Get in Gen Z, We're Going to the 90's
Clueless (1995)
I remember the summer that Clueless came out in the theaters. My family were visiting relatives in Los Angeles and it was a hot July night when myself, my girl cousin and her bestfriend sat in the air conditioned theater feeling alive with independence. Being a few years older than me, they were both more excited. In fact, it almost felt like they were babysitting me, which they were but I was just so content with my box of popcorn and child size soda. Clueless is one of those films where the plot and its characters were understandable and loveable for any age. I was more mesmerized by the LA’isms, being a city kid, I never knew what it felt like to be fearful of driving on a freeway for the first time. For the remainder of that summer and well into the school year all you would hear me repeat was “as if” in such a Californian twang that I’m sure it annoyed the girls in my class, especially the ones that weren’t lucky to have seen the film.
I don’t remember there being a lot of rules in the 90’s. It had the feeling of being served a plate of food that you didn’t ask for, but was told to just eat it you might like it. Okay. And some of it you did like, but what we lacked in options, there were so many good things that looking back now feels like treasures.
One word. dELIA*s.
There will never be anything like dELIA*s and for that I am sorry. You would’ve loved it. It was the pre-internet’s answer to Pinterest but in the form of a print mail order catalog, where every few months I would stick post-it’s on several pages and leave it for my mother to see, informing her of my fashion choices for the school year. Even though I wore a school uniform, there were still weekend activities. It was more than a catalog, it was a zine for the pre-teen to teen to early college wanna be fashion influencers of tomorrow. I still remember the number to this day, as soon as I received approval from one of my parents that 2 to 3 outfits were a go and was given the credit card, I dialed on the cordless phone, 1-800-DELIA-NY. And I would speak to usually a woman of a certain age on the other line and I repeated sku #’s off to her and sizes. Sometimes I would mail it using the very intricate order form that came inside the catalog, but then with USPS mail time, I couldn’t risk it getting lost in the mail. A dELIA*s order took a lot of time and focus, it was an important fun part of growing up in the 90’s.
The telephone. The touch of that coil wrapped around my fingers in the middle of an exciting conversation. It would somehow get wrapped up into my elbow and I would sit there listening to the voice on the other end of the line, glad to be in that moment.
