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Post by housemouse on Dec 18, 2006 9:13:22 GMT -5
After the fifteenth time I told my eight year-old to brush his teeth this morning before school he looked at me with that expression - perfected by eight year-olds - that said "yes mom I know." My response to him: "I know, I sound like a broken record." This time he looked at me like I had two heads. That's when it hit me, he has never even seen a record. He has no idea what a record is, much less a broken record.
This morning I was knocked over the head with proof that - no matter how young and hip I like to think I am - there is a generation gap. Please tell me I am not the only who feels like this. You know the old saying "misery loves company."
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Post by shmeep on Dec 18, 2006 9:38:30 GMT -5
You're not alone! I felt quite ancient when I worked at the high school every time I thought about what I was doing the year most of the students were born.
On Saturday I was in a little shop in Annapolis and the music playing was "Do They Know it's Christmas?" You know. The first time people from all the trendy bands at the time got together to sing a song to raise money for starving people in Africa? I love that song because I vividly remember when it came out. I had the record and watched the video repeatedly. My favorite two lines are when Sting sings, "...and the only water flowing is the bitter Sting of tears..." and when Bono sings, "Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you!" Anyway, I was getting into that song and singing along a little and, when it was over, I encountered the girl working the counter. I asked her if that Band Aid song was in 1983 or 1984? She said, "Oh, that's a little before my time. I've never even heard that song before." Ouch!
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Post by housemouse on Dec 18, 2006 9:49:49 GMT -5
On Saturday I was in a little shop in Annapolis and the music playing was "Do They Know it's Christmas?" You know. The first time people from all the trendy bands at the time got together to sing a song to raise money for starving people in Africa? I love that song because I vividly remember when it came out. I had the record and watched the video repeatedly. My favorite two lines are when Sting sings, "...and the only water flowing is the bitter Sting of tears..." and when Bono sings, "Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you!" Anyway, I was getting into that song and singing along a little and, when it was over, I encountered the girl working the counter. I asked her if that Band Aid song was in 1983 or 1984? She said, "Oh, that's a little before my time. I've never even heard that song before." Ouch! OMG! I so remember watching those videos and naming all the stars. I still wonder what exactly Dan Ackroyd was doing in the American video. If I remember correctly Bono sports a wicked mullet in the "Do The Know it's Christmas" video. What about that scene in Friday Night Lights where Herc is telling Jason about the guy with Parkinsons who was introduced at all these events? Jason had no idea who he was talking about and said "you gotta remember, I wasn't even born in 1985." I am old enough to be that character's mother. My little sister has one son who already graduated and one who graduates this year. Ouch is right! |
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Post by anna on Dec 18, 2006 13:27:32 GMT -5
Anyway, I was getting into that song and singing along a little and, when it was over, I encountered the girl working the counter. I asked her if that Band Aid song was in 1983 or 1984? She said, "Oh, that's a little before my time. I've never even heard that song before." Ouch! Oh, please. Just wait until the store clerk looks at you, smiles, and says, "My mom has a sweater just like that!" Or your (younger!) doctor begins every statement to you with, "As we get older . . . . "  |
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Post by housemouse on Dec 18, 2006 13:32:07 GMT -5
Oh, please. Just wait until the store clerk looks at you, smiles, and says, "My mom has a sweater just like that!" Or your (younger!) doctor begins every statement to you with, "As we get older . . . . " FYI, you are allowed to smack people when those things happen. Just make sure you wait until after the exam to smack the doctor. |
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Post by shmeep on Dec 18, 2006 13:42:45 GMT -5
Oh, please. Just wait until the store clerk looks at you, smiles, and says, "My mom has a sweater just like that!" Or your (younger!) doctor begins every statement to you with, "As we get older . . . . " You're quite right. I don't think any compliment ever began with "my mom has a..." Point noted. I haven't had the younger doctor thing yet, but I'm starting to get a lot of doctors who look like they're my age and that's a bit unnerving. I know my mom had a hard time when Clinton was president because he was the first one who was younger than her in her lifetime so that was probably a great big ouch. What is the current generation called? I know I'm in Generation X and the next one is Generation Y (or was it "why"?) but...is there another one yet? Much of my family is kind of between generations. My grandparents were/are just older than The Greatest generation, meaning Grandpa was just old enough to avoid going to War. That means my mom is just a few years older than the Baby Boomers and my oldest brother is just a few years older than Gen X (but I'd hardly call him a Boomer...is there something in between?). Who decides what these generations are called? Do the names come naturally as the generations grow old enough to define themselves? I remember I was starting to hear my age group referred to as Generation X when I was in junior high (if not before) and there were jokes made about how it was impossible for a generation with Drew Barrymore as a leader to have much of an identity. Heh. Well, I think she turned out okay, eventually. |
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Post by inuvik on Dec 18, 2006 15:05:38 GMT -5
What is the current generation called? I have heard two terms for them, Generation Next and The Echos. Echos refers to there are more of them than gen x and y, so they are an echo of the boomers. These names refer to those college aged now. Guess that would be Eyphur! |
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Post by anna on Dec 18, 2006 15:18:34 GMT -5
What is the current generation called? I know I'm in Generation X and the next one is Generation Y (or was it "why"?) but...is there another one yet? . . . Who decides what these generations are called? Do the names come naturally as the generations grow old enough to define themselves? The term that I hear most often for the group entering college now and for the next several years is "Millenials." I've always assumed that these terms were coined by the press or picked up by the press from an article written by a scholar or think-tank type. |
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Post by shmeep on Dec 18, 2006 15:25:34 GMT -5
The term that I hear most often for the group entering college now and for the next several years is "Millenials." I've always assumed that these terms were coined by the press or picked up by the press from an article written by a scholar or think-tank type. I found something about that today because I got curious. They are called Millennial because they are the generation that includes the Class of 2000. Interesting. I also found out that I didn't have the generation names right. There's the GI (Government Issue) generation, then the Silent Generation (now often lumped together with GI to form The Greatest Generation), then the Boomers, then Gen X (or the 13ers) and then Millennial. Very interesting. And Gen X does include my big bro because it starts in 1961 (I think) and he was born in 1965. And my poor mom is part of The Silent Generation. |
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Post by Eyphur on Dec 18, 2006 16:55:31 GMT -5
There's the GI (Government Issue) generation, then the Silent Generation (now often lumped together with GI to form The Greatest Generation), then the Boomers, then Gen X (or the 13ers) and then Millennial. Yep, these are what we called the generations in one of those boring Library Science classes. I've seen differnt cut off points. Acording to one I asw a few years ago I was just a few years before the cutoff date for Generation X. (I don't remember the exact year it listed somewhere between 1984 and 1990). I graduated from high school in 2001, though so I guess that makes me a Millenial. ETA: fixed minor typo. |
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Post by hoosier on Dec 18, 2006 19:07:27 GMT -5
I wonder why they decided to label each generation anyway? I fall in the middle of the Baby Boomers and I understand why they tagged all of us with that but now they talk about the "graying of the bb's" and its like sheeshhh, puleeze! I have images running around in my head of little diapered toddlers with my great-aunts' blue tinted hair! I have some gray but I'm not quite there yet! I can remember hearing my grandparents and parents talk about not understanding the new generation--this was in the 1970's when I was graduating high school and all the turmoil that was raging because of Vietnam and Women's Lib and the sexual revolution ect. Well, I guess now its my turn. When they begin to call you "ma'am"  and the average 3rd grader can work the computer when you fuss and fume at the infernal machine, when you remember 8 track tapes and cassettes and the adding machine was your calculator and there was no such thing as a video tape much less a dvd... I could go on and on but I won't. What is really telling is when the babies you knew are now having babies of their own! |
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Post by housemouse on Dec 18, 2006 19:23:28 GMT -5
I always thought I was too old to be a member of Gen X, but I guess I am.
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Post by mlm828 on Dec 18, 2006 19:57:54 GMT -5
What is really telling is when the babies you knew are now having babies of their own! So true! I'm heading to the East Coast at the end of the week to spend Christmas with my college roommate and her family -- and remembering a Christmas with them 29 years ago, when their older daughter was just a toddler, and her favorite present was Play-Doh. Now she's a mom, with an almost-two-year-old daughter of her own. And, yes, daughter and granddaughter will be there this Christmas. ;D |
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Post by housemouse on Dec 22, 2006 10:51:35 GMT -5
On Saturday I was in a little shop in Annapolis and the music playing was "Do They Know it's Christmas?" You know. The first time people from all the trendy bands at the time got together to sing a song to raise money for starving people in Africa? I love that song because I vividly remember when it came out. I had the record and watched the video repeatedly. My favorite two lines are when Sting sings, "...and the only water flowing is the bitter Sting of tears..." and when Bono sings, "Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you!" I heard that song this morning; my favorite line is: "the Christmas bells ringing are the clanging chimes of doom." Wow, talk about dramatic! That line is followed by the Bono line we all love, "Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you!"  Here is Bono working that mullet. What an unfortunate hairstyle. |
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Post by shmeep on Dec 22, 2006 11:10:17 GMT -5
Ha! Thanks, Mouse! For some reason, seeing the Bono mullet made my day. But...I always believed that this... ...was a cool New Wave mullet while this...  ...was just never a good thing. By the way, I found that second picture at a hilarious website I just discovered called ratemymullet.com. I guess a mullet is a mullet, but there was a difference between the rock mullets and hockey player mullets back then. Now they all get lumped together in one big ball of hair badness. |
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and the average 3rd grader can work the computer when you fuss and fume at the infernal machine, when you remember 8 track tapes and cassettes and the adding machine was your calculator and there was no such thing as a video tape much less a dvd... I could go on and on but I won't. What is really telling is when the babies you knew are now having babies of their own!