Journal Entry of a GenXer

Memories of the Past from GenXer's point of view

October 4, 2025

Sometimes I forget how different the world used to be. Then a song comes on the radio—maybe The Cure, maybe R.E.M., or the haunting echo of Siouxsie and the Banshees—and I’m suddenly 13 again, the key to the house jangling in my backpack, walking home alone after school with nobody waiting but the TV and a box of cereal.

Being Gen X meant independence by necessity. We were latchkey kids before anyone thought to label it. There was no GPS, no constant texting with parents, just trust, boredom, and a whole lot of unsupervised imagination. I’d walk in the door, drop my bag, and maybe pop in a VHS tape or call a friend on the rotary phone if no one else was hogging the line. The house always felt a little too quiet, a little too big—but I didn’t mind. It was freedom, in its weird, lonely way.

The best escape came every summer when school let out. Cape Cod was where everything smelled like salt, sunscreen, and fried clams. We’d spend hours on the beach—sunburned, sticky with popsicle juice, our cassette players blasting mixtapes with whatever we’d dubbed off the radio. There was something sacred about those days: lying on a towel with sand in every crevice, looking out at the endless ocean, feeling like the future was just another wave rolling in.

Music was everything. It wasn’t background noise—it was the lifeline. Those songs weren’t just catchy, they understood us. They spoke to the alienation, the hope, the quiet rebellion of a generation caught between analog and digital, between boomers and millennials. I remember pressing “record” and “play” at just the right time to catch the start of a favorite track, hoping the DJ wouldn’t talk over the intro.

Even now, decades later, when one of those songs hits the right chord, I still feel it in my chest. Like I’m back in that awkward, beautiful middle place—growing up too fast, but never fast enough. Living in a world that was messy, raw, and deeply real.

We didn’t have hashtags or influencers. We had diaries, Walkmans, and friendships built over shared headphones. And somehow, that was more than enough.