The 1970's: A split decision

The Prude’s husband this past weekend proved he is more than a pretty half-face (the other half being covered by facial hair). He reminded The Prude that in the 1970’s, we used the term ‘Split Personality’ to refer to those whose personalities were split.

(Please note that The Prude will be engaging in a little whimsy here as she personifies the 1970’s as if it were a real person with a Split Personality- sort of like anthropomorphizing that 10 years but much easier to spell.)

The Split Personality Syndrome of 70’s was a direct result of being sandwiched between:
the 1960’s, the decade draped in love beads and peering through a haze of funny-smelling smoke to see whether that person with the long hair and wearing velvet pants and a frilly shirt was a boy or a girl,
AND (hang on, this sentence is heading somewhere)
the 1980’s, which encouraged the wearing of little alligators on shirts and sweaters and the consumption of vast quantities of money.

This understandably left the 70’s with an Identity Crisis, a sort of cosmic Inferiority Complex.  This led to wild mood swings for the decade, which led to bizarre over-reactions contained within that 120-month span, such as:

-Let’s have a TV show about a lovely lady bringing up 3 very lovely girls!
-NO!!!!! Let’s have a show about an unseen millionaire who HIRES 3 very lovely girls, let’s call them angels, and let’s send them dangerous missions clad in bikinis!

-Let’s have a great, thumping anti-war song sung by a big strapping guy, and, for clarity’s sake, let’s call it ‘WAR’!
-NO!!!!!!! We want a song that features romantic rodents, and we want it called ‘Muskrat Love’.

-We want pants that flap around teenager’s ankles, are bell-shaped, and, for clarity’s sake, are called ‘bell bottoms’
-ARE YOU CRAZY! What we really want is to remove 90% of the fabric from bell bottoms and make them into hot pants!

-Well then, how about we balance everyone and their Elton John on 9” soles and call them platform shoes?
-Good Grief, what are you thinking? That’s like handing the 1980’s an entire chiropractic industry on a platter! The 80’s will be rich enough- let’s fool them and make negative-heeled Earth Shoes!

-If we really want to show the 80’s that we’re a buff and healthy decade, let’s have athletes swim a couple of miles, bike a couple hundred kilometers and run a marathon, all without a break! And for clarity- let’s call it the IRONMAN!
-Nah. If we really want to prove what great shape we are in, let’s have grown men shed their outer AND undergarments and dash about in their birthday suits! We’ll call it STREAKING!

-ICK! GROSS  I’m going crazy! Can’t we agree on anything? Like- maybe long rows of fresh-bowled veggies in restaurants? We’ll call them salad bars!
-Ok, but only if we can invent Ranch Dressing for people to completely douse those vegetables.

-We want to rejuvenate the science fiction genre! We’ll start a series of 3 great movies and call them ‘Star Wars’!
-Maybe. But you have to guarantee me that 20 years later we can make 3 more truly horrible Star Wars movies and utterly confuse an entire generation by naming them ‘Episodes I, II, and III’.

At this point the 1970’s tabled its discussion with itself. It was time to feed its Pet Rock.

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DISCLAIMER: The Ironman actually only consists of a 180.25 kilometer bike ride. Once again The Prude was exercising her Poetic License.

TOMORROW: Disapproval at the County Fair