A Nostalgic Time Capsule of Teen Magazine Pages From the '90s and '00s

I can still smell it. I can see it. I can even taste it. The sweet soda flavor and subtle berry-colored tint made Bonne Bell's Dr. Pepper Lip Smackers a cult favorite from elementary school all the way into high school. The lip balm was mentioned all the time in our favorite teen magazines, and the popular girls at school applied and reapplied every five minutes. That sh*t smelled so good. While it took a while for me to convince anyone to buy it for me, once I had it, I was hooked. And I felt like I was part of some club - a club that the late, great Brittany Murphy may very well have started.

This flavored balm was hardly the only thing I got from teen mags. I got dating advice that I would never, ever use, read mortifying stories about girls getting their periods - IN PUBLIC - and enjoyed some celebrity gossip to boot. Though the fashion options touted by the mags were entirely out of my financial reach, they gave me something to dream about. I'd gleefully buy Teen or Seventeen whenever I was with my grandparents, poring through the pages, sniffing perfume samples (Ralph by Ralph Lauren anyone?), and ogling the latest heartthrob.

At some point my love of these colorful magazines fell off - it was probably the fault of the Internet or leaving my teen years. Either way, I hadn't given them much thought, until recently when I happened upon the Y2K MAGAZINES Twitter account. I saw a vibrantly colored advertisement for gel pens and was blasted back in time for a brief moment. God, those pens were popular. Unlike me. Anyway. The account got an instant follow, and has been bringin' me back ever since. So whether you're a geriatric millennial such as myself, or are curious about the Ancient Ways, these tweets are for you.

Posted by Ada Elder