Went to HS in the late 90s. I didn’t “dress up” but I didn’t want to look grundge or a homeless person. My classmates used to call me Metro or a yuppie.

Every girl wore sweats, and every guy dressed like a hobo in the 90s.

We had some British software developers visit our group once and the contrast was stark. They wore suits and business dresses and we wore jeans and t-shirts. I mentioned the difference and one said they were expected to look professional. One of my gang said we were expected to write good code.

Every time I go to my kid’s school, I am amazed at the difference between my day and now.

That time I went, there were kids just in pajamas and slippers. Not just one or two, dozens, and it wasn’t some special day.

Then there’s the dressier kids in lounge pants and whatever giant tshirt they pulled out of a drawer (or laundry basket) that were obviously their version of pajamas. Shit, one girl had very obviously rolled out of bed, thrown some leggings under her nightgown, slipped into crocs and jumped on the bus.

It’s pretty cool tbh. Just no fucks given for meaningless frippery unless the individual kid/family wants it. Most of the kids were relaxed, nobody giving them shit for the way they’re dressed, staff not even noticing at all. That’s the way it should be imo. Whatever gets the kids in their seats and keeps everyone relatively engaged.

Yeah, there were still plenty of jeans and t-shirt sorts, a few of the button up shirt variants, and a handful of clothes hounds. But nobody was giving anyone shit about the clothes. From what my kid says, that wasn’t just the case for the hour or so i was there that day.

We insist on clothes that are weather appropriate and acceptable for an emergency, but beyond that after seeing the norms there, we stopped giving a fuck.

In elementary school i thought there would coordinated dances at high-school events.

I used to think that media isn’t influencing my real life worldviews in a significant way. But now that I am older, I realised that media sold us impossible notions that so long as you live within your means, you could have a pretty good lifestyle as a young adult, while also eventually able to save money to buy your own house and raise a family. I kinda got that from Friends. Although now, that ship has sailed. These shows and movies were operating on the zeitgeist at the time during the economic boom in 1990s and 2000s (well the media is scripted as well, so of course there is bending reality). After the late 00’s economic crash, as a millennial, we are forced to give up one desire and dreams over the other. We couldn’t have it all unlike the older generations.

I feel worse for the younger generations following us. They are going to inherit a world that is literally cooking everyone, in spite the inspiration from Greta Thunberg to global protest against the inaction on climate change when they were kids. How could they feel more optimistic about the future like the boomers and Gen X? No wonder populist far right is gaining traction; the global liberal order failed all of us except for the few elites.

I didn’t mean to go on a long serious musing over a post about high school clothings lol. It was a spur of the moment.

My high school look was so extra that if you lived in Seattle 25 years ago just talking about my hair and jacket could dox me.

I feel like Americans would freak out in the most incredible way if they had hs uniforms