The youth have become an army of senior-citizens-in-training, all lying in wait for their AARP cards and social security stipends. The whole scene reeks of a nightmare combination of stale piss and Aqua Velva aftershave.
When I was younger, I had my fair share of run-ins with the elderly. Usually these encounters consisted of either being chased off some fist-shaker’s lawn or sitting on a couch with a geezer or two, listening to them talk about the same things over and over while Lou Dobbs’ “Moneyline” played on an incessant loop in the background. I used to think, “How do these people do this? Are they senile?”
And looking back on it, they probably were senile. But they were old, and old people are afforded that privilege; they earned it after all. I just hoped that I never became that way.
The future hit sooner than I had ever dreamed.
Recently, while visiting an acquaintance, the day’s program consisted of watching a marathon of some hideous new television show’s numerous episodes on Netflix.
As I sat there wondering if I had anything better to do (sadly, I didn’t), I looked around and noticed the humble abode was chock-full of people glued to the television set with stares not unlike those associated with watching a dryer spin around and around at a Laundromat.
At each episode’s conclusion, the watchers would whoop it up and talk about how enthralled they were and how “crazy” the episode was before popping on the next one; rinse and repeat.
Has the American youth always been so wildly boring?
Maybe, but I guess I just never happened to notice it. Granted, I’ve spent a lot of time in strange, foreign lands which were anything but dull. I once lived in Beirut where many of the nightly goings-on would make Caligula blush. A good time amongst people my age there most assuredly didn’t consist of obsessing over the latest cultish television show.
And don’t even bother trying to have a conversation with any substance.  People of our generation are great about keeping up with the Kardashians, but ask them their opinion on something important like what’s going on in Afghanistan or even if they also share the sentiment that Syrian President Bashar Assad looks an awful lot like Walt Disney, and they have nothing to say. All that comes out of those fruitless attempts at discussion is a blank stare followed by a quick return to raving about how bad-ass Hal from “Malcolm in the Middle” is.
I’m lost. A man without a country. I don’t fit into the senior citizen youth brigade that has come to dominate the times.
Maybe I’m too critical and should just resign myself to embracing the whole thing. Maybe I’m the curmudgeon. Maybe I’m out of touch.
Probably.
I suppose it’s high time I strap on some Depends, lull myself into a state of Benzodiazepine warmth with a stiff Valium/Oxycodone cocktail and settle in on the couch to watch 23 episodes of “Game of Thrones” in a row while drooling all over myself. Ah, the good life.
I believe Patrick Henry once said something like, “Give me Convenience, or Give me Death.”
If he didn’t, he should have. It’s a fitting motto for the Millennial generation.