A quick little 2016 throwback…

It’s kinda wild how pervasive Internet culture is.

I’m not on social media anymore, but I also can’t escape it.

Apparently there’s a little trend going on right now with the start of the new year where we’re all posting our 2016 moments and memories.

Like, truly can’t escape it. Friends that have posted their 2016 memories on social media have sent me screenshots so I don’t get FOMO. Thank you, friends! Glad to be part of your memories.

I obviously can’t share on Instagram, but since I’ve been around on this URL for waaayyyy too long, I thought it might be kinda fun to take a peek back in the vault and laugh/cry at the version of me that existed (and was thoroughly documented) 10 years ago.

2016 feels like yesterday, but also like a complete lifetime ago.

I was living in Chicago. Say what you want about my 20s: I fucked a lot of things up and made a lot of very Poor Life Decisions (mostly regarding my dating life), but the decision to move to Chicago was not one of them. I still look back fondly on my time in Chicago and wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Sipping Goose Island at Cubs games, relying on Eater’s brunch guides to guide me through West Loop, walking to concerts at Aragon and the Riv, drinking happy hour rosé on River North rooftops while swiping through Tinder — it was the best possible way a girlie could spend her 20s in the 2010s.

While I was living in Chicago, I was working at the Tribune. It’s wild – WILD — to see how my career has taken such unexpected pivots in the past decade.

Peace Corps was not on my radar, and the 26-year-old version of me dancing among the skyscrapers would have revolted at the idea of the 36-year-old version of me working a job that required me to camp in the woods for weeks at a time.

WITHOUT CELLPHONE SERVICE. The HORROR.

The 26-year-old version of me working full-time in digital journalism and social media also would have GUSPED at the notion that 2026 Randi does NOT have Instagram.

By choice.

I was alllllll about social media as a job, personal brand and lifestyle in 2016. I spent all my work time and free time curating feeds, researching algorithms and fully leaning into social media as a career.

It’s wild that 10 years later, I never got a TikTok — and while I do fondly miss 2016 Twitter culture (RIP Twitter, nothing will ever compare), I think I’m OK with not being constantly glued to my phone.

Because 2016 was 2016, you couldn’t be an Instagram girlie without being a blog girlie.

I was in my fashion. blogger. era.

Every brunch was an occasion. Every occasion was an outfit. Every outfit was a blog post, and then an Instagram post, because Instagram Stories — let alone Reels — did not yet exist.

I lived for Nordstrom’s sales, J. Crew’s new releases and monogrammed leather goods from Madewell.

My life was DIY Essie manicures, throwing on oversized Karen Walker sunglasses to defeat a hangover, and carrying my stilettos in my oversized Dagne Dover handbag on the “L” because day-to-night, office-to-evening was a thing.

It was snapping photos of my boldest MAC lipstick on a Starbucks cup, scheduling monthly excursions in search of the best pastel macarons, and owning that very specific Anthropologie mug — in GOLD — just so I could use it as an Instagram prop.

You couldn’t even hold the damn thing’s handle, it was so inconvenient.

It was Ellie Goulding at Lollapalooza. It was fresh peonies from Trader Joe’s. It was $7 matcha art.

It was “How to be Parisian Wherever You Are.” It was Sophia Amoruso’s “#Girlboss.” It was “Broad City” and Lena Dunham’s “Girls.”

It was “but first, coffee.” It was “rosé all day.”

Fam, it was lowkey basic, but also somehow lowkey extra.

A very far cry from the Patagonia puffer jackets and Smartwool base layers I essentially live in now. My Birkenstock-clad feet could never wear those same glittery pointed-toe Sole Society loafers I lived in at 26.

If only I’d invested all the money I spent on Kate Spade clutches into my retirement accounts.

In retrospect, I probably should apologize to allllll my friends for making them eat cold food because I absolutely insisted on embarrassing us all by standing on my chair and taking #flatlay #brunch photos before we could eat anything.

Sara, I’m sorry!

This is just how we all were in 2016. We were cringe, but we were free.

I was obnoxious (so obnoxious), but I was happy.

Outside of work and Instagramming like it was my life, I hadn’t started solo traveling yet, but I did do my best to satiate that 20-something travel bug. I started my whole venture into one-bagging (thanks to Spirit Airlines being all my paltry bank account could afford) and my venture into quick trips (due to a lack of paid vacation time).

Because I was working at the Chicago Tribune on contract (I didn’t get annual leave or benefits), I was still relying on my parents’ health insurance and taking really quick weekend trips anywhere and everywhere since I couldn’t afford to take unpaid time off work.

Like, I literally worked 40 hours in three days so I could take an extended weekend trip to Europe, then went straight from the airport to my desk so I could work another 40 hours in three days.

Say what you want about 2016 Randi, but the girl had energy. I do miss that about her, because just thinking about that travel itinerary makes 2026 Randi crave a nap.

Anyway! I just wanted to take a quick scroll down memory lane. I love who I am; I love where I’m at. I’m so settled into the incredible life I’m living now — in the mountains, with my husky and my future husband — and even though it’s such a drastically different life from the life I was living in 2016, I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to fully live two different lives in one amazing lifetime.