Seven Oaks Magazine.

By 1999, human 'progress' was clearly out of control. The town of Halfway, Oregon (population: 345) was seriously considering a name change to Half.com, after being solicited by a Philadelphia-based Internet start-up looking for a publicity stunt. According to Time magazine, in exchange for 22 computers and $75,000, Halfway became the first city or town with a ".com." Meanwhile, the e-commerce brand Half was propelled to instant stardom and a $300 million valuation six months later. It seems to have been a win-win situation for all parties involved, but wasn't something - pride, or maybe even integrity - lost along the way?

Nine years earlier, in 1990, the Hubble space telescope sprung into orbit. From the get-go, there were technical difficulties. Like a high-school science fair project gone awry, most of the gathered data was murky and out-of-focus. Adding insult to embarrassment, the Hubble's solar-array design was flawed, causing the structure to vibrate for several minutes when emerging from Earth's shadow. Right from the start of the 90s, our view of the universe was short sighted and shaky.

So, are you ready for the official 90s revival?

If time goes in spirals, as some indigenous cultures believe, then the human tribe has likely already moved through childhood, adolescence, maturity, seniority, and decline several times in the course of existence. In the 1990s, I believe humanity slid once again into another unfortunate adolescence, complete with the telltale awkwardness, propensity to experiment sexually, and growing pains that plague all teenagers. Humanity is beginning to realise that our actions may indeed have had unintended, permanent consequences, and although we're terribly scared, we're putting on a good show of acting all cool about it.

I will remember the 1990s as the decade that North American law became queer, in both senses of the word. Many landmark cases saw homosexuals gaining more rights under Canadian and American laws. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Lorena Bobbit is found not guilty for severing her husband's penis dues to a finding of "temporary insanity."

But in Canada, the hallmark, defining, to-be-reminisced about query of the 90s is not: "Where were you on October 30, 1995 when the separatists were barely defeated?" Nor: "What hockey game were you watching when Nunavut became a new territory?" But: "Where were you on October 3, 1995, when the O.J. verdict was handed down?" Ever since then, DNA has been getting some people out of trouble, and more folks (and sheep) into trouble.

In the decade that brought us the term "going postal," cash and audiocassette tapes disappeared, middle managers everywhere began wasting time playing computer solitaire, and the nebulous 'Web' started catching unwary humans in her grasp. Culture was modelled after, of all places, Seattle: Starbucks, flannel, Internet cafés, hiking-wear, grunge-pop, and Microsoft-geekism seeped into the world like so much Seattle rainwater run-off. We didn't know why the Northwest had become the 'It' girl; we just knew we had to jump on the bandwagon before someone changed the tune.

When North America finally got to party, according to the 1982 Prince song, like it was 1999 , most of us had no concept of what that meant anymore. How is one meant to party in 1999? Do we allow our now-retro Tamagotchi to have a cocktail? Do we sip pale ale at the local microbrew pub discussing company stock options? Do we stay awake all night in chat rooms? Do we mosh?

What will the 'cool' kids think? And weren't we surprised, in retrospect, to discover that the millennium "Y2K" computer bug was, in fact... us . In the post-90s tech world, humans have become the single largest cause of all computer malfunctions and crashes.

Nostalgia for all things 90s will invade, like so much spam mail, this summer. It's about time, too. The revival cycles for 70s and 80s nostalgia were accelerated in the 90s, and when they ran out of material, they just started again with 1920s lindy hop dancing and worked through to the early 70s. Post-2000, we got over the space-glam promise of a shiny-new millennium within weeks. But for the North American cultural retardation caused by the terror of 2001, 90s nostalgia should have blasted us fully in 2003. It has already invaded the airwaves of some Vancouver radio stations.

Faust or farce, boom or bomb, hackers or slackers, the 90s will always hold a few of my heartstrings in its greedy little clutches. Let us hope, for the sake of humanity, that as the human species continues to grow up over the next decades and centuries, our angst isn't that great, our hormones don't rage too much, and our pimply breakouts don't last too long. And please, for the love of all that is good and pure, don't let humanity spend too much time smoking pot at the Dark Side of the Moon planetarium laser light show.