So, I was lying awake idly wondering how old our newest neighbors are. One’s in the community college down the street, one works doing IT stuff. Good, considerate neighbors. Twenty-something.

Then I realized that persons who graduated from high school this spring, as tradition dictates, will be mostly eighteen years of age sometime in 2002.

I graduated high school the year they were born, 1984. In what appears to be some sort of coincidence but which is in fact a mathematical property which applies to anyone that thinks about this, they are, this year anyway, half my age.

What can the world look like? No Watergate. No Vietnam. Hell, they were born the year the Mac was introduced to the market! Four years of Ronnie, but I’d be surprised if he generated memories. Four of GWB the 1st. Maybe some vague impressions. Eight of Clinton; coincident with adolescence, even.

Eight years of a bad economy, eight of a good one, and two character builders so far.

(Note to kids: what political party controlled the white house when the economy was your friend? Note to DNC: do you guys even exist? For god’s sake, DO YOUR JOB! Oh, never mind.)

And then this matter of 9-11. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be an eighteen year old today, I think.

Every political stimuli I was exposed to by the time I was eighteen clearly demonstrated (Vietnam! Watergate! Central America! Iran-Contra! October Surprise!) that American politicians are nemesis, liars, with no respect for democracy, human lives, the rights of man, or the constitution.

So far, seems unlikely that kids have seen the mask stripped, and less likely as time goes by and more FOIA requests are remanded by GWB the 2nd.

4 thoughts on “Old. No doubt. Old.

  1. Heh. Here’s another fun way to look at this. My youngest staff member is 22 years old. I was explaining to her that I met Eric in 1989. Then it occurred to me that at that time she was 10 years old! It feels like just a minute ago to me, but it’s (part of) a lifetime.

  2. Try talking about watching the first lunar landing in 1969 to someone who was born around 1978. I think it’s turning my roots gray…

  3. what up dog…(that’s what they say today i hear). anyway I can’t comment on the political aspect of things…but I’ll say for myself that compared to the other two rupublican dominated eras that I’ve lived in this one isn’t so bad. sociopathic bizarro richard nixon when I was a wee one,..but old enough to see my cousins come home from Nam f***d up and they still ARE…and then there was our pals Ronald “I’m am nearly an IDIOT and I have my finger on the button”…reagan
    and unbelievable annoying and callous George senior…I mean junior is bad but hey compared to those psychos he’s no SOOO bad…at least you get the sense that he’s NOT REALLY CALLING THE SHOTS anyway…which is a comfort of sorts.

  4. Your name is interesting since there are not many Uhlmansiek, Uhlmansick, of Uhlmanski in this county. My husband’s ggrandmother is Clare Uhlmansiek that immigrated to St. Louis and later to Nebraska

Comments are now closed.