Friday, May 05, 2006

The Generation Gap

I held a staff meeting yesterday to get ready for our summer program (I coordinate a school aged child care through our school district). For me it is always an exciting time to think about all that we will be doing with the kids during the summer. The field trips we will be going on, the people who generously will be coming in to teach us new things, the themes for each of the 12 weeks. I give my staff all of the credit. They are excellent at planning fun and creative things for the kids, and I am always amazed at the projects they can find.

Anyway, we were discussing themes, catch phrases, etc, and one of my older staff suggested that we have a sock hop with the kids. All the good stuff, music, dressing up, dancing. Four out of the seven of us started to rattle out ideas, while the three high school girls were quiet. Finally one of them asked what a sock hop was. What is a sock hop? My goodness, we had some teaching to do. I might as well have told the girls they sounded like a broken record, they wouldn't have known what that meant either I suppose. So, we explained to them what a sock hop was, and once we started explaining it, they caught on and kind of knew what we were talking about.

On to the next idea. One of the staff's parents are going to Japan and will be bringing back things for the kids. We decided that would be a fun theme to run with. Using chop sticks, etc. So in trying to come up with a name for the week, I said,

"It probably wouldn't be PC to name it "Oriental Week."

Now the high school girls knew what I was saying, but my older staff who mentioned the sock hop was confused. I heard her whisper to another staff,

"What's PC?"

And there you have it. One generation gap to another. Somehow I fell right in the middle, knowing what each side was talking about . But as time goes by, I find myself slipping. I get confused with all the features on my cell phone, I have no interest in an ipod and just found out that an mp3 IS an ipod. Computers will always intimidate me. Palm pilot? I can write it down faster in my calendar than program it into a palm pilot. HDTV? I get angry even talking about it. I don't want an obsolete TV in a few years. We can't afford it. And what is with those cell phones that are just an earpiece? It looks like someone out of a Jetsons cartoon. How can the people hear you talking if the phone is up at your ear? It makes no sense to me.

When I got a cd player in my car, I was on top of the world. A cd player! In college I was so excited to get a tape deck. I have no clue where all of my tapes are, but we still have a few tape decks around the house if I ever get the urge to listen to them. I'd just have to find them. We have a cd burner. Or is it a dvd burner? Or is it both? I still don't know, and I have no clue how to use it. You should be proud that I can even post pictures on this blog.

Yikes. I have taken one step closer to the generation who has no clue what's new out there and how to run it. Pretty soon you'll hear me saying that I don't understand the clothes kids wear now a days and why does their hair do what it does? And what's with the color? Maybe they don't have a mirror at home, and they just mistakenly hope that it looks ok. Poor kids. Poor kids? Poor me.

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