Stuck in 2000

As I approach my 40th birthday, I can't help but wonder if people tend to stall out and stick to the time period of their prime.  I was a child of the seventies and eighties and I remember the "hippies" that couldn't seem to change with the times.  I realize now that they probably didn't want to change.  I recently read a comment accusing (and I use that term lightly) someone of being stuck in the nineties.  Are the nineties really a bad place to be?  Once you get past the grunge phase, I think the mid to late nineties were fairly benign.  There weren't any major fashion faux pas of the past like polyester bell bottoms, pegged pants or big bangs.  Right?

I brought Emily to a classmate's birthday party yesterday afternoon.  (Between the three girls, this was the 5th birthday party we've been to this school year.)  The party was held at a gymnastics-type place where one of Allie's classmates had a party two years ago.  Emily had a blast with her friends and I didn't have to helicopter.  Complete sidetrack but one of her friends is the same exact size (height and weight) and they look so freaking cute together, especially running around holding hands.

When we arrived home, Allie and Anna were asking Emily questions about the party and I overhead Allie ask if Emily had heard a certain song.  (They had music playing while the kids jumped around.)  Allie was dancing around singing, "Even though I just met ya, here's the number."  Okay, so I have no idea what song she was singing (and I suspect she doesn't have the lyrics exactly correct) and when I asked her how she knew it, she said that it had been playing at some party they'd had at school.

Back in my twenties, my prime, I thought that I would be a cool mom.  I shopped at all the trendy stores.  I knew every song on the radio and who sang it.  The internet was a baby back then.  I remember my first few years of working full time and no one had internet access at work.  Talk about a difference in productivity levels!  There were no iPhones or texting or Facebook or Instagram or Twitter.  I still don't have a smart phone.  I'm the person who had an analog cell phone until my service provider sent me notification that they would no longer be supporting my phone and I needed to upgrade or lose service.  

If we listen to music in the car, it's usually kid music, my music, or Rich has the radio on some light rock station.  I came home from work one day a few months ago to find the girls dancing to Vanessa Carlton.  Apparently, they had decided to go through our CD collection, found those CDs and liked them.  Smashing Pumpkins, not so much.  If I turn the radio on, it's almost a guarantee that I won't know any of the songs.  Unless they're playing a back to the nineties set.

As for trendy, I've never purchased anything from Anthropologie.  I've never set foot in an Anthro store.  I don't even know if I'm too old to be shopping there but it seems like everyone else is.

I know - age is just a number but I am most certainly no spring chicken.  I've aged ten years in the past five.  That's life and I'm okay with it.  I have my beautiful baby girls so it was well worth it.

I was wasting time on YouTube last night (I can't seem to focus on one task these days) and I came across the Goo Goo Dolls Storytellers episode, which I haven't seen in at least eight years.  I was there in the audience (talk about an amazing experience) and right around the five minute mark, I spotted a much younger version of myself and Jen, my brother's girlfriend at the time.  Jen died a few years after that from a stupid, senseless mistake.  Talk about time traveling for a few minutes.    

Okay, so this post is going off on tangents I didn't think possible.  Speaking of jumping into 2012 - I was asking my sister-in-law about reading books on an iPad because as much as it pains me to say this, it would be more convenient that lugging a book back and forth on the train.  My netbook is almost three years old and still works perfectly fine but when it doesn't, it will most likely be replaced with an iPad.  Talk about expensive.  At least living in the year 2002 saves me some $.  

I just re-read this and I'm laughing to myself thinking about Allie singing that song.  I feel so old because my first thought, when she repeated the lyrics to me, was should a five year old really be singing 'even though I just met you, here's my number?'   

Update before I hit publish - I just googled searched the lyrics and it appears that the song is Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepson.  When Allie asked Emily if they had played that song, Emily said that they had and after watching the video on YouTube right now, I can confirm that they did.  Not only do I find it amazing that Em and Allie were able to communicate with each other the way they did (because Allie's version of the song is a bit off), I can't believe my babies aren't babies anymore.