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Jewish World Review Dec. 23, 2005 / 22 Kislev, 5766 Going Postal By Gene Weingarten
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
This just in to the Below the Beltway mailbag:
Since you are a man of great intelligence, I wanted to ask you a question that's been eating away at me. Why is it that adults never seem to come to terms with the fact that the time period in which they had their glory days is over? Why must they always make us teenagers feel guilty for things beyond our control? For example:
Teenager: "Dad, can I have 20 bucks to catch a movie?"
Dad: "Twenty bucks! Why in my day, we could see a gajillion movies for 20 bucks!"
Teenager: "Um, I don't even think a gajillion is a number . . ."
Dad: "Well, in my day it was."
What is this strange phenomenon that adults experience, and why does it occur?
Sincerely, Erick Whitaker, Washington
(A devoted teenage fan)
You ask an excellent question, and it deserves an honest, straightforward, respectful answer. Unfortunately, for some reason you asked me. What kind of a stupid name is "Erick," anyway? I realize this is not your fault, per se, but the apple never falls very far from the tree, if you see what I am saying. Unnecessary consonants are the enemy of brevity. And because brevity is the soul of wit, your name is an affront to the art of humor. And since humor is mankind's main defense against the existential horror of existence, you are a living embodiment of loneliness, despair, chaos, decay and death.
Thanks for writing!
No, seriously, Erick, you ask a fair question, and I will try to answer it without being condescending. ("Condescending," as I have explained before, is a great big word that we grown-ups sometimes use. It means "talking down to.") So. Why do we middle-aged, parent-generation types talk wistfully about our "day," as though life in the '60s was some sort of idyll, as opposed to an era characterized by assassinations, TV dinners that tasted like steamed cat food, and clothing in colors now only found on those plastic mustard and ketchup squeeze bottles at restaurants with place-mat menus? The answer, Erick, is that we had much better music. And by "better music," I mean "better drugs."
Ha-ha. Just kidding. Now let me give you another answer, one that will permit me to retain my health benefits.
The reason we celebrate our youth is that it is gone, and we miss it. And therefore, we carry positive associations with anything from that time of our lives.
For example, you may watch an old episode of "Bewitched" and think, "What kind of feeble garbage is this?" whereas guys my age will watch the same episode and get all misty because we remember that the first time we saw this episode, even though we were only 9, we knew there was something about Elizabeth Montgomery (particularly when she did that cute thing with her nose) that made us feel tense and nervous — not tense and nervous like having to take a big test, but tense and nervous like when you really have to sneeze but can't, but know you eventually will, and when it happens it will be good. And at that very moment when we remember this, we also realize that Elizabeth Montgomery is dead, and so are both Darrins, one of prostate cancer, which reminds us we've been having to pee an awful lot lately. It is invariably at a time like this that some snot-nosed kid with an extra consonant in his name comes up to us and asks for a double sawbuck to go to the movies, and so excuse us, Erick, if, at just such a moment — when we are contemplating the cosmic unfairness of a world that wastes youth and vibrancy on those too callow to appreciate it — we might seem just a teensy bit testy. In short, Erick, here's your 20 bucks! Go watch "Garfield: The Movie," or whatever nonsense you young people are flocking to these days. And don't worry about us. We have a gajillion memories to keep us going, memories of things you'll never experience. Like, you know, all that great music.
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