everyone that 50 is the new 30. And THEN I found out that the party had a theme. And THEN I found out what it was - an 80s costume party. Gag me with a spoon.
My date to this party was my wonderful friend Mary. Mary is one of the few women on this planet that I can truly be a friend to and feel that friendship returned. If I don't speak to her for 3 weeks, she doesn't automatically think I am mad at her, that I hate her, and thus talk to everyone else behind my back about imagined insults. She is a straight shooter - she tells me exactly what she thinks in a way that doesn't make me feel attacked. I never feel like I am in some obscure competition with her over things that don't matter. Most importantly, when I hang out with Mary, I always truly enjoy myself. So if there was any chance of me having fun at this (now) ludicrous party, it was all going to be because of Dona Maria.
I love dressing up for almost anything except funerals and dates, which can sometimes feel like the same thing. The idea of going to a costume party always makes me happy, depending on what the theme is. The only things coming to mind about the 80s were how much I hated it when Billy Carney would call me Lysol (get it? Lisa/Lysol? He was truly a clever kid), how much I would laugh when Mr. Piatz threw erasers at kids sleeping in his math class, and how truly awful the fashion was. If you could even call it fashion. It was more like every bad idea regarding a person's appearance was crammed into 10 long years of visual ouch-ness. Mary, being Mary and generally much more positive about these sorts of things, seemed thrilled.
Ok, so if I was going to attend a party celebrating a friend's birthday with another good friend as my date, I was either going to have to adjust my attitude or just stay home. I don't try to be a party pooper, it just comes naturally sometimes. Mary's suggestion that we dress up as Milli Vanilli helped immensely. Unfortunately, I am not a talented lip syncher. I'm not a talented singer, either, but that would not be necessary for obvious reasons. And even though you can find all kinds of truly wonderful and bizarre things in San Francisco any day of the week, long dredlock wigs would be a challenge. Besides, I enjoy looking like a girl, not some hairy wannabe popstar.
By Friday afternoon, I was tired and grumpy and in no mood to try to find 80s togs to wear that wouldn't completely gross me out, but I had agreed to go shopping with Mary. We took a stinky, crammed bus up to Haight/Ashbury where all the best vintage stores are and started browsing our way up the street. I could tell you all sorts of interesting things that I saw and heard while in the Haight that night, but that would totally take me off on a tangent. Maybe another time.
One thing I will tell you is that for some reason, the 80s are now retro. I personally don't think I have lived long enough to have my childhood be labeled as retro, but obviously some fashionista does. ALL the trendy little shops along Haight Street had lots of 80s knock-offs, 80s inspired, and 80s refrence items in their windows. It was kind of creepy.
Eventually, we went into a store I usually associate with vintage Summer of Love and Disco clothes. Held Over is pretty famous for having the best quality vintage items from the 60s and 70s. I was skeptical that we would find anything newer than 1978, but boy was I wrong. They not only had several racks of honest to god real 1980s clothing, but they had it sorted out by the type of person who would have worn it - valley girl, preppy, long prom dresses, short prom dresses, rompers, beaded dresses that Angela Lansbury would have proudly worn on Murder, She Wrote. They even had Little House on the Prarie dresses - anyone feel like channeling Laura Ingalls Wilder? The best (or worst, depending on how you look at it) was a pair of parachute pants - I had deliberately forgotten how truly awful those things were.
As we started flipping through racks looking for things to try on, I was totally unprepared for the memories that came flooding back. That sounds really cliched, but seriously, that is what happened. Every single thing I saw reminded me of someone I knew, something I saw, something I wanted to own, to be, to look like when I was a kid verging on teenage-dom. I could not stop laughing at how horrible the fabrics were (everything seemed to be made from some flammable fake material), how crazy the colors were, and how truly unflattering some of the shapes were. One completely unflattering dress Mary tried on was classic valley girl with triangle shaped buttons running asymmetrically up the side (think civil war uniform). When she stepped out of the dressing room, the white bib front looked like a cloth diaper she had thrown on before she started burping babies. Yuck doesn't even begin to cover it.
I tried on a few dresses, but the one I chose is something that if I am truly honest, I would have loved when I was 14. It was classic 80s punky-rocker chick, very Madonna and Cyndi Lauper-ish. It was also hideously ugly, but who cares - I was too busy channeling my inner teenager. Wearing a really ugly dress in public was something that I loved when I was a rebellious teen. Half a life later, I was doing it again.
Mary and I spent hours flipping through racks, laughing at truly bad items, making fun of absolutely everything, and having a total blast getting all the details of our costumes just right. It wasn't such a bad way to spend a Friday night.
The next night was Julie's party. Mary went to a salon to get her hair as big as possible and then came over to my apartment to get dressed. I was bowled over by the poodle on her head - the hairdresser had crimped her hair all over, then used half a can of hairspray on it and put a little ponytail on top in a scrunchie. She even had her bangs up in a 'rooster'. Classic 80s all the way. Getting ready was just like highschool - we were sharing makeup, fashion ideas, stuff, and laughing our asses off as we got ready to go out for the night.
The party was at the Log Cabin in the Presidio, always a fun place to be. When we walked in, I was shocked and very embarrassed - hardly ANYONE dressed up. We just stood in the doorway wondering if we had somehow crashed a completely different party. It wouldn't be the first time in my life that I had misinterpreted something and gone completely overboard in the wrong direction in as public a way as possible. That feeling of awkwardness coming over me was unfortunately one of the most memorable parts of my life in the 80s. I felt like a cliche - the girl trying so hard to fit in who is clearly not one of the group. Ugh doesn't even begin to cover it.
Someone grabbed my shoulder and hugged me really hard, screaming 'oh my god you look great' in my ear. It was Julie, and she was totally glammed out as Joan Jett - this woman was clearly setting the tone for her own party. She was obviously thrilled that Mary and I had gone all out with our costumes and made me spin around a few times so she could get a good look at all the details. I really had it goin' on - spiky hair with a big hot pink bow, bright makeup, Cyndi Lauper dress, lace gloves, loads of jewelry including huge white earrings and a rosary (I know, I will go to hell some day for using my first communion rosary like that. Add it to the list of all the other things sending me to hell), hot pink cut off lace tights, Doc Martens. Mary was totally fabulous with her short dress, pink lace tights, high-heeled black booties, and really big hair.
It was obvious that Julie was thrilled we had really gone all out for her party, which helped that panicky, oh god I am such a dork AGAIN feeling start to go away. Life became even better when she pointed out the open bar. One of the best parts of being an adult - I don't have to pay an obliging grownup to buy me something alcoholic and then hide it in the way too obvious brown paper bag. The years of consuming 40s of Old English, St. Pauli's, or even Bartles and James are long over. After we got drinks and started talking to other people, it became pretty clear that Mary and I were part of the small cool kid club at the party.
I have never in my life been one of the cool kids. Even as an adult I have to work extra hard to fit in. Part of the problem is that I don't understand why some people are cool and others are not. The rest of the problem is that in general, I just don't care. That doesn't mean that there haven't been times when I wanted to be part of the in crowd, just like nerdy Brian in the Breakfast Club asking if the cool kids stuck in detention with him will ignore him on Monday morning. I am still enough of a dork/nerd/geek to want to be part of the popular kids group now and then and Saturday night I was one of the coolest people at the party. All because Mary and I took the idea of an 80s costume party as literally as possible and channelled our inner Molly Ringwalds instead of poor dorky Brian.
The party was great. It was obvious that Julie is a much loved and respected woman for so many reasons. She also set the tone by going flat out in enjoying herself, even going so far as to take part in a skit of several of her favorite songs. In one part, she was dressed up like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz - I would love to know the backstory on that one.
The music was fabulous. Think of an 80s artist who had at least one song with a dance beat and you would have heard it that night. For all my kvetching about how awful the 80s were for fashion, when it came to music, that decade was as good as any other. I had forgotten how many truly great bands thrived in the 80s and I knew the words to every single song played. And I sang my little atonal heart out, not that anyone could hear. They were all singing too.
I also danced my tuchas off. Most of my friends these days would agree when I say I am not a dancer. The truth is, I don't usually boogie down with them unless they drag me out onto a dance floor. I don't really know why that is. If you had asked me last week, I would have said it is because I am such a complete klutz that I am afraid of hurting innocent bystanders or embarrassing myself with a clumsy, maiming dance move. But when I was out on the dance floor at this party shaking my thing and hopping around like a demented pre-mosh pit pogo stick, I remembered how much I had really, truly LOVED dancing when I was a teenager. I have so many great memories of dancing with my best friend Mike Reinsch (I mostly sort of orbited around him while he was doing his own thing) or watching Candi Baldwin recreating every Madonna video step for step at school dances. Even the jocks were fun to watch - they all danced by jerking their heads around, like demented chickens who were always on the off beat. By the end of the night, I was tired, sweaty, and extremely happy.
It is interesting how memory can play tricks on you if enough time goes by. My perspective on the 80s was always tied up in how bad everyone looked - and it is true that there was a lot of really awful fashion. But no era is ever exemplified by just one thing, and that is definitely true of the decade where I spent most of my childhood. This party not only gave me an opportunity to help a really awesome woman celebrate how happy she was to be turning 50. It also in a cliched, sappy, Hollywood way gave me back some things I had forgotten along the way in life. I really did love The A-Team, I was kookoo for Cocoa Puffs and Count Chocula cereal, I wore my knee-high rainbow striped gym socks with pride, and I always had a spare can of AquaNet in my bag so I could maintain my big hair. I knew all the lyrics to every Madonna song, had watched Goonies, Ghostbusters, and Raiders of the Lost Ark hundreds of times, and had the predictable crush on Rob Lowe. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
I heard a rumor that a bar in my neighborhood hosts an 80s night on the weekends. I can't wait to get my gear on and go.
2 Super Hot Chicks
Kissing Michael Jackson
Gotta love the bow
The infamous poodle
