Generations
I had a bizarre and confounding moment on Saturday. I realized that Pete and I don't consider ourselves part of the same generation. This is amusing, because I'm only a bit more than three years older than him.
I don't think I've posted Journey's Theory of Generations before. I don't really feel that generations are defined by years. I feel that they're defined by events. My mother tells me that everyone of my grandmother's generation remembers where they were on VE day. Everyone in my mother's generation remembers where they were when JFK was assassinated. Everyone in "Generation X" remembers where they were when the Challenger exploded.
I was in my gifted class, which means it was a Thursday. Our teacher had been very excited about the first teacher going into space. And she had to come in and tell us that the space shuttle had exploded, and everyone had died. I remember how visibly upset she was. I'm not sure I had ever seen an adult quite that visibly upset, before. I was . . . eight? Nine? But I was aware. It was like the world ended, in a little way.
Having had that level of awareness that early means that I remember and identify with so much of what makes up "children of the 80s." That's how I define myeslf. That's where I identify, despite being technically "too young."
For awhile after I developed this theory, I wondered what event would define the next generation. When someone flew an airplane into the World Trade Center, I knew, and was not comforted.
Pete mentioned it in very much this context, as the kind of event that will define "our" generation. That everyone will know where they were. And I disagreed, but only because I thought it would define the next generation . . . and kind of snapped my mouth shut in mid-sentence. Because while our ages are very close, and he was a very precocious boy, five is just a little too early to have been really impacted by this thing that impacted me. We straddle an odd kind of cusp, between us.
I don't think I've posted Journey's Theory of Generations before. I don't really feel that generations are defined by years. I feel that they're defined by events. My mother tells me that everyone of my grandmother's generation remembers where they were on VE day. Everyone in my mother's generation remembers where they were when JFK was assassinated. Everyone in "Generation X" remembers where they were when the Challenger exploded.
I was in my gifted class, which means it was a Thursday. Our teacher had been very excited about the first teacher going into space. And she had to come in and tell us that the space shuttle had exploded, and everyone had died. I remember how visibly upset she was. I'm not sure I had ever seen an adult quite that visibly upset, before. I was . . . eight? Nine? But I was aware. It was like the world ended, in a little way.
Having had that level of awareness that early means that I remember and identify with so much of what makes up "children of the 80s." That's how I define myeslf. That's where I identify, despite being technically "too young."
For awhile after I developed this theory, I wondered what event would define the next generation. When someone flew an airplane into the World Trade Center, I knew, and was not comforted.
Pete mentioned it in very much this context, as the kind of event that will define "our" generation. That everyone will know where they were. And I disagreed, but only because I thought it would define the next generation . . . and kind of snapped my mouth shut in mid-sentence. Because while our ages are very close, and he was a very precocious boy, five is just a little too early to have been really impacted by this thing that impacted me. We straddle an odd kind of cusp, between us.
posted by Journey | 12:48 PM
4 Comments:
Welcome back Journey, from your, um, journey. Speaking of that, I must admit to a rather guilty pleasure just now. Yes, I was watching a Journey dvd, live from their Escape tour in '81. Wow, Steve Smith rocks (on the drums), and the other Steve... to quote Miles Davis: "white boy can SING." Yes, Miles was talking about Steve Perry, love him or hate him. Brings me back to freshman year in high school. (That's not necessarily good.) Plus, some of the band lived near where I grew up.
So this brings me to my main point: there's no way that I (nostalgic for early 80's music, and all) are of the same generation as you. Yes, we share our first where-were-you event: the Challenger disaster. But I was a freshman in COLLEGE, fer cryin out loud. Problem is, my generation simply doesn't have a where-were-you event, unless you count the OPEC oil embargo, or the rise of disco. Not really "events," per se.
My theory of generation centers on the popular culture at the coming-of-age time. What songs, books, movies swept you up at age 14 or 17 or 19? At age 18 I discovered The Smiths, my contemporaries (roughly). If you discovered the Smiths at age 18, you were being admirably retro.
To me, all this puts you and Pete squarely in the same generation. But maybe not? Perhaps tastes really changed during those three years. I don't know; I probably wasn't paying attention...
Speaking of culture, please do hook me up with your Charles DeLint advisor. I could really stand a shift in perspective about now. My email address is durangodave@sprynet.com
Thanks, Journey,
--durangodave
That's actually a very interesting interpretation of generations, and I think a very accurate one.
We were in Grade ... 5? 6? When the Challenger exploded. All we remember is the video image of the explosion, and the sick jokes that went around afterwards.
Strangely enough, the 80's seem, to us, not that far back, and just a bunch of disjointed events. It is hard to accept that it ended sixteen years ago. It seems much shorter.
Mind you, I think we're mostly something of children of the 70s and 80s, with a large period involved. One reason I think we're so disjointed in our memories is because we were forced to 'break' a number of times. Moving across the country twice, moving within a city two or three times, it prevents any roots or sense of permanency.
DurangoDave: You see, that's where the difference in our perception of the situation is. ;) By the age of 14, I had more-or-less given up on pop culture. I did pop culture from about 10-14. From 14-18 I was mainly listening to classic rock and reading science fiction. My idea of movies you *must see* contains an awful lot of titles that were released between 1983 and 1987.
Like I said . . . I'm technically too young. But Pete is one of my few close friends who is actually younger than I am. For most of my adult life, my friends ranged from my age to about 15 years older. And the majority were 5-15 years older. They were the people I got along with, identified with, could hold conversations with, and found I had experiences in common with. Weird, but true.
I see your point, Journey. If we don't really identify with the culture of our times (insider OR outsider culture) then we hardly belong with our generation. But darn it, I still want my big where-were-you moment.
I remember Watergate. Non-stop radio news item at the time. I was quite young, and the picture I formed of the scandal was of a chain-link fence running into a lake. Maybe I'm of the Watergate generation.
--durangodave
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