Groan. I’m Old.

Posted on November 12, 2008
Filed Under Daily, Life With The Boss | 1 Comment

The other night, The Boss and I were headed to my mom’s place for dinner when we started talking about where we were when we discovered the Internet.
Can you believe that our generation can have that memory now?
I feel old.
And it hurts.

When I would come home from college in the summer, I worked as a camp counselor at the school my mom teaches at during the school year.
A few years ago, while at camp, I was on the bus with the kids coming back from the pool, when a boy in third grade (sitting in front of me) had this conversation with his friend:

Boy: Have you ever heard of this show…it’s like from our parent’s time…about these kids that are in high school together?

Friend: What’s it called?

Boy: I forgot but it has a really cool theme song.

Friend: How does it go? Maybe I’ve seen it.

Boy: It’s like,
When I wake up in the morning
And the alarm lets out a warning
And I don’t think I’ll ever make it on time
By the time I got my books I give myself a look
I’m at the corner just in time to see…

Me: THE BUS FLY BY! WOO!
IT’S ALRIGHT CUZ I’M SAVED BY THE BELL!!!!
YEAH!!!

Boy and Friend: Look at me like I’m a total freak.

Me: Slowly and uncomfortably slide back into my seat.

At that moment, I realized that I had officially crossed over to the other side of the “generational gap” that everyone talks about. You know, the one we have with our own parents and grandparents?
I couldn’t believe it.
And now I was the loser who just jumped into this kid’s story – and what the hell was he talking about, “from our parents time.” I grew up with that show! And I didn’t have a 9 year old!
I couldn’t believe that I was one of those people now.
It all happened so fast.

The advent of the Internet is a milestone in our history – just like the series finale of “Saved by the Bell.”
The Web was such an unheard of concept, but I remember when I found out what it was –
It was the summer before I started 8th grade, and the year was 1996…

My family was living in Germany at the time, and I had gone to my best friend Jessy’s house to hang out.
Her parents just bought a new family computer with AOL.
And this was our conversation:

Jessy: It’s pretty cool because you can get information about anything.

Me: Is it like a library?

Jessy: Not really. It’s like for anything. You can buy stuff and it’s hooked up to the whole world.

Me: Blank stare.

Jessy: Blank stare.

Me: Wanna go smoke a cigar?

Jessy: Yeah, let me get the dog.

And then The Boss told me about the first time he discovered Google. He had been talking to his cousin, Faiz on “American Online.”

The Boss: It wasn’t even called AOL or AIM back then.
Faiz was like, “Yo, you gotta check out this new search engine called Google. It’s way better than Yahoo.”
And then it was like, the Internet opened up a whole new world for me.

(And especially when it came to basketball).

The Boss: It was a place where I could find out what teams were playing, even though they weren’t on TV, and what their schedules were and each player’s stats!
PLAYER STATS! That was HUGE!

Me: Oh my God, we have to stop having this conversation.

The Boss: Why?

Me: Because I’m embarrassed that I’m old.

I started to imagine having this conversation with my kids one day and then plunging head first to the bottom of their list of people they think are cool.

“Oh my God mom, the Internet wasn’t around when you were born? You’re old.”
“Go to your room, young lady! You’re grounded until the advent of cars that can fly!”

At summer camp it was cute when the 3 year olds thought I was 40.
It was NOT cute when the 10 year olds thought I was 30.

It’s not that I’m obsessed with my age. I don’t care about sunspots and wrinkles or pockets of cellulite that could be forming on the backs of my thighs.
People get old. It’s the law of life.
But for some reason, I’ve been overly concerned with how old I am lately.

And the damn Internet, with all its Google glory and NBA stats, isn’t helping one bit.

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