I entered the world in January 2008, so it was a pretty big year for me. Hard to believe it’s been 18 years already.
I was in elementary school, parents took me to Ron Paul rally which was pretty cringe. Reading Warriors books, watching Star Wars the Clone Wars, mascot for older sisters robotics team.
I remember being very confident and optimistic. I had just started college, and nerd shit had just become the dominant force in our culture.
People were joining the internet and connecting via Facebook which I thought would lead to world peace.
Bush was out of office and Obama had won.
The iPhone meant I could use the internet and apps whenever I was.
Everything was becoming higher quality. The fast food restaurants were all remodeled to look like actual buildings. TVs in waiting rooms became all flatscreen, something I associated with the very wealthy.
Every brand was trying to copy apple so everything became a lot more white and clean. Simplified.
I had discovered reddit which felt like cheat codes for knowledge, especially since I was the only person I knew in real life who knew it existed.
Ding ding, except Android instead of iOS and I was just in Highschool
Drunk, got fired for being a drunk, sold plasma to get a daily McDouble and a couple 40s. Read library books until my landlord (wife of the woman who fired me) evicted me.
What a low time to look back on. So glad I got sober.
Just graduated university. Couldn’t get a job in my field. Couldn’t get a job at Taco Bell. Sold my body for money.
It was a terrible time in my life… no job and no friends. Family overseas…
curious about the “family overseas” thing
Did you move abroad or did you family abandon you in your home country?
Cuz that is a huge difference.
I think because of the circumstances around my birth (illegaly born against One Child Policy) I would’ve been left behind in China if they couldn’t get the legal documents for me to leave…
It’s terrifying to think about… would my parents actually abandon me and just focus on their 1st born child instead?
Wasn’t terrible, wasn’t great, but I was younger. Cherish your youth.
Feel bad for the kids today, at least older people can remember what hope felt like.
Meanwhile my parents tells me how much they had to suffer in China and how much things have improved and constantly tells me to “be grateful” because I have more variety of food to eat and “shouldn’t be picky about food” and “complaining”
Also tells me about many people being undocumented and that I “should be grateful for being so lucky of having legal status in the US”
(I literally never said I was ungrateful lol, but its this constant guilt-trippin every time my mom think I’m “being ungrateful”)
I never enjoyed my early years, I was consistently bullied at school and the school itself never made me feel challenged mentally. In a couple years I’d switch school which would let me to meet my first love and set my social health back up.
Miserable, but a different kind of miserable.
I voted in my 2nd presidential election that year.
Sadly, I was still just beginning the very first stages of realizing God is the biggest scam in the history of the universe, so I voted McCain.
There is a lot of my past I’m not proud of. But given that I didn’t really have a lot of human contact outside of church members until I was almost 14, I gotta give myself a little slack. But it’s still embarrassing af.
My first election, I voted conservative because that’s just how my family voted and I didn’t know better. I get your embarrassment.
I was 22 and struggling massively. I’m told there was a financial crisis but financial crises don’t really affect people with no money, no job, no prospects and no hope.
Believe it or not there was 15 years of going further downhill from there, with depression, drugs, alcohol, crime and insanity.
I was doing an exchange high school year in Santa Clara, California. Nowadays I look back on this time and wonder how on earth I didn’t get shot. My daughter is definitely picking another country for an exchange year.
Also, I refused to get Facebook, but this bit me in the ass because it was the way to communicate and stay in touch back then, and I ended up losing all the contacts I made in that school.
I gave birth to my middle baby, my eldest was 13 at the time. It’s one of my favourite years. Simpler time. We were still going to video stores to pick out movies and internet wasn’t much of a muchness yet.
I was 21 and crashing out of college. I voted in my first presidential election, I was always left of my family politically, something about taking love thy neighbor seriously, but I was appalled anyone could vote for Sarah Palin or someone who didn’t have the sense to not appoint Sarah Palin VP.
i was a fetus in january of 2008
