My Generation

I have been unemployed for a few weeks now. Not a big deal we are getting by, but I do get a little frugal when the income gets cut down to one breadwinner. It is not difficult to do other than my addiction... that is, the buying of new music. It is hard to control myself when the iTunes store is so easy to use; it is really difficult to stop. Luckily, I discovered that the library in the town next to ours, Essex, has an incredible collection of CDs. Occasionally, I pack up my laptop and attached CD player and do some ripping of some decent music .... everything from The Clash, Buzzcocks and Television to Adele and Molly Tuttle. This really helps with my addiction, like a nicotine patch. One of the best finds so far is a three-disc compilation of The Who. I have always loved the song, My Generation, but it just started hitting how truly great a song this is. Now that I am in my 60's, it is like I am hearing a different song than what I heard in my teens. This is proof of its genius. 

They are so youthful and full of energy in this 1967 appearance on the Smothers Brothers:

It has really gotten me thinking about the idea of generations. 

Thinking takes me to strange places. Isaac Asmimov's Foundation trilogy takes place in the distant future when there is so much documented history that historians (called psycho-historians) can predict the future using sophisticated mathematical models. We are not there yet, but once I had heard Strauss and Howe's generational theory, it made me think that we are getting a lot closer to Asimov's world than ever. 

Every 80 years or so, America goes through a revolution, a major upheaval that changes everything. Something occurs that changes the basic way to do things in this country. 

Here are the upheavals:

• 1780's: the American Revolution
• 1860's: the American Civil War
• 1940's: World War II and the Great Depression
• 2020's: Trump's bullshit (someday we'll have an official name, until then I am sticking with this)

Smaller upheavals happen as well, I am not forgetting them, like the Civil Rights Movement, the stock market crash of 1890 or the 911 terrorist attacks, but the big ones seem to come every 80 years. Yes, what is happening now in the 2020's, could very well be as big as the other three.

Strauss and Howe generational theory says it is more specifically 85 to 88 years. Generations are defined as groups of people, of similar age, who have a shared experience based on what is going in their society. Within these 80-year periods we have four generational cycles. They label them "adaptive," "idealist," "reactive," and "civic" generations, in order. Major events change our lives, and perception differs based on how old we are when they happen. The 911 attacks shaped the lives of millennials in a way I will never understand as a Gen Xer. 

William Strauss and Neil Howe describe these archetypes that we still use today. If you were born from 1901 to 1924, you are often called the GI generation or the Greatest Generation. This is the civic generation from the previous cycle. Born in 1925 to 1942, the lesser-known Silent Generation, is the adaptive generation. The Baby Boomers, born from 1943 to 60, are the idealists. This group produced the civil rights movement and hippies. Gen Xers, born from 60 to 83, ("I'm talking about my generation") is the reactive generation with the Millennials, from 82 to 2000, being the civic generation. Hence, the Gen Zs are the new civic generation as the cycle continues. No doubt, you could rip some holes in these generalizations, but it is fascinating, nonetheless. 

My generation, Gen X, was originally called the 13's, because we were the 13th American generation. That name didn't catch on. The label Generation X has several origin stories but the coolest one comes from Billy Idol's first punk band by the same name. We are the last generation that has a collective social pop culture memory. What I mean by this, is that we all watched the same television shows at the same time because on-demand media didn't exist and we only had three television stations, mostly. We listened to the same music because there was rarely one or two radio station available to us. VCRs came out in my teens, DVDs in my 20's, DVRs in my 30's and on-line streaming in my 40's and 50's. GenXers had to watch what was on when it was on. Every American Gen Xers can recite the Preamble to the American Constitution. Why? Because we all watched Saturday morning cartoons and School House Rock came on several times on many commercial breaks. 

We had to watch the commercials too. There was no fast forward or skip ad functionalities on our remote controls, if we had a remote. You had to watch what was on or go outside. For a while, I was my family's remote control: "Mark, change it to channel 5. Bonanza is on." "Mark, adjust the antennae." etc.

Regardless of how it sounds, I like being old. If only I had the energy of my youth and the mindfulness that I have now, in my youthful body. That'd be ideal. Truly, whoever said that "Youth was wasted on the young" was onto something. Somethings, though, we should leave to the young. When I see an 81-year old Roger Daltrey singing, "I hope I die before I get old," I really wonder: Why does he still play this song?  

Pete Townshend, the song's writer, said in a 1989 interview with Good Morning America that the line "I hope I die before I get old," was talking about the rich. "Old" is more of a state of mind, representing the establishment. I buy it, I guess. He was in his 40's at the time said this. He was 19 or 20 when he wrote the song. He had to say something to justify singing a song about youth, but he was also very rich at the time, so I am not sure his answer holds up. Like all generations, his, mine and yours, will all, eventually, "fff...fade away!" Everything becomes old and passe. 

I am old man. Please excuse me, my mind wanders.