As I lay on my bed with one of my teens next to me, laughing over a Reel before we forward it to my mom, I find myself suddenly the butt of a joke. “Why do you poke your phone like that, mom? You’re such a Boomer. That’s so unc.”
I paused, hovered over the sharing airplane, and looked at the seemingly normal (to me) way that I am tapping my phone. Was I acting like an old lady? Was I “unc,” the new gender-neutral uncle-derived slang term the teens currently use to describe anyone annoyingly older than them?
After a moment of denial, I settled into the belief that my kid was actually right: I am old. No, not as old as my parents or as old as most U.S. politicians, but when it comes to the benchmarks that define age, I am decidedly more crotchety than I was five years ago.
Today, as I sit in my dining room typing this missive on the morning of my 43rd birthday (Yes, I am an geriatric millennial), I am faced with two important thoughts: Why is my neighbor’s car engine so loud, and what kind of bird is chirping in the tree outside of my window?
I pause to send my friend a recording of the bird. She replies that it is a mockingbird (likely mocking me, like my children) and I get back to work. She’s a Boomer now too, I assume. She recently invited me over to learn about plants — and take a few clippings. Wild times for the Real Housewives of Pittsburgh as we all work remotely from our messy homes.
I begin to mentally list the things that now piss me off: Overhead lighting, too many people talking at once, small talk at professional events (or anywhere), pants with a waistband and shoes without good arch support. I am furious that every movement in life requires a new app, deeply concerned about the safety of e-bikes and gas station drugs and the state of our local roads, and trialing my fourth set of cooling bed sheets. I also list the things I do not care about any longer: fashion trends, what anyone else thinks of me, and the well-earned lines and wrinkles on my face.
It’s a weird juxtaposition when you’re parenting in middle age, raising kids that are on the cusp of adulthood. In many ways I feel like I’m in the prime of my life. I’ve whittled down my friend group to the besties who can stand me, my career is satisfying and moderately successful, and I’ve finally found a hairdresser who gets me. Some days I walk down the street feeling like a million bucks — only to be cut off at the knees by a side-eye at my shoe choice from my teen daughter.
I ask my friends, my comrades in aging semi-gracefully, if they feel the Boomerness creeping up on them, too.
“For sure,” one friend tells me, “Or like how my boyfriend always talks about how we used to be able to get a hamburger for $5 or what the cost of gas used to be.” I remember… it was under a buck the day I got my license.
Another friend says her kid dissects the “unc-ness” of her text messages. Emoji choice is a dead (☠️) giveaway, apparently. So are the television shows and movies we reference as “recent.” Hold hands while I tell you this: The final episode of Parks and Recreation aired well over a decade ago; ten whole human years ago. Don’t even get me started on the OG version of SATC.
So I’ve chosen to accept my fate. In many ways, we are becoming the Boomers now. Not literally — generations are fairly well-defined, and Boomers were born between about 1946 and 1964. But in the funny, small ways that matter, many of us Elder Millennial and Gen X parents are showing our age.
After some soul-searching in my backyard inflatable hot tub, which helps with the aches and pains of old age we’ve barely touched on, I’ve decided this isn’t such a bad thing.
So I am worked up enough about e-bikes to briefly consider a run for town council? That’s because I care about the safety of kids in our community; call me Karen. I’m frustrated with the condition of roads or schools or public infrastructure? I won’t apologize for being old (or mature) enough to realize civic engagement matters. If we want to live in a thriving and bustling community, we are the adults that must create that now. We can’t decry the loss of a village if we aren’t willing to get out there and make one.
We’ve also, as a group, taken healing quite seriously. I am proud of us for this, more than anything else about our generation. While we might bitch about the cost of everything or the state of the world in those Boomerish ways, we are also a generation that is serious about breaking cycles, building new patterns, and parenting conscientiously.
We talk about our therapists in ways that normalize taking care of our mental health. We find mental health help for our kids when they need it, too. We mess up with our kids—and we apologize. We try, we screw up, we try again. Our hips and back and knees may be less flexible than they once were, but I am proud that we are trying to keep our minds flexible. Our Gen Z and Alpha kids poke fun at us and insist the way we dress is awful, but I choose to believe that they see we are working so hard.
So, to my fellow Millennial-and-Gen-X-Boomer-but-not-really-moms, pull up a supportive chair and join me. Bring your latest craft project, your current book club read, or your stack of political postcards that you need to get out before the midterms. Bring your comfy soft pants, your persistent chin hair, and your achy lower back. We will turn off the Big Lights, skip the small talk, and bitch about hot flashes while our kids make fun of us in the next room. Honestly, I think we’ve earned this.
Meg St-Esprit, M. Ed. is a journalist and essayist based in Pittsburgh, PA. She’s a mom to four kids via adoption as well as a twin mom. She loves to write about parenting, education, trends, and the general hilarity of raising little people.
source https://www.scarymommy.com/lifestyle/are-we-all-boomers-now
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