1986: Further Down This Rabbit Hole of My Life Surrounding G.I. Joe
By Destro Designs- Viper Den Studios
1986, the Year of the Joe, was put on a pedestal because of the explosion of imagination surrounding my entire habitat. I lived across the street from a Pizza Hut with an arcade game, and there was a laundromat down the street with 3–4 rotating arcade machines. I had family scattered in all directions throughout our grid-style neighborhood that stretched from the hill to the river, end to end, with my house sitting right in the middle of it all.
With family “close enough,” I was able to ride my bike all over the place despite having no business being out alone like that beyond my block. My parents were awesome, but they were in their mid-20s at the time and both worked full-time jobs. So free rein was instituted, and I grew up naturally becoming self-reliant.
At one point, I remember getting an inexpensive camera for my birthday. I spent the rest of that summer, when I wasn’t playing G.I. Joe, acting as a photojournalist around my neighborhood. Within a week, I had created an entire newspaper.
Legitimately, a dead bird was found in the alley, and I wrote about the mystery of how it died in that exact spot and why it had been left there. Ms. McQue moved out of her corner-lot home, and it was big news. Her husband had passed away under suspicious circumstances, and I was always trying to sneak pictures of her and the backyard. I may have speculated that she killed him and buried him in the garden. Imagine my surprise later in life when I watched the movie Secret Window starring Johnny Depp.
Unfortunately, all of this creativity was handcuffed by the fact that developing film was expensive, and my parents were spending money on photos of dead birds despite how awesome I thought it all was.
But my slightly morbid and far-too-grown thoughts for a 7- or almost 8-year-old kid stemmed, at least in part, from the media I was consuming. Renting VHS tapes from the local video rental place was the absolute highlight of the week because I would get two movies and a video game. It was pure bliss. Walking through those doors and seeing the giant wall of NES games in all their glory felt like stepping into happiness itself.
First, you had to grab the video game. You didn’t want to get snaked on the latest release while you were busy browsing the Action section.
Movies I watched that year included, but were not limited to, Return of the Jedi, The Goonies, Back to the Future, GoBots: Battle of the Rock Lords, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge (my favorite), The Jewel of the Nile, Spies Like Us, The Money Pit, and of course Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Rambo: First Blood Part II. Absolutely insane choices for my age.
All of this led to even more scenarios I could throw my Joes into. My head canon expanded massively that year because of the crazy movies I was definitely not supposed to be watching.
Down the street was my babysitter during the summer. She had an older brother who was the prototypical ’80s teenager. Black walls with a black light in his bedroom, posters of Slayer, Megadeth, and other heavy metal bands plastered everywhere. This dude was awesome — and genuinely nice.
In fact, he helped me customize some of my Joe vehicles and figures, build dioramas in the yard, and all kinds of other cool stuff. He didn’t have to be cool to me — his sister was the one getting paid to watch me — but he was awesome anyway.
Later in life, he ended up marrying the older sister of one of my best friends, so I got to know him even better over the years. He was a genuinely cool dude. Honestly, I could write an entire article about him alone and some of the epic partying we did together. Especially one unforgettable Memorial Day weekend where our enormous group rented a massive ski cabin in the offseason that slept like 30 people, and we went absolutely hard.
Rest in peace, Mike, my brother. I’ll see you on the other side. Maybe I will write that article someday.
And now, finally, I’m ready to get into how all of this began shaping what would become the year I transformed into the ultimate G.I. Joe fan.
Stay tuned, as 1986 continues.
