My, how things have changed.
If you were born in the twenty-first century, you simply haven’t lived yet.
No offense. You can’t help it. You didn’t choose when to be born. Neither did I, or anybody else for that matter.
The median age in the United States is about thirty-eight. So, if you’re say, “pre-1980”, you have the distinct advantage of being born before most people. Yes, I said advantage.
If you’ve only been alive twenty-something years, first of all, congratulations! You get to be “young”. You look great! You still have your knees! You have oceans of opportunity! And hair! You get to determine what’s fashionable. You still get to be cool.
But if you’re… um… “wiser” than the average American, you have the perspective of someone who has seen a thing or two “evolve” over the years. These changes aren’t necessarily better. Maybe they are, maybe they’re not. But they certainly are changes.
What the youth don’t have (yet), is perspective. They are, thus far, chronologically unable to compare and contrast generations.
For instance, what ever happened to disco? Okay, maybe that’s a bad example. Disco gets a bad rap. (See what I did there?) I probably shouldn’t have even brought it up.
But what is it that causes one genre of music to be widely accepted, only to be disdained within a decade? I believe it has something to do with brain drain. We simply get mentally fatigued.
Or maybe that’s just me.
How about clothes? Remember what you wore for your high school senior portrait? Oh my gosh. If you wore that today it better be either for Halloween or April Fools.
Here’s a fact. No matter what you wear today, in ten years it’s going to look funny. Except jeans. But even they can take on new transformations. Two words: “Acid Washed”.
Speaking of clothes, (and I think we were) you may recall a time when people dressed up once in a while. Like maybe once a week. Now “once in a while” could be once a year. If that. I guess it doesn’t really matter, but it’s fascinating to me that those rules just kind of went away without a memo. You might go to church, or a wedding, or a funeral and see everything from a three piece suit to shorts and sandals.
Ward Cleaver must be spinning in his grave. June Cleaver? She’s just “worried about the Beaver.”
Again, this is not a good or bad thing. It’s simply an observation about unexplained shifts in the culture. Like tattoos.
Don’t get me started.
Finally, what about the phones? We’ve gone absolutely insane with the phones. We think we need these phones. Old guys will say, “I made it fifty years without that phone, I don’t need it now.”
Whatever.
“Need” is a bit strong, but we would certainly miss out on a lot of benefits the phone provides. But we have to admit. We have completely lost our minds. This upgrade. That app. Hundreds of dollars a month. They never leave our presence. Let’s just go ahead and own up to it. They’ve got us.
But it’s cool.
Do you recall a time when the “land line” rang, and somebody yelled, “I’ll get it!”
Do you recall when the phone was just that, and only that?
Do you recall when someone dialed “0”, and got an “operator”? That was weird.
Once more I emphasize, these are not signs of virtue or vice, only speculation about differences in decades.
You may have some thoughts as to why these or other transformations have occurred. If so, you are likely over thirty. You have some context. You’ve seen some trends come and go.
If you have strong opinions and are confident you have the answers to the reasons for these developments, you are probably over forty. You have a fair amount of wisdom. (also known as “gray hair”)
If you are “simply right” about your viewpoint, dollars to doughnuts you’re over fifty.
Over sixty? You’re just shaking your head.
And you’d be correct.