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In a poor-to-working class neighborhood. We lived in rental units that were pretty ghetto. It was all my parents could afford. My dad was a trucker in the 80s, but my mom felt the job kept him away from the family too much, especially after I was born in the late-80s. So, he quit and struggled finding consistent work. He was a roofer for a time, and then eventually got a job working at 7-11. It's embarrassing admitting as much, since 7-11 is far from a prestigious job, but that's where my dad worked for a bulk of the 90s. He eventually quit, in the mid-90s, and received a job at a window and door frame constructing plant. He worked there until they tried to unionize a few years later and the plant owner laid them all off. It wasn't until the very late 90s, early 00s, he received a job working at the local VA Hospital here in Salt Lake. It was probably his best paying job and one that allowed good hours.
I remember when my dad worked at that door frame plant in the 90s and how he and my mom would discuss raises in 'cents', not dollars. It always perplexed me how they would get excited over such little money, but now that I'm older, it makes sense.
I think my dad also worked for a grocery warehouse where they stocked the goods to be shipped to the grocery stores, but had to quit due to a hand injury. That might've been the job he held before being employed at the VA. But like I said, he had a lot of jobs in the 90s and we struggled financially because of it. But my dad was never really out of work. He'd lose a job and find a new one and work his butt off to provide for his family.
But we lived in a four-plex, never went on vacation, never owned a new car, or even a nice used one. We had a used Monte Carlo for a time and the thing I remember most about that car is that the driver's seat door was a pain to close, so, they would never open it. So, to get into the car, you had to enter through the passenger side, even if you were going to drive it. After that, my dad bought my grandpa's old Dodge Rampage (I wonder how many people even know what that is?!?) - yes, RAMPAGE. Not Dodge Ram - RAMPAGE. This is what it looked like:
In fact, that was the one he owned - well, at least the color. He still drove that sucker until he couldn't drive anymore in 2009 and it still sits outside my mom's house, even though he's been dead since 2010! That thing was awful to drive in as a kid. There was a very narrow area to sit in the back and often, we would sit in the bed of the truck.
Eventually, my parents bought a Chevy Impala from one of their friends, but it was really rusted and about 15 or so years old. The car was a mess, but my mom drove it for a while until it failed to pass inspection. Eventually, we were back to only using the Rampage. It wasn't until high school, in the 00s, that my parents finally could afford to buy a used car from a real car lot. They bought a 1995 Jeep Cherokee.
But the thing I remember most about the 90s is the crime. Like I said, we lived in a poor neighborhood with a lot of rental properties and it attracted seedy people. We had a lot of gangs and drug dealers and users on my street. Across the street from me was the mom of a Mexican Blood and he often would stop by his mom's house with his gang buddies. Next door to me, in the same housing complex (remember, we lived in a four-plex), was a Tongan-Crip. The Crips & the Bloods fought, a lot. Now Salt Lake is different than L.A. in the sense there are no real gang boundaries. Gangs don't own certain area of the town. They mix and mingle, which is a bit more dangerous because it leads to clashing. Well, one night, my house was shot up because they were targeting my neighbor.
I couldn't sleep on the top bunk of my bunk bed because it was level with the window and my mom feared I'd get shot if there was ever another drive by shooting. We had cops constantly on our street, drug overdoses, fights, you name it, I saw it growing up.
So, for me, the 90s was always about crime and economic instability. That's what I remember most about that decade. Maybe I was in the minority, which is entirely possible, but growing up in that decade, we didn't see an economic boom. It just didn't happen for us. We lived on a ghetto street, with gangs and drug abusers and it really was the early-to-mid-90s when things really went down hill on that street. Maybe it was the early-90s recession that did it, I don't know. But when we first moved there, it wasn't bad. Then it got bad and stayed bad for years. There were murders, there were beatings and it's not like we lived in on a huge street. We were a circle! So, it wasn't nice. It exciting at times, of course, but there was always economic instability in my family. We couldn't afford any vacations. We rarely went out to eat. We never went to the movies. My mom would send me to my local elementary school in the summer for free lunch. But you know what? I still had a blast as a kid. I miss a lot of those times. But for my parents? I'm sure it was a constant struggle.
One of my first memories is my mom watching the 1992 election returns and the network announcing Clinton as the winner. She was jumping up and down she was so happy.
Personally, I was too young to grasp the whole struggle. I just didn't think much of it until I got older. Yeah, we didn't go on vacation, but neither did most my friends. Yeah, we didn't have nice shiny new electronics and cars, but neither did most my friends. In retrospect, I was like them because they were like me - we were all lower working class. Sometimes, though rarely, we would splurge and get something nice - like a new TV from the rent-to-own place. That was always nice. I had good Christmases in the 90s, but I think it was because my parents knew how to budget and saved for the entire year, often using layaway, so that we could have good Christmases.
I mean, we weren't on the street poor, but we hardly were well off, or even middle class. I often think of my family similar to the Conners on the TV series Roseanne and less like the other families seen on TV during that era. We just didn't have much expendable income.
But like I said to another person above, the things I remember most about the 90s were gangs, crime, good TV, good music and always seeming to have just enough money to get by but nothing more. I couldn't climb in trees because my parents didn't have health insurance for us kids and they constantly worried about broken bones. There was no CHIPS when I was a kid, that came by the time I hit middle school, I believe. That was a good thing, but it didn't exist until the late 90s.
One of the biggest memories that sticks out to me is that I couldn't wear certain colors to school. My dad is from Chicago, so, I grew up a Bulls fan ( 
) and I had a Bulls jacket. They wouldn't let me wear it to school because red = bloods and they feared kids being shot on the way to school. Jerseys? Forget about it. LA Raiders gear? No way! Not gonna happen. British Knights? I loved 'em. They were the shoes I wore all the time as a kid until I was told I couldn't anymore because BK stood for Blood Killer and it was associated with gangs.
Those are the memories I remember the most about the 90s. A lot of gang violence. A lot drug use. A lot of poverty. Back then, it was normal. So, I didn't give it a second thought.
But today? Violent crime isn't nearly as high. I feel safer. Even my old neighborhood is safer today than it was in the 90s. So, it really is weird how some areas can thrive and other areas struggle. We struggled. Life wasn't bad, but it wasn't great at times. If the 90s boomed, it didn't boom for my family and me.
