Soundtrack of my life (well, through my childhood anyway)

Let me take you back to the 80's, unfortunately I don't have a hot tub to get you there, but I can describe to you my childhood memories and the music that helped er, shape me, if you will.

I remember living in the very small town of Walterboro, where the only thing to do on a Friday night is go to a bonfire party and get drunk or drive up and down the main strip to see who else was out and about for the evening. Since I was 4 years old at the time of this story, neither of those were happening to me or my 10 year old sister, so we had to be creative and make up our own stuff to do.

Most times this included us pretending to play "Church" in our formal living room. My sister would play the piano (our pretend organ), I would walk in the room and read from a huge family Bible and pretend to be preaching, (really, the Bible was like 30 pounds - it couldn't be lifted!). I would "HEAL!" whomever was in need that day in our audience, Barbie, a Puffalump, a glow worm or even My Little Pony.

After "church", we would find it appropriate to listen to Madonna's "Like a Virgin" album on our record player. We would dance around foolishly, singing all the words to every song, all the while not knowing what we were REALLY singing about. And really, what were our parents doing buying this for us? The title of the album didn't tip them off that perhaps this wasn't the best choice for children? All I knew is that we wanted to be JUST like her, we even had a white lace glove to wear! My favorite song on the entire album, naturally, was "Material Girl".



Side note: Sesame Street also came out with a similar video around this time called, "Cereal Girl", which I also loved and sang all the time.



During our boredom, we'd also listen to my Dad's old 8 tracks, yes, I said 8 tracks. We'd play Elvis or The Beach Boys as loudly as possible and have a dance party in the den. It was all Soul Train, all the time. We also listened to my favorite album of my Dad's, "The Big Chill" soundtrack; possibly the BEST soundtrack...ever! Every song on the album is a classic, but of course, "I Heard it Through the Grapevine" was my absolute favorite! I never saw the movie until years later, and it was the most depressing movie I've ever seen! Did you know its about funerals?!! How can such an upbeat soundtrack be for such a depressing movie?! The songs like "My Girl", take me back to the Fourth of July, spending time at the Rickenbaker's pool, while our parents sipped on Bartles and James wine coolers and I got fried in the sun (thanks mom for the sun damage).



This leads me to a few years later when I was still listening to Madonna, but had also branched out to the likes of Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, and Wilson Phillips. Oh yes, I "Held on for One More Day" and didn't think "We're Alone Now" for a while! My sister and I would get home from school and video tape each other playing dance party! I remember her teaching me all the dance movies to Debbie Gibson's "Electric Youth", which I mastered perfectly, as proved by the video taped version. Speaking of, I wonder where that VHS is these days?



(Bonus points if you can do the dance!)


That brings me to the end of the 80s, which means I can't leave the decade without mentioning New Kids on the Block. While there were many songs that all of the guys sang (who was your favorite? I liked Johnathon b/c my sister liked him and I copied everything she did). And I can also tell you that I had a NKOTB duffle bag that I got for my b-day from Susan Quarterman, but my sister had the best....it was a denim vest with buttons of faces of each and every NKOTB-er. oh yeah. We kissed the buttons, well, all except for Donny, whom we referred to as "monkey face". Man, kids are so mean!!
While it was hard to pick the one NKOTB song to embed, I'm going with The Right Stuff b/c I had it on cassette tape as a single (other side was "Cover Girl"!!!). Ok, so play this and get up and do the dance, you know you want to!




In 1989, my family moved from Walterboro and it was a sad end to an era. New exciting things were happening in our lives; my sister was growing up and driving, I was still playing with Barbies and entering band. I listened to everything Charlotte listened to, trying to soak in her coolness and hoping it would rub off on me. We no longer had dance parties b/c it wasn't "cool" anymore, but I yearned for the days that she would offer to drive me around town in her new car, (a 4-door Cutlass Ciera). The songs of my youth changed from catchy pop songs to more edgy, even some rap!

In the moment, I really loved "MMMM, MMMM, MMMM" by the Crash Test Dummies. (You Tube won't let me embed, but you can watch it here). Charlotte started listening to things like C&C Music Factory's "Gonna Make you Sweat!" and I started branching off into country music, a la "Achey Breaky Heart".

Now that I'm up to my 90's years, I'll leave that for another time. Isn't it funny that a song can take you to a certain time and place?