Kool Aid Jammers
Remember ripping open your vinyl Polar Ice lunch bag in unbridled excitement to find nothing but a red-flavored Kool Aid Jammer packed by your dad because he and mom failed to communicate that your new school doesn’t have hot lunch? Those were the days!
Lisa Frank Everything
You just had to have every acid-trip dolphin school supply—or that’s what your mom’s new friend Robin who wears a lot of vests thought when she gifted you a Lisa Frank desk set. The scented stationery was especially useful for writing, “I HATE YOU ROBIN” over and over again after seeing her kiss your mom. Bet you can still smell strawberries—and confusion! Remember those years back then?
Being Unsupervised at the Park For Hours
What a different time the 90s were! Kids like you were free to play in the neighborhood park past sundown without a parent in sight. This was a simpler time before cell phones, instant communication, and the ability to let your parents know that they BOTH forgot to pick you up from soccer practice because they were too busy with their new lives. Kids today will NEVER know if their police station has cool guinea pigs!
AOL Instant Messenger
AIM was the perfect place for kids of your generation and custodial status to put up emotionally charged away messages in Comic Sans, reenact your parent’s fights with SmarterChild, and anonymously bully peers to let off a little steam. But only at your dad’s apartment, because he didn’t make you get off the computer after an hour like Mom.
The Parent Trap
This movie was A LIE and it gave you FALSE HOPE. Home Alone had a much more relatable and plausible premise and described about 75% of your days. Your mom has totally gone on an unplanned journey with a bunch of truckers, and your dad…was also…in that movie, right? Was there even a dad in that picture?
Tamagotchis
Your virtual pet taught you the valuable life lesson that you still hold with you today: Raising something takes a lot of hard work, things don’t always end happily, everything is definitely your fault, and you’ll probably end up dead surrounded by piles of your own feces. Now, kids have Facebook!
So if your mom sent you to live with your auntie and uncle in Bel-Air, it’s only until she and dad sort out who’s getting the house. Nineties kids!
