The other night I wrote a rambly post about good memories from the past and it made me smile in the moment. This morning I came across a social media post about nostalgia and the 21st century.
I don’t know a lot of people nostalgic about the 2000s.
Now, it’s been long enough, nearly a quarter of a century since the beginning of the 2000s so there’s certainly room to be nostalgic about those times. But I don’t know many people that look upon the 21st century with a lot of nostalgia. We often hear, “the ’80’s were awesome” and “I loved the ’90s!” but when it comes to 2000s, not much. Maybe I”m not hanging around the right people.
Well, for one thing, did we ever settle on what we were to call the 2000s? It’s easy to say and type the ’60s and the ’70s and such, but the ’00s? Are they the “oh”s? Are they the zeroes or the naughties? Or do we just say the “2000s”? It’s funny, as I’m composing this blog entry that decade seems so long ago.
The 2000s pretty much kicked off with 9/11 and from my seat it appears like the United States completely lost its mind as a result of that day. Insane amounts of security theater in the airports, forced us to give up a lot of personal freedoms with the Patriot Act, and the like were gained steam in a time when we had the first modern President we didn’t actually elect, and things just got weird. Then there was the Great Recession at the back half of the ’00s and that was a hoot and a half. At the very end of the ’00s the Tea Party was kicking into high gear and after enduring eight years of “W”, we decided that stupid was really chic and embraced Sarah Palin.
No, there’s not much to be nostalgic about when it comes to the first decade of the 21st century. Things calmed down a little bit when President Obama was elected into office and that got us through the first half of the ’10s, but even that decade doesn’t seem like it’s going to lead us old folks into the same wistful gaze our parents had when they got nostalgic about jukeboxes, drive-in movies, and poodle skirts. As much as I enjoy technology, I’m not wistful about out first flat panel TV.
Perhaps many of the ills of this century have to do with all this (arms gesturing wildly) being nothing to be nostalgic about. Good memories? Of course, I hope everyone has good memories, but while I often read about people claiming the likes of the ’80s and ’90s being “the good old days”, I really don’t think in 20 years we’re going to be saying the ’10s or the ’20s were the good old days.
Maybe we need to all nudge society into a direction that will change our feelings about this era when we look back. There’s also a chance I didn’t get enough sleep last night and I’m starting to feel a little loopy as I finish up the little missive.
Make an awesome memory today.
