It’s 40 years since 1986. Suddenly, I feel very old

March 29, 2026 — 5:00am

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For some of us it’s a bit rattling to know 40 calendar years have elapsed since 1986. Let’s not pretend 1986 feels like yesterday, but 40 years?

In 1986, I was turning 14. In the first week of school a kid in my woodwork class confided, with a bloodshot smile, that he was stoned. He encouraged me to join him before class, next time. Petrified I’d be zombified like the girl in Go Ask Alice – a flick shown to us in 1985, made in 1973, about the dangers of peer pressure, pills and wearing flares – I told him I’d prefer to wait until my birthday. The slippery ploy worked. Remembering things was no longer a strength of his.

In 1986, I received my first love letter. All in green, her handwriting looked like choppy winter waves. After reading it 26 times, still astonished, I hid it for some unfathomable reason, between my bed and the wall. Its unexplained disappearance is something my mother........

© The Sydney Morning Herald