Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping, into the future
Getting old isn't for the young.
When I was a youngster, I remember thinking that "old people" must not feel pain in the same way that a young'n would. Perhaps all the talk about a loving and benevolent creator led to this line of thinking. Then again, plenty of discussion concerning original sin and the closely held notion that our bodies are bad and must be punished (sex bad, food good) should have balanced out my feeling on the feelers of old folk.
Of course, there is no mercy, even at the end of life, when it comes to pain.
I also remember thinking, when I was young, that I would not forget what it is like to be young.
Much of childhood is like this. Major advancements on a short schedule. Growing larger, taller. Hair here, other things there. And school, with their precise stratification, serves to magnify this making each year's milestones demarcating lines between all the children.
It is difficult to remember what being a teenager was all about. While some of my best times, but also some of my worst times were during my teenage years. Just a whole lot of bad decisions and at times, superbly turbulent emotions and an inability to process everything. Being an adult, compared to a teenager, at least for me, adulthood has been smooth sailing, with spotty thunderstorms. The teenage years were like one 100 year storm after another. And after being out of and removed from the world of megastorms and we become increasingly prone to forgetting what a real storm is like, and how scary it can be to try to sail those seas.
But getting older has some benefits, at least, before 'getting older' turns into simply being old.
I was born at the tail end of the 'Gen-X' era, which, according to Wikipedia, ended in 1981. Supposedly, the 'Millennial' generation started in 1982.
Is it already old hat to discuss all the ways that older generations "hate" on millennials? I still see articles written about how this generation is painted with a broad generic brush of negativity. I hear older coworkers and other professional people lament the attitudes and presumption that this younger generation comes pre-installed with. And that is the key -- similar to how a computer often comes with malware preinstalled (mostly PC's of various ilks) so does a child with it's upbringing. Of course, this analogy can only be taken so far, but it does fit.
Imagine a VP at Dell, or something, buying a computer and then being angry with all the bullshit that comes with the computer. Programs that are bulky, annoying and sometimes downright malicious. It was his/her company that did this!
So it is with the 45 year old doctor who now complains about millennials and their bullshit. He or she raised that generation, or one aspect of it. They were part of the culture at large that produced the next generation.
I think of it like this: the older generations know that they slipped, that they have taken more than their fair share -- greed, corruption, and all the other human experiences have coalesced in this country, specifically, to leave less for those who are coming after them. The actions, even the healthy ones, demonstrated by millennials, are reflections of and direct responses to the choices and behaviours of the baby boomers, and even the older gen-x'ers.
Pick a dying industry, or one that has been "disrupted." Taxi-cab service is a good one. Millennials destroyed taxis. Well, it is fairly obvious that if the taxi industry had been just a little more flexible and willing to change with customer desires, it could have easily been ahead of the Ubers and the Lyfts. A cab company that offered the ease and convenience and relative safety of the ride-share programs could have taken over the industry. I'm old enough to remember calling a cab at the end of a night, at a restaurant and waiting, with uncertainty if a cab would ever come pick us up.
Millennials are killing cable TV. Well, thank goodness. Somebody put them out of their misery already! Put us out of our misery! Now, if only the millennials could band together and stop the FCC from handing over the reigns of net neutrality to those very companies who aim to replace the lost revenue from "cord-cutting" with paid internet streaming services and options, we would be getting somewhere.
This is kind of a unfocused blog post. It is kind of how I feel, caught between pre-defined generations. When I was a child, I spent a lot of time with older kids, teenagers even. Mostly because my parents were in charge of the youth group at the church we grew up in. As a small child, I was listening to Boston, Journey and (yes) some actual good classic 70's album rock. Many of my contemporaries were listening to whatever pop slop pumped out of the FM stereo speakers -- and that is okay, it is just I've straddled the generation gap since the beginning, and at times, I feel it.
And this is all stuff that other people have made up. Babies are born with no predilection as to what generation they should be a part of. The parents don't care, most of them are just happy to have gotten laid -- they're not purposefully designing the next generation, however -- I argue, that is exactly what they are doing, and just like Crosby, Stills and Nash, of the baby boomer set had to say...
When I was a youngster, I remember thinking that "old people" must not feel pain in the same way that a young'n would. Perhaps all the talk about a loving and benevolent creator led to this line of thinking. Then again, plenty of discussion concerning original sin and the closely held notion that our bodies are bad and must be punished (sex bad, food good) should have balanced out my feeling on the feelers of old folk.
Of course, there is no mercy, even at the end of life, when it comes to pain.
I also remember thinking, when I was young, that I would not forget what it is like to be young.
Much of childhood is like this. Major advancements on a short schedule. Growing larger, taller. Hair here, other things there. And school, with their precise stratification, serves to magnify this making each year's milestones demarcating lines between all the children.
It is difficult to remember what being a teenager was all about. While some of my best times, but also some of my worst times were during my teenage years. Just a whole lot of bad decisions and at times, superbly turbulent emotions and an inability to process everything. Being an adult, compared to a teenager, at least for me, adulthood has been smooth sailing, with spotty thunderstorms. The teenage years were like one 100 year storm after another. And after being out of and removed from the world of megastorms and we become increasingly prone to forgetting what a real storm is like, and how scary it can be to try to sail those seas.
But getting older has some benefits, at least, before 'getting older' turns into simply being old.
I was born at the tail end of the 'Gen-X' era, which, according to Wikipedia, ended in 1981. Supposedly, the 'Millennial' generation started in 1982.
Is it already old hat to discuss all the ways that older generations "hate" on millennials? I still see articles written about how this generation is painted with a broad generic brush of negativity. I hear older coworkers and other professional people lament the attitudes and presumption that this younger generation comes pre-installed with. And that is the key -- similar to how a computer often comes with malware preinstalled (mostly PC's of various ilks) so does a child with it's upbringing. Of course, this analogy can only be taken so far, but it does fit.
Imagine a VP at Dell, or something, buying a computer and then being angry with all the bullshit that comes with the computer. Programs that are bulky, annoying and sometimes downright malicious. It was his/her company that did this!
So it is with the 45 year old doctor who now complains about millennials and their bullshit. He or she raised that generation, or one aspect of it. They were part of the culture at large that produced the next generation.
I think of it like this: the older generations know that they slipped, that they have taken more than their fair share -- greed, corruption, and all the other human experiences have coalesced in this country, specifically, to leave less for those who are coming after them. The actions, even the healthy ones, demonstrated by millennials, are reflections of and direct responses to the choices and behaviours of the baby boomers, and even the older gen-x'ers.
Pick a dying industry, or one that has been "disrupted." Taxi-cab service is a good one. Millennials destroyed taxis. Well, it is fairly obvious that if the taxi industry had been just a little more flexible and willing to change with customer desires, it could have easily been ahead of the Ubers and the Lyfts. A cab company that offered the ease and convenience and relative safety of the ride-share programs could have taken over the industry. I'm old enough to remember calling a cab at the end of a night, at a restaurant and waiting, with uncertainty if a cab would ever come pick us up.
Millennials are killing cable TV. Well, thank goodness. Somebody put them out of their misery already! Put us out of our misery! Now, if only the millennials could band together and stop the FCC from handing over the reigns of net neutrality to those very companies who aim to replace the lost revenue from "cord-cutting" with paid internet streaming services and options, we would be getting somewhere.
This is kind of a unfocused blog post. It is kind of how I feel, caught between pre-defined generations. When I was a child, I spent a lot of time with older kids, teenagers even. Mostly because my parents were in charge of the youth group at the church we grew up in. As a small child, I was listening to Boston, Journey and (yes) some actual good classic 70's album rock. Many of my contemporaries were listening to whatever pop slop pumped out of the FM stereo speakers -- and that is okay, it is just I've straddled the generation gap since the beginning, and at times, I feel it.
And this is all stuff that other people have made up. Babies are born with no predilection as to what generation they should be a part of. The parents don't care, most of them are just happy to have gotten laid -- they're not purposefully designing the next generation, however -- I argue, that is exactly what they are doing, and just like Crosby, Stills and Nash, of the baby boomer set had to say...
You who are on the road
Must have a code that you can live by
And so become yourself
Because the past is just a good-bye.
Teach your children well,
Their father's hell did slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picks, the one you'll know by.
Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry,
So just look at them and sigh
And know they love you.
And you, of tender years,
Can't know the fears that your elders grew by,
And so please help them with your youth,
They seek the truth before they can die.
Teach your parents well,
Their children's hell will slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picks, the one you'll know by.
Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry,
So just look at them and sigh and know they love you.
Songwriters: Graham Nash
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