There’s No Way That Was 20 Years Ago (And Other Things That Old People Say)

Perhaps, I’m overly-sensitive to the passage of time. My wife, my two children, and my Israeli therapist would all say that’s not even up for debate. Okay fine. I’m sure they are all correct. Please stop shouting.

But lately, I’ve become acutely aware of the anniversaries of things. Not important stuff like my wedding or Pearl Harbor. But big boldfaced BuzzFeed headlines about “Twentieth Anniversary of Cory and Topanga’s First Kiss.” Or “It’s been 18 Years, do you know where your AOL floppy disc is now?” That kind of stuff.

I hate to sound like Andy Rooney’s crankier, older brother, but I feel like we (the media) commemorated fewer anniversaries back when I was growing up.

Admittedly, there were far fewer sources of news and information. Practically everything we knew, we got from the 3 major TV networks, Cracked Magazine or Rona Barrett.

Additionally, who had the time or energy to look back? We were too busy living our lives. Waiting in gas lines on odd or even days. Trying desperately to avoid being struck by flying Skylab debris. Chewing pounds of Bubble Yum while simultaneously convincing our peers that it was littered with spider eggs.

I guess there were a few special anniversaries that got mentioned. I can certainly recall John Chancellor or Walter Cronkite devoting a segment of the evening news to the 20th anniversary of the JFK assassination. The Boomer Rockists over at Rolling Stone sure seemed enthused about the 20th anniverary of Sgt. Pepper’s. Then again, wasn’t every Rolling Stone article of the 80’s dedicated to lamenting the passing of the Summer of Love?

To that end, I feel we got a special commemoration of every 5 year anniversary of Woodstock. Plus, it always seemed like they commemorated with a New Woodstock in which the “good vibes” spirit of the first Woodstock was celebrated by kids throwing mud at Green Day.

One could argue that the granddaddy of anniversaries was our nation’s Bicentennial. That holiday got both its own tall ship regatta and a redesign of our nation’s quarters. In the Bicentennial’s defense, it was a celebration of two centuries of democratic norms, ideals and institutions. That is arguably more worthy of recognition than an online think piece asking “Whatever happened to the bespectacled boy from Jerry Maguire? Jonathan Lipnicki turns 80!”

So why this is all impacting me now? It can’t just be those wildly depressing photos of the Nirvana baby floating in a pool as a 30 year-old man. Though those haven’t helped anything and they should just stop with it.

Instead, what seemed to particularly trigger me (even more than the regular vicissitudes of everyday living) was a recent Saturday night episode of Entertainment Tonight. Now mind you, it’s been ages since I last watched an entertainment newsmagazine show. To the extent, that I kept pestering my wife to explain to me where Mary Hart and John Tesh just up and vanished to?

But it wasn’t just that I was watching an ancient show that troubled me, it was the night’s topic — it was basically an hour program about things that were celebrating their 20th anniversaries this year. They had “then and now” features about 10 Things I Hate About You. Never Been Kissed. Cruel Intentions. She’s All That. Basically, the last giant wave of high school rom-coms.

So what made me gasp in disbelief that any of those movies were approaching the two-decade threshold. Well, first of all, my wife and I saw every one of them, even though we were, even then, far out of the target demo. But more viscerally upsetting to me was the reminder that we voracioulsy and rapidly attended all those films in anticipation of Sammy Behar, our first baby.

Everyone on the planet would say “See your movies now. You’ll never get another chance.” For us, absorbing as many teen romps was as vital to the pre-baby nesting process as hanging a mobile or installing the Snap and Go car seat.

Thus, when I naively asked my wife Beth how any of these specific movies could be 20, especially when those were our pregnancy movies, she reminded me what I likely was pretending not to know — our “baby” also turns 20 next month.

Now it’s not like I live in an imaginary utopia of full denial. I’m fully aware that she’s away at college, achieving marvelous and manifold things. I know that she’s almost 20. But somehow, simultaneously recognizing that a Freddie Prinze Jr. movie was also almost 20, made it feel indefensibly concrete.

“But I just saw that movie,” I’d wanly mutter to the TV. But what I really meant was: “ I was just a young man with all of parenting still ahead of me. Not mostly behind me.” “And that baby, we hadn’t even met yet. That baby who is now a fully-grown, fully-mature woman.”

So when I find myself getting inexplicably choked up about anniversary articles about Livin’ La Vida Loca or Gunther’s first appearance in Central Park, it may not be those things that I’m really lamenting.

I’m really just lamenting how darn fast it all goes.