Never has my computer brought me such joy. I wasn’t perusing Facebook and spotted a funny status or checking my grades to see that stubborn “B+” rose to that all-important “A.”

No, I was looking at a website with a compilation of 90’s toys.

The walk down memory lane was perfect and well-needed.

There were the Skydancer Barbies that flew up into the air and made me think that flying was magical and obtainable. There were the Lion King stuffed animals that had magnets in their nose so when they were held in close proximately, they had no choice but to kiss. There were the suckers that doubled as whistles and provided minutes of sweet music and even sweeter tasting candy.

There was my childhood.

I was instantly in a great mood after I saw toys that I haven’t thought about since this past century. Warm nostalgia flooded over me.

Things were less complicated then, I hypothesized. I only worried about forgetting my sandals and having to scamper barefoot across the hot asphalt to get to the neighborhood pool.

Now the list of worries is endless. Class, homework, papers, wash, rinse, repeat.

Stay up until the ungodly hour of 3 a.m. finishing a paper only to have another due the next day.

Get that huge research project done just in time to start the next.

It never ends.

If only I had a time machine to take me back to the year 1999. I’d be worrying about choosing what Valentine’s to bring into class and my spelling words for the week.

However, those were a big deal at the time. I lost sleep wondering if the teacher would call on me the next day or if I was packed some kind of treat for lunch.

The worries existed in 1999 and they are still pecking us in 2012. The only difference is that we let them consume our lives.

When I was eight and something bothered me, I went out on the swings and pumped away my frustrations.

Nowadays, people might turn to less healthy ways of coping with their collegiate stress.

Instead of turning to a bottle of beer, why don’t you just turn to a friend? Plan a sleepover. I had a Disney movie marathon the other night and it put me in a spectacular mood. It reminded me that life is only complicated and hard if we make it so.

I’m not advising Disney movies or 90’s toys to be the cure to the quarter life crisis blues.

If it was that simple, we’d all be humming songs animated characters sing and carrying around battered toys.

Just think back to those days. Yes, things got to you.

They may seem trivial now, but they still presented a worry all those years ago.

The difference between then and now is the way you handled it.

Go swing instead of drink. Go buy a piñata and a cake and remind yourself what partying used to mean.

Your childhood really wasn’t that long ago, and I guarantee that it’s easy to find.

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