A Day In the Life - 1985

Ten years old and I’m on top of the world. Or, elementary school, at least. I scramble out of bed and get myself ready for another day of fifth grade, which starts with a heaping bowl of Fruity Pebbles.  

My dad left hours ago, but his voice fills the kitchen between songs. He’ll talk traffic, promotions, take callers and requests as he hosts the morning show. A locally famous dee-jay, he’s always getting recognized when we go to the mall to pick up new records.

I dribble milk on the sports section of the newspaper as I soak up the box score from last night’s game. To say I’m obsessed with the NFL is an understatement. It’s Tuesday, and so I’m checking the stats of last night’s game as a nine o’clock bedtime puts a hamper on my Monday Night Football viewing.

The Cowboys are doing okay, at least they have a winning record, but it’s the Chicago Bears everyone is talking about. They’re undefeated, making history as they steamroll teams with an imposing defense and a three-hundred-pound battering ram named Refrigerator Perry. I recently spent a dreary Sunday at the Ground Round restaurant (second only to Showbiz Pizza), sipping on New Coke, my feet crunching peanut shells as I watched the Bears cream the Cowboys 44-0

I was raised to be a Cowboys fan, but the Bears’ energy is contagious and I gotta say, it’s testing my loyalty. How could it not? Jim McMahon, Willie Gault, Richard Dent, and perhaps my favorite football player ever, Walter Payton.

My older sister emerges from the basement and goes right for the phone on the wall. She pours a glass of soda (in the morning!), her hoop earrings jingling as she turns to me, her heavy mascara eyes daring me to tell on her. She talks someone, the cord stretching across the kitchen, one hand shielding her mouth. She’s an eighth grader but thinks she’s Madonna. Mostly she’s just grounded.

She laughs, her rubber bracelets ride up her arm as she hangs up the phone then finishes the soda before my stepmom hurries in and reminds us all to get moving. My sister takes this as a personal afront, and she reacts with one of her epic eye rolls before she storms out the door for middle school in a gust of sighs and attitude.

I look to my stepmom, a devious smile as I expect her to lay down the law, but she’s a bit frazzled and in no shape for discipline. She’s missing a shoe, fixing an earring, helping my little sister get dressed while guzzling coffee. Something about a meeting at work, 

She tells me to move it and so I do, leaving my bowl and paper behind, only to be reminded to put my bowl in the sink. I shake my head, always something around here.

My parachute pants swish as I stomp back to my room for shoes. I pass on the penny loafers, opting for my white Chuck Taylors with the fat laces. My family doesn’t understand breakdancing or beatboxing. My dad works in radio but I’ve never once heard him play the Fat Boys. It’s a shame, too.   

The bus stop can present its own host of problems. Most of the time, we rehash yesterday’s backyard football game. We argue over the score, who did what and who they did it to. After that, things get dicey. Let’s just say I need to come up with some new your momma jokes, and fast.

In class we finish up our papers. My cursive has improved but still not neat. Show and tell is announced for Friday and I smile. I’d recently written to Randy White, defensive end for the Cowboys and received a signed glossy 5X7 for my troubles. Beats a stupid collection of Garbage Pail Kids any day.  

After a nationwide search, a teacher has been selected to join the astronauts on a mission next year. Not my teacher, she's still stuck with us. Math is my specialty. I ace the quiz given to us on the overhead projector. Multiplication tables and division come easy. My sister says wait until Algebra, let’s see how big of a hotshot I am then. I shrug. Not sure what foreign language has to do with math, but okay.  

Lunch in the cafeteria. My trusty NFL helmet lunchbox has a splotch of rust in the corner. No worries, all twenty-eight teams are accounted for, and my peanut butter and jelly sandwich goes great with the leftover Girl Scout cookies.

After school, I catch up with Dad. We toss the football around and then I teach my younger stepsister karate. I’ve never taken a single lesson, but I’ve watched all the Karate Kids and Chuck Norris movies. Today’s lesson involves the Japanese throwing stars I got from the flea market. Then it’s down the street for another round of backyard football. 

Dinner is a drag. We sit at the table. My younger sister happily eats what she’s served. I set my cheek to my hand, locking eyes with my older sister. We both have ways of beating the system. She likes to sneak her food into her napkin and feed it to the dog under the table. I do my best to eat around the lima beans, tuck them into whatever I can find until my dad threatens to shove then down my throat. Eventually, I swallow them down with milk.

With dinner out of the way and the table clear, I spread out the bicentennial edition encyclopedia and get to work on my paper. The encyclopedia is great, but it's my stepmom who powers the way, especially when she gets so caught up in the assignment the paper basically writes itself.

Depending on the night of the week, the show lineup is mostly a family affair. The Cosby Show. Family Ties. Growing Pains. Mr. Belvidere. My stepmom makes microwave popcorn, and I’ll fill one of my football cups to the brim with caffeine free soda. Someone will yell that the show is on and we take our places just in time for the commercials to end and the sitcoms to begin.

Bedtime rolls around. My little sister is all tucked in her Glow Worm tent bed. She has her Cabbage Patch dolls and Pound Puppies to get her through the night. In my room, look over my desk, to my radio. The floor is a scatter of GI Joe figures in various stages of combat. Transformers, Atari cartridges and football cards. I dream about the Nintendo Entertainment System. I’ve seen the commercials. No way Dad will spring for that, he won’t even buy that thirty-dollar Michael Jackson jacket at Hills.

A grab one of my library books and climb in bed. I’ve taken it upon myself to read the entire NFL team set from our school library. All twenty-eight books on all twenty-eight teams. Now it’s time to get through the book about the hapless Tampa Bay Bucs, a team about as old as I am. Dad stops at the door and wishes me a good night

“You think the Bears will win the Super Bowl?”

“Looks that way,” he says with a yawn.

It’s 1985 and arguably the greatest time in the history of mankind to be a kid. I’m ten years old, maybe eighty pounds, with dreams of making it the NFL as a wide receiver. I have no idea what’s going on in the world outside of this house, this book, my neighborhood. I’ve got school tomorrow and that stupid paper is due, but for now, as my dad wishes me a good night and turns off my light, I stare up at the ceiling and let my thoughts roam. The Nintendo. A teacher astronaut. Knight Rider. That Fat Boys. And of course, the Chicago Bears.

What a time to be alive.