I was 22 and had been independent for four years. Times were rough but getting better, slowly.
I was two-thirds through my first "adult-like" relationship and was just beginning to learn that I had set my expectations way too low. We broke up over Xmas/New Years '83-'84, which was not just the best for me at that moment but opened the door for my 20s to really take off.
I was working as an assistant manager at an off-price clothing store in the middle of downtown Boston and worked very hard for a homophobic, racist, misogynist piece of shit whose staff was, oddly, entirely either female, gay or minority. This sounds like the makings for a really funny sit-com but most of the time it was pretty horrifying to live through: I learned a lot about business and kept my mouth shut unless he went way over the top, in which case I'd yap back.
Though I've forgotten the exact argument, I remember he told me "Respect the position if you cannot respect the man" after an especially outrageous remark caused me to call him out. Considering how little respect he showed any of his staff (or customers for that matter), I roared later, privately, at the irony.
My partner and I had begun 1982 sharing a large Victorian house with another gay couple, full of fireplaces and stained glass in a really dangerous part of Dorchester. When the local toughs decided to show who was "in charge" and firebombed a house rented by a large Haitian family down the street (thankfully no one was killed), we broke the lease and left.
That was the year my partner bought a car, which made our lives much easier. We went out every Thursday for two-for-one drinks to a place called the 1270. The 1270 had a basement lounge (mostly lesbian), New Wave/Post-Punk on the first floor and Hi NRG dance hits on the second floor, and at least at that time, there was precious little mixing. Everyone I knew stayed on the first floor. For a darker and more aggressive sound (and crowd), there was a bar called Spit that was gay on Sundays (and pretty safely mixed on other nights).
As NudeYorker mentions, this was the time I cut my hair shorter and discovered hair gel, which I'd over-use, of course. My work clothes were sorta preppy (no jeans, and a tie was required) and my nightlife gear was the "everything torn everywhere" look. For just casual everyday, I'd wear mostly cords or jeans with T-shirts (long or short sleeve depending on the season).
At stage of my life, I was smoking weed every day, though increasingly I found it made me more paranoid than high. Once in a while we'd splurge on hashish or 'shrooms or a small bag of pills (downs, mostly), and we drank beer mostly either hanging around or going out. It was very much part of the culture of the time, though I never shared any enthusiasm for speed or coke, so it was never a big part of our scene.
Personally, for me, 1982 will always be remembered as the last of my "twen-teens". The next year:
1) I stopped smoking weed and doing illicit drugs;
2) Got my first real career job working for a furniture importer/retailer;
3) Broke up (painfully, at first) with my partner and eventually moved back in-town.
In other words, 1983 was the year I got serious about my future and stopped kidding around. As such, there's a funny place in my heart for that time, and as responsibilities grew and there was less and less time for spontaneous or unplanned fun, I grew to miss the simpler times very much.