Exhibit A:
One of the first rock songs I ever loved (because I was not allowed to listen to rock music until 1986) was "Livin' on a Prayer," by Bon Jovi. It came out when I was in the seventh grade, and we would sing it in the choir room while we were waiting for our teacher.
Today I heard it on the radio ... on the classic rock station.
Exhibit B:
While explaining to my speech class how language is always changing, I used CD as an example.
"About 20 years ago, when a person said he was buying a cd, he was talking about a thing you get from your bank," I said. (I do not know the specifics of cds, or financial finaglings, for that matter; I did not try to explain further.) "But today, a when a person says he is buying a cd, he is talking about a compact disc."
And I realized that my children have never lived in a world without cds. They will never know the beauty of a mixtape, or have to hold one tape deck next to the speaker of another in order to record "Pour Some Sugar on Me" off the radio.
I would feel sorry for them, if only I wasn't so focused on feeling sorry for ME.
Exhibit C:
One of the students I had last year--he's a junior now--came up to me in the hallway. "Ms. Flower," he said, "do you know somebody named Billy B?"
I mentally paged through my rosters. I don't have all my classes memorized yet, so I replied evasively: "The name sounds familiar."
"You should know him; you graduated in the same class as him."
"Really," I said. "I'll have to look through my yearbook and find him. I might recognize his picture."
"Well," said the little dear, "he's my dad."
GAH.
Ms. Mei Flower
- Mei
- I'm a spinster schoolmarm with a degree in English; I watch artsy movies about British people; I knit while watching the History Channel; I listen to NPR in the car; I eat frozen dinners on the couch. Is that stereotypical enough for you? No? Well, then ... and I have a cat.
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3 comments:
gah. We helped a HS senior with his "senior project" this year by filming a concert he put together and promoted on his own. He kept talking about how old my husband and I were until I finally broke down and asked him, "How old do you think we are?!" His answer? "Like in your forties?" I had only just turned 26 a few months previous. You should have seen his mother's face... not as bad as having a classmate's child as a student though.
My first high school friend's kid started at my school when she was in second grade and I was 24.
I was feeling kind of old turning 30 last spring, when one of my students said "Wow, you are way younger than my mom!" And her mom was barely 40.
It is weird being such a different generation from my kiddos.
I graduated in 93, so the kid was obviously born to a teenage mother. Still.
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