When you were growing up, how did you know... →[More:]what radio station everybody was listening to?
How to get your parents to buy you what everyone else was wearing?
if the other kids got Easter baskets (or whatever) too, or if it was just something weird your family did that you'd rather people not find out about?
how to dress for a sports event?
how to act when you go to a place or type of event that you're sure everyone else has been to but you?
how not to die of embarrassment when your mom announced things like "This is the first time he/she's ever done/seen (fill in something everyone else has done/seen)"?
how on earth everybody else got their hair to look that way?
I could go on...not sure what the point of this post is, except to hear "you weren't alone" ...I think it's fashionable nowadays to say things like "I hardly ever let my kids watch TV" or "My kid doesn't eat at fast food restaurants" and I guess my parents were ahead of the curve on those things, but in reality the parents let the kids watch plenty of TV and eat fast food at least once a week, whereas we didn't. I didn't even know the other kids got their music from the radio, which was pretty much how you heard it at the time. I thought they just somehow knew which music was cool through word of mouth and the occasional TV concert. I thought kids my age would think radio was old-fashioned. (My parents had no radio in the car, and only listened to serious radio at home.)
I suppose my parents were extremely judgmental about not doing things their way, so much so that it never occurred to me to do things like turn on the TV on my own. Thank god for siblings.
Did I just have too much fear of being laughed at from speaking up in order to find out what was really going on? Does everyone have to get laughed at in order to get a clue?
Am I just venting about typical adolescent angst about needing to fit in? Anybody care to join me? Any other insights?