Please Don’t Come Back – Part Two
Last Spring I had the honor and infamy to be Freshly Pressed when I posted a picture of myself from 1977. (Please Don’t Come Back)
I had an unshakable sense of style, but unfortunately, 1977 styles were quite shaky.
1977
I didn’t think I was overly brave publishing that horrible picture. If a hundred or so people saw me in my regrettable fashion choices – how bad could that be? Then WordPress played a practical joke, and decided to award me the coveted publicity of Freshly Pressed. And 100 people became 11,000.
Well, so you’ve all seen me at my worst.
Or so I thought.
This week I found a photo from about eight years later.
Oh my God, it got worse.
Do you remember the mid-80’s?
Oh what an interesting fashion era.
Women could be super tough – with huge shoulder pads and huger hair – and at the same time could be super girly – with as many lacy scarves and bracelets as you could pile on.
And I adopted it all – apparently.
I don’t remember myself as over-the-top.
I just remember being fabulously stylish. And racing home from Happy Hour on Friday night to watch “Miami Vice.”
Why can’t I be young now? I love today’s style –
whether it’s skinny leather jeans with ankle boots-
Or a great crazy combination of casual tee and sparkly skirt – with purple high heels thrown in for good measure:
I would love to be at my style peak today.
I was born too soon.
**
Or maybe too late.
I would look great in a full skirt, gloves, and kitten heels – a la Audrey Hepburn in the fifties:
Or I could go back even further – with Gibson Girl hair and high collars – that’s my Grandpa and Grandma on the left:
But no.
I had to peak in 1985:
Oh Yeah. Shiny makeup, spiky hair, droopy sweater (though it had shoulder pads) and lacy scarf. With a big floral skirt. And although you can’t see my legs, rest assured the stockings were white.
- Posted in: Aging ♦ Fashion ♦ Humor ♦ Style
- Tagged: 1980s style, Aging, Audrey Hepburn, fashion, fashionista, Gibson Girl, High-heeled footwear, Humor, Kitten heel, Miami Vice, style trends, Wordpress
notquiteold 
I always thought (and still do) the 70s photo was actually adorable. But the 80s, hon, I gotta agree. I hope nobody pulls out any 80s pics of me.
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I actually scared myself when I found the picture.
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You were beautiful then and you were beautiful yet again, and you are even more beautiful now. Little did you know huh?
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It’s funny, but your twenties and thirties are supposed to be your peak. I like myself better now – at 62. Maybe it’s the lack of pressure….
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Yes, those ’70 shoulder pads. I still think this is an adorable picture. The ’80’s one reminds me of someone I know. OMG. How can that be?
Delightful post, Nancy.(giggles)
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Oh, I feel bad for the person who looks like that now. Perhaps an intervention?
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Nancy, I don’t know how to break it to you, but my 2nd FP’d post had almost the same title as the first. Get ready for the onslaught of comments on this one. Because it’s pretty much a guarantee that it’ll be FP’d.
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I would love to be FP’d again – but please not this one. I will have to change my name.
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There is always the Witness Proection Program.
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If we live long enough, today’s styles will look pretty ridiculous, too, eventually. Funny post, thank you!
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Now what could possibly be ridiculous about purple stilettos?
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I had that skirt!
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Oh, I’m so sorry. (But it was my favorite that year. Why didn’t I think it was god-awful?)
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I had that outfit only in peach and a Farah Fawcett hair long after it was fashionable! I think you looked kind of adorable!
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I never had Farah hair. But now that my hair is longer, my hairdresser asked me if I wanted her to blow dry it like that. I said, “Oh. I think NOT.”
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I love that photo of your grandparents, and think it’s cute that the mens’ hats are in the ladies’ laps! Recently, I’ve been “organizing” old photos; it’s amazing how styles (and we) have changed!
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Wasn’t my Grandmother lovely in her gibson-girl hair? Unfortunately I look just like my grandfather.
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Nancy I think you were the very best the era had to offer. We all look back and think, “what was I thinking.”
I look at some of the fashion today, I think the same thing. I guess I am fortunate, I was so poor in the 70’s I couldn’t be fashionable, I was also still pretty much of a hippie. By the 80’s I had already adopted my, “who cares I will do what I want and be comfortable attitude.” I also had this sense of, if it is ugly I am not wearing it.
Just think though, you missed the worst of it…you weren’t in Texas. In Texas no matter the era, right up through the 90’s we honestly believed the bigger the hair the closer to God. Many Texan women also had their plastic surgeons on speed dial and not for botox.
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I have to admit – I am glad I wasn’t raised in Texas. As for the hippie stage – I was so THERE in the late 60s and early 70s. But I was a CAREFULLY STYLED hippie.
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I knew there was a reason I refused to let people take pictures of me after high school. Mind you, I learned to sew and I was well aware that simple was better than cluttered on my frame. I’m still in the layered era and I absolutely totally hate shoulder pads, but that’s mostly because I have terrifyingly square shoulders and pads are just not compatible with them. Not unless I want to look like a cartoon. Both pix are so much a part of their time that they’re nostalgia. And these days, I may not make fashionista, but I seem to have settled into a look and body that are so much better than they were twenty years ago. I’ll be 61 this year.Thanks for your wonderful
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I have to see if I can find any photos where my big shoulder pads make me look just like Spongebob Squarepants.
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One of the advantages of not having a lot of money is that one tends not to follow short-lived fashion trends. I completely missed those huge glasses in the 70’s because I was still wearing my unfortunate cat’s-eye frames from the 60’s (with new lenses periodically, of course). Pretty much the same with clothes…I’ve worn the same jeans and simple tops forever and ever, amen.
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I think I had curtains that were a perfect match to your rose covered skirt! And come to think of it,I also had a long blazer that looked much it, too…damn, we were hot!
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My switch to contact lenses was one of my better fashion choices.
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square up those glasses from the 70’s a bit and you’d be right back in.
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I always wear contacts, but I finally replaced my 12 year old wire rims with some nice square tortoise shell frames. My brother says I look like Garth from Wayne’s World – and …um… he’s got a point.
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Oh, the iridescent blusher. Good times, good times.
I had that same, pink sweater in 1985. I am not even kidding. But all of my dorky 70s and 80s clothes (and pictures of me in them) were tragically lost in a bizarre fire that only affected dorky clothes from the 70s and 80s and pictures of me in them. The fire department was perplexed, as you might imagine.
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I need that kind of fire.
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Funny, as I have been unpacking I have been going through boxes of old pics. Last night I came across some pictures very similar to this. I can tell you one thing, I hope that shiny makeup never makes it back into mainstream fashion again.
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OMG, I could double as a mirror, couldn’t I?
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