"I Got a '34 Wagon and we call it a Woodie"

Something caught my eye the other day and it took me back to the 1980s, and here in 2022 I realized that 40 years ago, everything had fake wood grain on it!

I guar-ahn-tee you, you had a clock radio just like this before you counted on your cell to wake you up in the morning. That GE or whatever brand AM-FM clock radio looked real nice on the nightstand, all fake wood and everything, and exactly at 6 in the yawning the Morning Zoo radio show would come on and gently awaken you to "Bang On The Drum All Day" by Todd Rundgren as the Zoo Crew howled their slightly sexist jokes.

Oh, you hit the snooze button, and six minutes later, here would come "Lady" by Styx, and you knew it was time to face another day.

Down in the kitchen, you put your English Muffin in the wood grain toaster oven, put on your fake wood grain glasses, and your fake wood bow tie (male) or your fake wood leggings (female) and it was off to work in your Chrysler Le Baron with the fake wood dashboard, and a day in your office with fake wood desk accessories and file cabinets.

The theory about why wood grain was so popular in the 70s and 80s is that it replaced the Mid-Century modern look of the 50s and 60s. We were caught up in the space age, racing the Russians to the moon (and look what that got us!) so we decorated everything in a Space Age Motif with a side salute to the atomic age and all the wonders that we expected from splitting the atom.

And then, in 1969, we put men on the moon, and it was as if the thrill was over. The next time people were on the moon, they showed it on TV, but people called and yelped that they wanted to see "All In The Family" instead. Decorations changed. People didn't want fake wood grain anymore; they went to the beach and found chunks of driftwood the size of the front door, stuck legs on it, and there was the new coffee table we enjoyed while doing macramé and making our own yogurt and drinking wine in a wineskin.

That lasted until cell phones and email took our attention away from what was in our living rooms and focused on what was in our hands.