Gnarly to the Max! (slightly revised quotation from the movie below)

Dear brethren and...uh...sisteren...

I would like to formally announce to the world (okay, to the blog family) that the 1980's are officially cool again with the younger set in the community in which I work. Just last year, my 8th graders mocked all things 80's - the music I'd have streaming on iTunes during lunch, the way my hair looked in my college freshman ID card from Long Beach State, the clothes worn by the cast of "Facts of Life..."


...but now, it's all changed.

I should have known something was up when, on the first day of school, one of the first boys into my classroom was sporting a classic AC/DC "Back in Black" t-shirt. I thought to myself, "Brian Johnson's been sober longer than this kid's even been alive!" Heck, AC/DC hadn't had anything resembling a hit in years when the current crop of 8th graders were born (yes, in 1991-1992).

Next, I began to read over the things the kids wrote on their index cards I gave them. See, every year, I give the kids in class an index card, on which they scrawl their name, phone number, parent/guardian/somewhat older person who's somewhat responsible for their behavior's name, and I have them list some interests. Hobbies, pastimes, sports, TV shows, movies, music...

...y'all wouldn't believe the names written down.



The previously mentioned AC/DC (on several kids' cards).



Bon Jovi. Yes. Bon FREAKING Jovi.



"The Breakfast Club." (As in the movie, not the one hit wonder band from around '88 or so).




One boy even listed "80's" as one of his interests. Totally tubular, dude!



So, I got into a conversation with a group of kids today, incredulous that one of them would be into "The Breakfast Club." (This one is my new ASB vice president, by the way).

They all began to quote lines at me, like ultra-cool versions of myself at 17 reciting dialogue from "The Quest for the Holy Grail." And not just from "TBC," either - I heard an exchange of dialogue between Ducky and Andi from "Pretty in Pink," parts of some of Ferris' monologues from "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," and heard an extended commentary on how totally cool "The Goonies" was.

I had an idea a few weeks ago while perusing the posters at Suncoast Video in the mall. I found a poster of the cast of "TBC" posed in front of their lockers: Judd Nelson, in his stoner/rocker glory, Ally Sheedy, sitting on the floor drawn up in a pre-Goth ball of Smiths- and Cure-driven despair, Emilio Estevez, all preppy and jock-y in his letterman's jacket, next to him my fantasy dreamgirl, circa 1984-1987, dear Miss Molly Ringwald, resplendent in her Nordstrom's best, and, finally, a pre-buffed out Anthony Michael Hall, rounding out the group that so spoke to a generation from Saturday detention. Next to them is a copy of the final note they wrote to to Principal "don't mess with the bull, young man, or you'll get the horns" Vernon.

I thought about buying this poster and putting it up in my classroom, then, looking at what passed for cool in 1985 as opposed to what passes for cool in 2004, decided against it. It's one thing for kids to laugh at and bag on one's generation in the general, but I couldn't take them telling me John Bender looked like a dork, with his Ray-Bans and flipped-up collar on his Levi's jacket. I owned and wore both of those fashions back then, thankyouverymuch.

So, resigning myself to the slings and arrows of obnoxious criticism from 14-year-olds who were barely born when I graduated from college, I decided against it.


Tonight, after having that totally awesome conversation with my students about the early filmography of John Hughes, I drove out to the mall, plunked down my eight ducats, and bought that "Breakfast Club" poster.

Tomorrow morning, the following words will be hanging on the wall of my classroom, along with the image of five pretty cool looking kids (for 1985, anyway):

Dear Mr. Vernon,

We accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was that we did wrong. What we did WAS wrong. But we think you’re crazy for asking us to write an essay telling you who we think we are - what do you care? You see us as you want to see us - in the simplest terms, the most convenient definitions. You see us as a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, and a criminal. Correct? That's the way we saw each other at seven o'clock this morning.
We were brainwashed.