Trendspotting: third grade
And how I learned I no longer know what's in style.
Last year, for the first time ever, my daughter knew about something cool before I did.
She needed a new water bottle. I was prepared to just pick up the first thing I saw at Target, but she specifically asked for a Gatorade bottle.
Random, I thought, but whatever. Sure.
”Like this?” I asked her, showing her a picture on my phone of the standard green squeeze bottle with the orange logo, the kind I brought to tennis practice in 2002. No, she said, the one she wanted was pink.
We happened to be going to Dick’s that day to find soccer cleats, so I said we would look around, on the off chance they had Gatorade bottles.
As we walked in, we were confronted with a literal wall of Gatorade squeeze bottles.
How had I — a proud owner of a Swell, a BKR, a Hydroflask, a Nalgene, a Stanley before they were cool, AND an Owala1— not known about this trend? This was it. My slide into irrelevance had begun in earnest.
Do you remember how you knew about trends when you were a kid? These days, Taylor Swift could be photographed drinking out of a certain brand of water bottle at 2 pm, my daughter could see a picture of it at 3 pm, and it could be on our front doorstep via Amazon by 10 pm. When I was nine, it went something like this:
January 1994: Jodie Sweetin arrives to the set of “Full House”2 and puts on a sick red plaid skirt selected for her by a costume designer.
September 1994: Stephanie Tanner appears on my TV wearing the sick red plaid skirt Jodie Sweetin was filmed wearing nine months earlier.
March 1995: I outgrow the first-day-of school clothes I bought in August of 1994, so my mom takes me to Cortana Mall (may its memory be a blessing), where we have three department stores that sell kids’ clothes to choose from. In Dillard’s, I see a mannequin wearing a blue plaid skirt, decide it’s close enough, and convince my mom to let me buy it.
What a lag! Kids today will never understand how we had to walk uphill both ways in the snow wearing last season’s skirt in the wrong color.
The speed at which we cycle through trends these days alarms me. (Every time I hear about a new trending item I picture millions of them floating in the ocean; a Pacific Garbage Patch made up exclusively of, say, jade rollers.) But, I am curious how the quick trend turnover will impact the way kids Rue’s age develop their taste. Will they end up confident in what they like because they had the opportunity to dip into so many personas and find out what works for them? Or will they be just as confused as we are (and with a bigger garbage patch to boot)?
Anyway, I think the Gatorade bottle trend is dying down3 but here are 5 other things I’ve noticed are trending among Minneapolis third graders. Please comment with your own data points of what 9-year-olds in other areas are doing.
"Bruh”: I keep getting ads for shirts made by someone with a Cricut, a dream, and a failed MLM (probably) that say something along the lines of “Hi, I’m Bruh! (formerly known as mommy)”. While I cannot endorse these shirts, I will acknowledge that my 9-year-old does say “bruh” a lot.
Squishmallows: Not only are there so many Squishmallows currently on my daughter’s bed that there’s barely any room for her, she has also been known to use the Instax she got as a birthday present to take portraits of her Squishmallows (this works out to a $1.30 picture of a stuffed animal.) I try daily not to think about the Pacific Squishmallow Garbage Patch.
Slapping your forehead when someone says something silly, corny, or stupid: I though this was an exclusively ‘90s gesture, but I guess it — like Doc Martens, slip dresses, and bootcut jeans — is back.
That one Lululemon belt bag: Rue asked for this fanny pack for her birthday. To be clear she doesn’t know what Lululemon is, but she does know that half of her friends have one. I cherish her but couldn’t spend $40 on a bag she will inevitably ruin/forget about/lose/fill with dirt. So I got her the Am*zon version4. She uses it to carry mini Squishmallows, Warheads for her friends, Aaron’s crazy thinking putty, and rocks.
“Crock” tops: I have not heard one of her friends pronounce this correctly. Please, no one correct them.
Other things: Taylor Swift, soft shirts with thumb holes and hoods, not wearing a coat, graphic novels, Trader Joe’s bagged dumplings, “The Thundermans,” chokers were popular but I haven’t heard a peep about them in months.
why do I have so many fucking water bottles though
In my last newsletter I polled you on what you wanted to read about, and “Full House” fashion came in dead last. But Rue is in a “Full House” phase and every episode is stacked with Good Outfits! I need to talk to someone about how many variations of “Lori Loughlin red drop shoulder turtleneck” I’ve googled. I need companions to hunt for early The Row inspiration.
Rue asked me recently “Do Stanleys have L.E.D in them?” so I know the girlies are talking about Stanley.
I have now moved on to thinking about the Pacific Black Fanny Pack Garbage Patch.
Elementary schoolers in my area have their own Stanleys (or Stanley knock-offs?) with the little straw cover thing. Graphic novels--especially the Baby-sitters Club, as you pictured--yes!! I have a feeling that our suburb/Zadie's school is not very trendy lol. They pretty much all wear clothes from Target. I'm sure in three months I'll start seeing the Gatorade bottles. ;) She does come home with a lot of horrible Youtube catchphrases that the boys in her class say, ugh.
Trends from my formative years are top-tier nostalgia. Show me early 2000s space buns and a dELiA*s catalog and I'll just wallow in warm feelings all afternoon. Will my kids feel that way about the red, white and blue Prime bottles? Or perhaps the crocks with the little icons shoved into the holes. IDK but I hope so.