I recently inherited my husband’s giant Chevy Suburban to drive around for a couple of weeks. He uses this large vehicle for his job but needed a, my, smaller car for the next couple of weeks. While driving his car the other day, I was flipping through his XM Radio stations (I don’t have XM Radio in my car) when I arrived at the “90s on 9” station. When I enjoyed about 5 songs in a row, I realized that I am old enough to look back a decade and enjoy music that today’s children would only recognize as “boring and old.”
What were these great tunes that were blasting over my speakers, you might wonder? If I recall correctly, the first one was a Dave Matthews song. There was a little Nirvana and some Sir Mix a Lot. None of that compared to the climactic moment when N-SYNC’s “All I Ever Wanted” started. Embarrassingly, I turned it up and proceeded to sing every single word with a smile on my face. I didn’t pride myself on listening, or screaming, to the boy band songs of my era – I preferred the Spice Girls, personally – but I suppose I listened to their songs regularly enough to imprint themselves into my brain permanently.
To further make the point of my era, I just turned the on TV to enjoy in the background while I write this. Guess what I saw playing? None other than the Sandra Bullock classic, “While You Were Sleeping.” The 1995 classic forever changed my view of the concept of “leaning.” I love this movie and I am enjoying it right now!
I am facing the fact that my age is nearing the three decade mark and that I am now considered by teens as “old” and I consider songs and movies “classics.” I also realized that I am a child of the 90s and that radio station preset will be the best part about driving that gigantic vehicle.
Tell Us! What defines the decade of your upbringing?
Re-run Prevention 
N-SYNC no way! I never did like them. Dave Matthews OK now.
Dave only partially counts as the 90s because he made it well into the next decade. But I agree with you, Dave is easier on the ears than the boy bands of my era.
I’m also a child of the 90’s and was humming along to Nirvana the other day, also while I was driving! Today they played some Oasis and I felt oddly reminded of my early teen years. Normally I don’t listen to radio, but my driving instructor insists. I always hated boy bands but still I had a teenage crush on Bela B of die Ärzte. Nothing to be ashamed of, they’re a German “punk” band who had quite a few hits in the 90’s. I liked your post, made me think of the tunes back then 🙂
They say that smells can take you back to a place but I think music does the exact same thing. I was taken away to my childhood bedroom, with my little “boom box,” doing math homework while I listened to the Spice Girls. Zigah, zig, ah. 🙂