Remember When #14 –'90s current events and finding “the one”
Post #14 in the Remember When blog series
Welcome back to the Remember When blog series. In the last post, we talked about ‘80s technology. In this post, we’ll discuss the current events and relationships that took place during our next stage of life: Young Adulthood.
For ease in breaking down current events, pop culture and technology, these sections will now be broken into decades instead of stages of life.
If you missed any posts in this chronological serial blog, I recommend you start from the beginning here.
Ok, ready to be all grown up?
STAGE OF LIFE: Young Adulthood
CURRENT EVENTS (Young Adulthood)
The 1990s were, relatively speaking, a peaceful and thriving decade—once we got past the Persian-Gulf War. With the Cold War ended, the U.S. enjoyed a time of calm and prosperity. By 1998, both inflation and unemployment reached their lowest levels in 30 years. We even had a federal budget surplus. Imagine that! (We now have a budget deficit in the trillions—that’s trillion with a “t”).
Remember these…other notable events
In 1990, the Persian Gulf War began and ended within six weeks when the U.S., in a coalition with NATO allies, attacked Iraqi forces in Kuwait (known as Operation Desert Storm), after Iraqi president Saddam Hussein invaded and occupied Kuwait with the goal of acquiring their large oil reserves and expanding their power. (If only all wars lasted six weeks or less—actually, if only we didn’t feel the need to go to war at all…)
In 1991, a black man named Rodney King, on parole for robbery, led police on a high-speed chase through Los Angeles. When they caught up to him, four policemen (three of them white) kicked and beat him with batons while other cops watched.
The four officers were charged with excessive use of force but a year later people were shocked to learn that the officers were acquitted of the beating. The outrage set off riots in L.A. that caused at least 50 deaths and $1 billion in property damage.
In 1993, President Clinton was sworn in, defeating George Bush Sr. This meant a democrat was back in office after a 12-year reign by the Republicans. He would serve for two terms before the position would be turned back over to a republication—another Bush.
In 1995, army soldiers and anti-government extremists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City, killing 168 people and injuring at least 680 more. Until the September 11 attacks in 2001, the Oklahoma City bombing was the deadliest terrorist attack in the history of the United States and is still considered the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history.
Also in 1995, the nation was transfixed on the murder trial of former NFL football star O.J. Simpson who was accused of stabbing to death his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her friend Ron Goldman. (Remember the infamous White Bronco car chase the year before when he refused to surrender?) Thanks to Simpson’s Dream Team of lawyers, Simpson was found not guilty. (Though he would be found guilty in a civil suit brought by the Brown and Goldman families a few years later.)
In 1998, the scandal between President Clinton and 22-year-old White House intern Monica Lewinsky broke. Clinton denied the affair but, after proof was presented (a semen-stained blue dress), he changed his story and was impeached for committing perjury and obstruction of justice.
He was not, however, convicted or removed from office as the two counts against him didn’t receive the necessary two-thirds majority vote in the Senate and he was acquitted. He ended up leaving office in 2001 with the highest end-of-office approval rating of any U.S. president since World War II. Go figure.
In 1999, two teens, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, went on a shooting spree in Columbine High School in Littleton, CO, killing 12 students and one teacher and wounding 21 others before turning their guns on themselves and committing suicide.
Some consider it a point of origin for contagion in school shootings that would become so commonplace they would no longer shock us quite as much as this one had.
I had just moved back to Colorado from Chicago four months before when it happened and Columbine High School was 15 minutes from my house.
Where were you when…
…you heard about the Columbine shooting?
At the end of 1999, we all worried about Y2K. The fear was that computer programs designed to abbreviate four digits to two digits might interpret “00” as 1900 rather than 2000 and create havoc in computers around the world. People stocked up on things like heaters, food, and bottled water on the off-chance electricity and water would be cut off.
Of course, the anticipated catastrophe never did come to fruition. Isn’t it funny how much time we spend fearing things that never materialize?
🗨 Did you do anything to prepare for Y2K?
🗨 What Current Events from the 1990s do you remember?
Young Adulthood Memories
For most of us late Baby Boomers/early Gen-Xers, the decade after college is when we started getting married, having kids and building careers. We were excited to explore our future but still uncertain about what it might hold.
Some of us worried that we were behind our friends and classmates when it came to having a long-term partner, a career, a house or other things they had. But we also had hope because we knew time was still on our side and a world of possibility lay at our feet.
Marriage (Young Adulthood)
The average age to get married in 1990, when those of us born in 1964 were 26, was 24 for women and 26 for men. I myself had gotten married at 21 and was on my second kid by then.
It was during the early ‘90s that the divorce rate started falling after steadily rising from the 1960s to the 1990s—a trend that has continued to today.
Remember when…
…you found “the one”?
“No, I haven’t met Mr. Right. But I have met Mr. Liar, Mr. Player, Mr. Asshole and Mr. Douchebag.” Anonymous
After never even having a long-term boyfriend in high school, I was the first of my friends to get married. I had found “the one” early in life at age 19 (he was 24). The one who only had eyes for me, not every other member of the opposite sex that walked by (and vice versa). The one who made me feel more confident, smarter, better looking. The one who thought I was so much more than I imagined myself to be.
We met at a casino party at a fraternity house at 2 a.m. when a friend and I, emboldened by alcohol, decided to go down the basement where music was playing and ask the first two cute guys we saw to dance. My husband happened to be one of those two lucky guys to have an intoxicated women hit on him and the rest is history. (Who knew one could find their true love in a drunken stupor?)
In those early days of our courtship, there was a nerve-wracking, intoxicating excitement when each word, each moment had a special drama to it. When sexual tension was high and discovery of each other was fresh and new. When I’d float to bed after a date on a high that would last for days.
Back then, we had a constant need to touch each other and were supportive, courteous and kind to one another, grateful to have found each other. This excitement evolved over time, of course, but we are still together 40+ years later.
🗨 How did you meet “the one” and did it last?
That’s it for current events and relationships during our Young Adulthood stage of life. We’ll get more into marriage in future posts.
In post #15 – Parenting and Working in the ‘90s, we’ll talk about the ups and downs of young parenthood and what working was like in our 20s.
Talk to you later!