Generations

I am scared of getting old, and equally scared of my generation getting old. When I was a kid, my brother and I and cousin would be in our great-aunt's house listening to our relatives talk about the '50s, referencing early TV shows and commercials like "I can't believe I ate the whole thing." The fifties were what I considered the Old Days.

I don't think I can come to terms with MY childhood being the Old Days. I hate it when someone reminds me that the mid-'80s were twenty years ago. I know that some day, I'll tell my kids about how I grew up with only three TV networks, and it used to take our television a minute to "warm up." But I still want the fifties to be the Old Days.

There was a line in the Wonder Spot in which the main character notes that her mother once told her that when she was young, girls used to say, "We don't smoke and we don't chew, and we don't go with boys who do." That cracks me up. That's something people would have said back in the Old Days, and that my own mother would have told me about.

There was no equivalent in my generation. And I doubt there's an equivalent now, except maybe "Use a condom."

Anyhoo, I'm getting off track. Sometimes I co-host trivia, and if there's a song from the '70s or '80s in the audio round, some early Gen Y twentysomething in the audience will say, "Oh, that was in Shrek." My half-sister's favorite movie is "Moulin Rouge," and I can guess why - it was probably her first time hearing those David Bowie and Elton John songs. That'd blow me away if I didn't know those tunes already, too.

Anyway, my point is, my childhood is slowly becoming a thing of lore, like the '50s. I hope it doesn't happen too soon. Were the '80s innocent, like the '50s always seeeeem to be? Yes and know. Honestly, I remember them as a wonderful time, even though my family life was a mess and I got picked on at school. I still managed to keep my nose in Mad Magazine and my ears on American Top 40. I don't know if I can admit that those things are old-fashioned. Well, maybe when I'm fifty I will.

For now, let's let the '50s stay the Old Days, and the '80s seem like Just Yesterday.