Your Parents Are Boring

  There's a meme that travels the interwebs, it is generally attributed to a different person every time it comes around. This time is was Bill Gates. The gist, frankly, is "Get Off My Lawn Millennials." Whilst I agree with the theme, as it is one I also support, I do not appreciate the tone. It sounds angry. And yelling at millennials has not proved effective for thirty years, why would it start working now?

  The meme makes statements: "Your parents didn't used to be boring, they got that way paying your bills," and "Nobody owes you anything, get a job." I just tried to unearth the thing and I cannot locate it, as Facebook moves more quickly than I do. However, I can say with certainty that Bill Gates did not say the 11 things listed. Why? First, he's not mad at anyone, and whoever wrote this list is pissed. And second, when you look up "Bill Gates Quotes" they are largely supportive with vague warnings:
"Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose". He does not seem to be a man that needs to publish a list of 11 Things That Suck About Millennials. As a high school teacher and a parent of millenniels, I think I am qualified to judge or scold or post 11 statements about them. I do not because lists like that sound angry, and as a teacher and parent I have said everything I need to to anyone who might possibly listen. I don't believe a list is going to catch the attention of any 20 year old I know.

  That said, that does not mean I do not agree with some of the sentiments, mainly "Nobody owes you anything." I see too much entitlement at the high school, and too much enabling by helicopter parents. When appropriate, or when asked, I will venture my advice. But I don't believe making a speech at graduation berating anyone, or posting a list like the Town Crier is going to change anything. I do struggle frequently with being nice to some of these people. I have perfected my stoic poker face when I need it, and I need it a lot. There are times when I just cannot believe what I am witnessing, and then am dumbfounded when a parent--or worse, an administrator--brushes it off as "Not a big deal." My number one issue is those who don't think they need to follow the rules in my classroom. It's worse when they're smart, and the only way the grade is impacted is when I include a behavior element. I had a parent ask me about that, as he felt his daughter should be an "A" student. I said "Well, she won't stop talking and she keeps bringing food. No food is allowed." I showed him the post on my website and on the syllabus stating this fact. He shrugged at me and said "So? She's smart, she's not bothering anyone else." I repeated that she was, in fact, by the sheer act of defiance "bothering" the class. And also did you note I said she won't stop talking, which also "bothers" the class. Sigh. Ten more years to retirement. It's fine, I'm fine, stop looking at me...

  This list...which I cannot now find...could have been made by any parent dating back to the 1950's. Frankly, every generation has kinda sucked since the WWII Bad Asses, and all parents and grandparents bemoan the laziness and entitlement of the generation that follows. I'm technically "Gen X", which as a teenager I called "The ME" generation, as we were part of the Wall Street/Club Drug rise. At the time my mohawk and combat boots frustrated many women who preceded me who felt it unladylike. OK. You make that list "11 Reasons Kryssi Sucks" and staple it to the telephone pole, I'll be over here slam dancing and ignoring you. I love old 50's  movies where the older women are incensed that the young ladies wear slacks. That is not ladylike. I remember hearing the phrase "Hysterectomy Pants" somewhere, which easily could be from the movie HAIRSPRAY now that I think of it.

  The thing is, really, the WWII Bad Asses had something real that changed their lives, and they just kept their heads down and lived life. My grandparents lived in a hole in the ground---I promise this is not hyperbole--with a piece of asphalt cover until they could farm the land and make enough to buy a house, which they then had trucked over the hole. I would question this, except that I was in that house a lot as a kid, and I remember their "cellar", which was solid and insulated and weirdly not like any basement I had experienced in the suburbs. They lived there with their first born whilst grandpa farmed. I'm sitting here on my deck lamenting that I have to pick up dog poo and it's going to be hot today and I'm not a famous author and I have to cut back sugar and use Steva. My grandparents did not have to write me a list of reasons I sucked. They just lived their lives and when I was an adult, after their deaths, my dad told me of the cellar home and I came to the "I suck" conclusion on my own. But I knew they had worked hard all their lives, and they never talked about it. And they never whined about what they did not have. And that was it, and I loved them and there were no hard feelings.

   There are already so many hard feelings out there, everywhere, about everything. People really need to enumerate why the parents  who were able to provide for their kids screwed them up? We need more hard feelings, do we? I don't think so. I believe in Karma, and these people are going to get what they deserve, positive or negative, regardless of a reposted, rebooted, reassigned list of 11 Reasons Everyone Sucks But Me.

  As Dennis Miller said, "But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong."