Portrait of a ‘90s Punk-Rock Kid

Mining the Past for the Pieces We Left Behind

“It takes an obsessive streak that borders on lunacy to go rummaging around in the past as memoirists are wont to do, particularly a fragmented or incendiary past, in which facts are sparse and stories don't match up.”—Mary Karr

I haven’t been ready until now.

As both a memoir writer in the making and a coach, I live in the business of soul-reclamation—helping others piece together the parts of themselves they’ve lost along the way. But if I’m being honest, I easily overlook my own reclamation opportunities.

That’s the trick of a fragmented past. If you’ve experienced trauma, memory doesn’t arrange itself neatly. It feels more like a scattering of half-written pages, with some missing entirely, others smudged and out of order. But sometimes, a fresh perspective can reveal the parts of your past you’ve long forgotten.

In the span of one week, the past came knocking in unexpected ways—first in a therapy session, then in passing conversations, and oddly enough, in a discussion about the music that once defined me.

When asked what songs I liked in high school, I came up blank.

Music was my life in high school. The very essence of who I was. And yet, I couldn’t name a single band.

That loss of memory unsettled me. Music was my whole identity. The theme of being a unique, early-adopter runs through so many of my stories, as does the pull toward exclusivity—being part of something few others understood. (Apparently, these ideals are quite important to my ego.)

High school wasn’t a time I usually looked back on fondly. Writing this piece made me realize I hadn’t just buried memories—I’d buried parts of myself that I want to call back.

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In the spring of 1995, just before my freshman year, my dad uprooted us from Southern California with little warning and dropped us in the last place I expected, Corpus Christi, Texas. Culture shock barely covers it. I didn’t fit the town, and it sure didn’t fit me.

The lunchroom of my new school was a maze of neatly divided cliques, none of which felt like home—until I found the punks.

The way I remember it, we connected over music, blasting songs through cheap car speakers and swapping band recommendations like currency. The right song could wake up the quiet parts of your soul, couldn’t it?

For decades, I’d written those years off as awful, overshadowed by the harder things—like the three months I spent at a Mormon-run ranch for “troubled” teens, where they forced me to take Prozac daily while simultaneously putting me through the 12-step program. A detour that left me with PTSD and stripped away any chance of a “normal” high school experience.

For a long time, that was the only story I let myself tell.

But the older I get, the more I realize memories aren’t black and white, no matter how much trauma tries to paint them that way.

Reconnecting with an old friend—someone with clearer memories—helped me see what I’d buried. He reminded me of the joy and unbridled energy that once pulsed through my veins: the nights that felt infinite, the laughter that echoed louder than the music, and how we lived without hesitation.

Being a teenager in the mid-’90s was something else. We were untamed, unapologetic, and alive in a way that’s hard to explain.

The internet didn’t rule us. No one had cell phones or social media. Instead of chasing likes, we just lived. We filled our nights with coffee shop debates, bottomless IHOP refills, aimless drives, and streets wandered for no reason except to feel free. And when the music started, we packed into sweaty rooms where the sound hit like a riot in our veins.

Though I’m a vastly different woman now, I wrote this piece because that misfit—the one who saw through the B.S. of The System, refused to conform, and found sanctuary in the underground—is still here.

And it’s time to bring her back. Piece by piece.

These memories, a mashup of ‘95 to ‘98, offer a glimpse of what it felt like to come of age in the mid-'90s.

We’re the adults who still know every word to I Wanna Be Sedated, but never learned a single lyric to Step by Step.

If you’re a ‘90s kid, I hope this reawakens something in you too. Maybe the nostalgia will remind you who you were before life smoothed your edges, and responsibility and adulthood quieted the fire.

That fire had a soundtrack. Maybe it’s time to turn it up again.

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Portrait of a 90’s Punk-Rock Kid

The bass drum rattled my ribcage as we crammed into another warehouse, sweat sticking to my back in the sweltering South Texas heat. The first chords ripped through the speakers—fast, relentless, a few minutes of raw energy. A typical punk song: power chords, a breakneck drumbeat, and lyrics hurled into the air.

But the sound we loved was never just one thing. Third-wave ska fused reggae rhythms with punk’s unrestrained edge, mixing offbeat upstrokes and blaring horns with rapid fire guitars. One moment, the pit was skanking, elbows flying, feet pounding in sync. The next, the tempo exploded, the brass dropped out, and the crowd shifted—swing dancers spinning under warehouse lights before being swallowed by something harder, faster, more chaotic.

It wasn’t just about music. It was about movement.

We lived for this. The underground scene, the bands only a select few knew of, the ones that wouldn’t—couldn’t—sell out. The day your favorite band signed to a major label was the day you retired their CD and replaced it with something rougher, louder, more authentic. Of course, there were always exceptions.

The fashion was as eclectic as the music: combat boots, fishnets, thrifted dresses, and rockabilly curls—Tragic Kingdom-era Gwen Stefani-style. You’d see it all: baggy corduroys with chains, smudged black eyeliner or lipstick, bleach-streaked or fire-engine red hair, and DIY piercings done with a safety pin and an ice cube.

We weren’t following a trend; we were shaping one. Misfits, outliers, kids who didn’t want to belong anywhere else, bound by nothing except the joy of the music and the freedom to be exactly who we were.

We could talk about music for hours, sometimes days, debating albums, breaking down lyrics, and dissecting obscure references like they held the meaning of life. We were disciples, gatekeepers, maybe even snobs. If you couldn’t name the drummer’s side project, did you even belong here?

The exclusivity made it feel important. You had to be in the know just to hear about a show. No one advertised it. They spread like rumors, whispered between friends, scribbled in notebook margins, scrawled on handmade flyers.

CDs, mixtapes, and records were our currency. We haunted record store aisles like ghosts, fingers trailing over jewel cases, memorizing liner notes, decoding hidden tracks. The perfect mixtape was a love letter, a secret handshake, or a manifesto.

And we walked. Everywhere. Sometimes we’d hitch rides. Gas was so cheap that a handful of loose change could keep us moving. If a friend gave you a ride, they’d have a crumpled gas station cup or an old jar on the dashboard, and you’d toss in whatever coins you had, knowing it was enough to buy another mile.

Parking lots became our makeshift town squares, where we stood under spotty fluorescents, making impassioned speeches about how much this town sucked and how we had to get out. Some never did. Some never even made it past 25.

There was a strange camaraderie in the shared experience of something both reckless and meaningful. The straight-edge kids, their discipline worn like a badge of honor—sometimes enforced with fists—stood shoulder to shoulder with the ones like me, the ones with a haze in their eyes but a fire in their chest.

I envied them. Maybe anger was enough for them. It never was for me. I reached for something to dull the edges, to quiet what felt like too much. They let the fire burn. Even if their crutch was fury, it was cleaner—one I sometimes wish I’d chosen.

We’d all collide in the pit, limbs tangled, blood and sweat indistinguishable under the flickering warehouse lights—only to haul each other up without a word, like it was sacred law.

The freedom we craved wasn’t always political; it was personal. A middle finger to authority and a way to carve out a space where we weren’t just someone else’s problem.

For me, the music wasn’t just an outlet—it was oxygen. It didn’t just accept my anger; it amplified it, celebrated it, and set it on fire. I wrapped myself in lyrics like armor, screamed them back like a prayer. Even better (though far rarer) when the voice behind the mic belonged to a woman. Girls didn’t often take center stage in this scene, but that was fine. I found my place in the feeling that I could be ‘one of the guys’, no questions asked.

We traced the roots of our sound back to the beginning—to the ‘70s punk explosion, the two-tone ska of the ‘80s, and the voices that paved the way. The music had morphed into something uniquely '90s—stitched together with pop hooks, big band brass, garage grit, and lyrics that swung between rebellion, heartbreak, and the kind of anthems that begged to be screamed at full volume.

The way I remember it, it felt like an underground youth movement—something fleeting yet limitless.

And we danced. We weren’t just listening to the music; we carried it in our bones, let it shake the walls, let it pull us into something bigger than ourselves. We were the music, the movement, the escape.

But looking back now, I see I wasn’t just chasing music.

I was chasing something real. Something wild. The feeling of being utterly, unapologetically, vibrantly alive.

Maybe that’s the part worth reclaiming. Not the chaos or the self-destruction, but the fire. The part of me that felt everything fully, that pushed against the edges of a world that still tries to make me small.

I may not throw myself into chaotic pits anymore, but I can still throw myself into what matters. I can channel that fire into tearing down what no longer serves and building something real.

Because that girl, the one screaming along to the music with fists clenched and heart wide open, spinning through the crowd like nothing else existed, is still here.

And I know she’s not alone.

Maybe we’ve traded warehouses for boardrooms, classrooms, and living rooms lit by the glow of baby monitors. The thrift-store clothes are long gone, and we don’t scrape together quarters for gas anymore.

But that fire, that hunger for something real—it never truly faded, did it?

Maybe it’s time we all pick it up, pick it up, pick it up again—whatever it is for you. That thing that made you feel alive, untamed, on fire.

Because you haven’t lost that part of yourself. It’s just waiting for you to remember.