My first experience with a Walkman is forever burned into my memory. My mom and I went to some local mixed-media store that has since gone out of business, and I begged her to shell out the dollars so I could listen to my Spice Girls in isolated bliss. My player of choice was bright red and had a Mickey-head shaped window to view the magical spinning of those cassette wheels. I put on my headphones, pressed the massive plastic play button, and yelled to my mom “WOW IT’S LIKE MY LIFE HAS A SOUNDTRACK” with an enormous grin on my face.
It was a magical afternoon.
Fast-forward to 2014, and Walkmans are relics of the past. Don’t think so? Check out this video of kids and teens trying to figure out what the hell the clunky contraption does, and their subsequent outrage when they discover what rewinding is.
This will not only make you feel ancient and give you an almost ungraspable sense of awe at the speed of technological progress in our lifetimes alone, it will also give you a window into those youths of today. Seriously, imagine having a smart phone at 7? I had to wait until high school to get a dinky flip phone and I could only send 200 texts a MONTH. What kind of hell is that?
Thanks to Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls and Mental Floss
