Today’s Essay

 

FOREVER YOUNG

 

                Bob Dylan is 69. Pete Townsend, Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney, Rod Stewart and Eric Clapton are all nearer to old age than to middle age. Even Sting, a relative newcomer is well past the half-century mark. These people are the icons of my youth. It should be easy  for me to feel old, but I don't.

It occurs to me that the reason that I don't feel old is because my entire generation refuses to let go of its youth. Being a kid is too much fun. Becoming a "responsible adult" is too boring a prospect. Nobody ever wanted to become his or her parents.

There has always been something a little cowardly about having a trade to fall back on. You know, in case things didn't work out quite the way you planned, or to marry well. People my age, (late "boomers" or "t'weeners") have always wanted to live out our dreams. We don't care to struggle economically like our parent's did and never bought that line that poverty and adversity builds character. That's the kind of thinking that breeds insurance salesmen.

It's true; my peers and I have had everything handed to us. We are the first American generation that was virtually guaranteed a college education. We all had jobs in our teens, but that was only to pay for our increasingly entertaining lifestyle. Growing up, we all had cars, stereos and entire libraries of music. Not a week went by without a trip to a concert or the movies. The partying habits of my generation are infamous. We were bulletproof and our parents and grandparents were left wondering what went wrong.

Thirty-five years later, we continue to believe that we are indestructible, engaging in all sorts of "extreme" activities. The rock and roll musicians we grew up listening to are still rock and roll musicians. Most have not descended into pop music and few have died from natural causes. They continue to act irresponsibly well past middle age. Our icons are still icons, even to a new generation, still at the top of their game. Our radicals are still radicals, setting records for longevity as social activists. Those of us that set our minds to doing something different with our lives have held fast and made a difference.

Like Neil Young rockin' in the free world, we continue to ride motorcycles, curse like marines and refuse, sometimes foolishly so, to become complacent. We have changed the way business is done in America and around the world. We have changed the face of entertainment from movies to music to sports. Having fun is now our business rather than something we do when and if we get time off. We invented high tech entertainment. We have been thinking out of the box since high school.

All this fun and individualism, though, has come with a price. We have among the highest alcoholism, substance abuse and suicide rates of any generation since less optimistic people began keeping these types of records. We raise our children in single parent families, leave our homes for more money or more prestige and swap "life" partners like flea market regulars.

We have learned important business lessons from the rock and roll ethic. Never compromise. Don't be merely different, be radically different. Bill Gates may wear a suit and tie, but is a s radical as ever, tweaking the governments nose every chance he gets. Mark Cuban acts the way you'd expect a billionaire rock and roller to act, doing as he pleases, throwing tantrums and making having a good time his business. Captains of industry now do business in khaki's and t-shirts. Casual Friday has become casual everyday.

I worked hard when I was younger, in mindless, menial work, but my goal was always to find something that suited me, not to adapt to a job. Things have changed from my father's generation to mine. It has been 25 years since I've had a real job and I don't intend to go back now. I hope that my children do well in life. I will need someone to take care of me so that I can continue to be….forever young.

 

 

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