Summer In Bloomington ’72
Category: 1970s
Brow Be Gone
In the late 1970s, the powers that be decided that foreheads were only useful as a canvas to showcase bangs, and forehead skin should be hidden altogether. By the fall of 1979, most hip teens had followed suit and were ready freddy for school picture day.
Even Caucasion afros came forward. Baby, you make my love come down.
Often, blond boys were indistinguishable from blond girls.
Then there’s this style, which would later morph into the “He wants you, too, Malachi” style from Children of the Corn.
Fashion’s dictates did not exclude any creed nor color. Rules is rules.
This girl missed the memo. She thought Marcia Brady was still groovy. By January, she was being homeschooled.
Judge Reinhold got the memo, but he got it late. Bless his heart.
Covered foreheads made dudes look hot, like poor men’s Oak Ridge Boys. How did the ladies ever decide upon a suitor?
Coveted styles included The Future Domestic Violencer, The Camaro On Blocks, and The 7-11 Graveyard Shift.
But if the goal was to entirely cover the forehead, to the extent that one’s eyesight was in peril, then there could only be one victor. Steve Wagner, you were that man.
Hip-Bumping At Wurstfest
These happy patrons were enjoying Wurstfest, a Texas tradition since 1963. Held annually in New Braunfels, Texas, they offer “good food, music, dancing, exciting carnival rides and games, German, Texan and domestic beer, special events and the finest in Alpine and Bavarian Style Entertainment.”
This sign from the 1975 event reveals that the drinking age was then 18, not 21.
Local colleges had been preparing students for weeks.
University of Texas students who could not travel to New Braunfels participated at home, drinking from kegs in homage to Alpine and Bavarian tradition.
These gals didn’t even mind singing for their supper frosty mugs of beer.
What about you? Would you sing a chorus for an ice cold beer?
Dog On A Hot Tin Roof
Unicorn Fabulous
Before The Rise Of Red Solo Cup
It’s hard to believe this was nearly 40 years ago. Two score years ago. Red Solo Cups had only just come out and were not yet the popular beverage container you see on late night talk show beer pong tournaments. Mexican dresses, big sunglasses, and scalp-hugging hair were in. The drinking age was 18. And yet, in this bright color, it doesn’t look that long ago at all.
Dolly Parton Tilted Conehead
Despite the Rocky Horror Magenta lookalike, this wasn’t even Halloween; just another day in 1972.
Billy Cart Races
Billy carts…not to be confused with Billy Carter.
Papunya Elementary
Getting Along
*images from “Lynchburg” by Joe Clark
As Long As Old Men Sit And Talk About The Weather
downtown Lynchburg, Tennessee circa 1970
Bruce Jenner Laryngeal Shave Sparks Concern
So much for the Adam’s Apple.
I don’t know what’s finally prompted the transition of the former Olympian, if ex-wife Kris’s penchant for plastic surgery spurred his interest in mangling a perfectly good face, or if the overexposure to a house full of Kardashian estrogen seeped into his insides, the way it does in kids who eat too many chicken nuggets. I’m not here to mock Jenner; I just DO NOT GET IT.
No one can argue his 70s hotness. Perfect hair, white-toothed smile, testosteroney sideburns out in full force. I realize it’s not 1976 and that getting old sucks. Wrinkles and gravity and cancerous growths on your face, they all suck. But dangit, Bruce, why did you have to go and tamper with that? Couldn’t you just go gently into that good night? Everyone with surgery looks like a melting Yankee Candle.
Perhaps it’s harder to go from a 10 to a 4, then it is for us 7s to simply slip to a 5. It’s a longer fall, that’s for certain. Or did you never think you were a 10 to begin with? Tell me, is it a form of body dysmorphia that led you to all these nips and tucks and French manicures?
Sigh.
Perhaps Jenner has felt the wrong gender his whole life. But shouldn’t he have been honest with his wives from the get-go? I wouldn’t appreciate it if my husband decided in his 60s that he wasn’t going to ride this whole male thing out any longer. If we two are one in a marriage, I would have liked to have gotten a head’s up on that whole gender identity pre-engagement. Preferably before TEN children and stepchildren came into the picture.
Now I realize these surgeries are getting more prevalent by the second, and we’re all supposed to applaud their bravery and wear ribbons in the name of open-mindedness, but imagine if you weren’t just clapping for Jenner from the sidelines. What if it was your dad or your grandpa? You can say “It’s still the same person in there,” but the truth is, it’s not. Gender identity is a huge part of your sense of self. Women don’t look or act like men, and (right or wrong) they don’t get treated the same. Because they’re not.
Ultimately, you can’t change an XY into an XX. At least not in 2015. It’s mostly a botch-job mutilation, a best attempt at what the medical staff had to work with. Call me selfish and narrow-minded, but I don’t want my son to chop his body parts off someday. What a difficult decision to make. And I don’t want him to wade through a sea of shemales to find a wife, or to have to worry if the woman he is dating used to be a man and doesn’t share that tidbit until the third date. It’s a shame that anyone would be born one sex, feeling like their Creator got it wrong. What a complicated burden to bear. Perhaps if Jenner had had his choice, he would have been a woman from the get-go. Then again, if he had his choice, strangers wouldn’t have opinions about his personal life. But such is the nature of celebrity.
So go ahead and bash my ignorance, LGBT community. Scold anyone who has honest questions and concerns and can’t quite jump all aboard this disconcerting bandwagon. I don’t hate people who transition. I hate the fact that anyone feels like they have to.
I Don't Get It 