I visited my grandson Douglas in sunny Arizona last week and got to thinking about all the things kids are exposed to today that we never even imagined when I was young. Kids today hear things and see things that were either forbidden or beyond the imagination of most of my contemporaries—at least until they went to Viet Nam. There’s more blood, violence, sex and verbal trash than I can get my old mind around. And don’t even start with the piercings and tattoos. (Not that Douglas has any--yet.)
When I was 19, my husband went to the San Francisco airport to buy a copy of "Peyton Place" which wasn’t available any place else. It was titillating and everyone was reading it. I found it shocking but now it would be laughable, even to me!
I think “old folks” have been complaining about the youth of the day ever since we lived in caves. “Yeah, the mastodons were bigger when I was learning to hunt. We had to drive them over the cliffs with sticks and now the modern kids have spears. They have no respect for what we went through and no appreciation for us inventing spears. Lazy, darn good for nothings…”
They complained in ancient Rome and American settlers did their share of complaining too. “Oh, yeah, I walked from Boston to Oregon territory and now these kids just want to loaf and live off the fat of the land. Always off fishing or chasing some Indian girl. They don’t know what real hardship is.”
Well, I could go on, but you get the idea. It’s a built-in mechanism that seems as sure as joint deterioration and forgetfulness. Maybe we don’t die of old age but just get sick of our own obsolescence. We need to make way for a new generation of complainers.
Meanwhile, my grandson still enjoys a spirited game of UNO and so all is not lost.
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