We can all remember, recount, or re-tell our own personal coming-of-age stories. First day of school, first kiss, first car–let’s face it, everybody has one unless you’ve lived your entire life in a dark cave or an Amish community. One of my coming-of-age stories is when I reached an age when my parents started letting me stay up later at night, especially on the weekends and in the summer when school was out. As a result, I became well versed in the humor of Saturday Night Live, the jokes of Johnny Carson’s opening monologue, and the music of Friday Night Videos. The nights I watched Johnny I would sometimes stay up a little bit later and watch a bespectacled Hoosier with an odd sense of humor and a Top Ten List that was sometimes self-deprecating.
Around this same time in my life there was a coming-of-age show on ABC called Thirty Something. It was an entertaining show but much of the show’s subject matter was lost to me because I was teenage-something. Years later, with my affinity for Thirty Something and Lettermen’s Top Ten List, I have compiled my own self-deprecating list since I am now thirty something.
TOP TEN SIGNS YOU ARE THIRTY SOMETHING
#10 You and your buddies used to talk about music and movies. Now you talk about mutual funds and multi-vitamins.
#9 You’re listening to a classic rock station and they are playing Metallica.
#8 You wonder why kids nowadays listen to thier music so loud.
#7 You don’t understand why kids listen to the music they do and the voice in your head asking this question sounds just like your father’s.
#6 Your television has been hijacked by an explorer named Dora and a big red dog named Clifford.
#5 You feel an unusually large bump on one side of your body and you feel on the other side to see if it’s the same size.
#4 You think about how much easier those college research papers would have been if there had been “googling” back then.
#3 The ultimate technology question is no longer how to set the time on your vcr but rather, “How do I send a text message with audio included?”
#2 What? Kids are wearing something other than Levis?
#1 Snap, crackle, and pop are sounds that used to come from your cereal, not your knees.
What are some of you mid-life coming-of-age comments or observations? Replies encouraged by all, but espcecially my fellow thirty somethings.
