The dream of the ’90s is alive in summertime

This is a ’90s summer, from someone who was five in 1990 and 14 in 1999:

Bikes. Scraped knees. Playing mermaids. Running through sprinklers. Going outside in the morning and returning when the streetlights came on. Staying awake at sleepovers until the streetlights went off again. Hydrating not via garden hose, but by spraying water directly into your mouth with one of those translucent green plastic waterguns. Chasing down a Dickie Dee bike.

Thunderstorms, streaking the sky with lightning. Watches and warnings in white text on the red, green and blue Environment Canada weather channel.

Wading pools. Hot plastic swing seats. The feeling of flight, metal chains snapping you to earth. Chalking out impossibly long hopscotch grids on the sidewalk. Daytime TV. Scandalous talk shows. Carrie and Austin. Bringing in groceries from the car wearing any shoes but yours.

Eating Pop Tarts for breakfast. Staining your tongue with Kool-Aid. Mashing a frozen orange juice into a pitcher. Eating DQ Blizzards with red plastic spoons. Cutting the corners of your mouth on freezies, blue ones, the colour of Windex.

Walking to the video store to rent movies. Going to the mall. The playground. The movie theatre. The Sev parking lot.

Making collages out of old issues of Canadian Living. Paging through back-to-school ads in Seventeen. Buying notebooks and pens on the hottest day in August. ICQ and MSN Messenger in cool, mildewy basement computer rooms. Simpsons reruns. Super Nintendo.

Rearranging your bedroom. Inventing a game. Being bored. So, so bored.

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“Nineties Summer” is trending. People are longing for a slower summer, a less scheduled summer, the kind of summer they had when they were kids. After all, there’s no season as nostalgic as summer.

There are, of course, some sepia-toned ideas out there about what constituted a ’90s summer. It was not “no screen time”; there was actually so much screen time, it was just different kinds of screen time. It was not “low dopamine” — did you see my diet above?

And it was certainly not planned out by our parents. Those out there trying to curate the perfect ’90s summer for their kids are missing the point.

A “’90s summer” was self-directed because it had to be. It was not a checklist or a shopping wishlist or a bingo card.

Also, let’s recognize that providing today’s kids a ’90s summer — if we’re using the term to define nine weeks-ish of unstructured, unfilled time — is an unmitigated nightmare for working parents who rely on camps and activities to fill in the hours previously occupied by school.

When I think back on my own ’90s summer, someone’s parent was always “around.” They weren’t entertaining us or even really paying attention to us, mind you, just vaguely aware of where we were and where we were going. But if you fell off your bike or swing set, an adult materialized like magic.

The ’90s summer was made possible by having a village, or at least knowing your neighbours.

When I look at my list above, and read between the actual activities and memories, some themes emerge that are perhaps more easily replicated. Those summers allowed for boredom and flexibility and diverting from routine.

So much of modern life is ruled by the rigidity of schedule; those summers didn’t have one. Not every corner of the calendar was filled with an activity, not every hour was planned. And we were not performing the Best Summer Ever for an invisible online audience.

We had to be present because there was literally nowhere else to be.

That feeling that your time is your own and there is lots of it — that’s what we’re really chasing.

And you don’t need to be a kid or have kids to have a ’90s summer. Have another extra glass of wine on a Tuesday because the patio vibes are perfect. Go see a movie in a theatre. Make a collage. Read a book you’ve read before and don’t track it on Goodreads. Have ice cream for dinner.

Say yes to spontaneous plans. Stay up late. Take a picnic to a park and photograph none of it. Actually, leave your phone behind entirely. Notice the evening sun dappled through the trees.

Feel alive and like you have time, because you are and you do.

Also, you can go on a swingset as an adult — nobody checks your age.

jen.zoratti@freepress.mb.ca