The Cranky Boomer
Well, you know, I’m not really all that cranky. I am a life-long cynic, something that receives reinforcement on a daily basis. I try not to be that way because at the same time, I often find myself to be one of the more optimistic voices in the room. It wasn’t always so. I think I have, unexpectedly, become less cranky in my old age. Although I despair at the repeating of foolishness in government and by the young, I can now keep it from eating at me.
We Boomers are kind of a cranky bunch anyway. Ask any member of any other generation that has to work with us. Our sheer numbers meant there was always a waiting line everywhere we went. That fostered our desire for efficiency. We get pissed off when there’s a line waiting and the people at the front are chatting. It’s not necessarily that we are in a hurry, we just are affronted at the inefficiency of it. (You’ve been waiting line for crissakes, how can you not have figured out what sandwich you want?)
There have been several articles of late talking about how the Boomers are suffering from depression at higher rates than other generations, about how we are more suicidal than other generations, that type of stuff. All the experts have their opinions on this. Things like,
1)We don’t like aging (well, who would?)
2) We worry about both our aging parents and our irresponsible children (I think they call us a “sandwich” generation- who’d have thought I’d use the word “sandwich” twice in one essay?)
3) We have anxiety about retirement (don’t- it’s great)
But you know, it’s not really as deep as all that. I think it’s pretty simple. In the movie, The Natural (I refer specifically to the movie, you know, with Redford. Not the book. The book, by Bernard Malamud is also good, but a very different story than the movie. It doesn’t have the movie’s essential optimism), at one point Redford’s character, Roy Hobbs says “Things sure turned out different.” When asked how he just shrugs and repeats, “different.” It’s like that for us Boomers. Youth is idealistic and should be. We wanted to change the world for the better and thought we would. From the Peace Corps to Earth Day to ending the draft to Civil Rights we felt we were part of positive change. And that it was on a roll. But a few things happened over the course. Those of us who remained idealistic (with perhaps a little cynicism added in) saw change slowing down and even saw some of the same old evils coming back. Others of us, due to the realities dealt along the way, had to forbear some of those ideals and held our noses and became part of the Establishment we’d held the line against in our younger days. So, we tended to either feel we hadn’t made our goal or we’d sold out. Not that any of us would say that out loud. Remember, Boomers are tough, driven, realists. Despite our sometime portrayal as Flower Children, most of us are not really that touchy-feely. There it is again, that touch of cynicism.
So anyway, with our lifelong experience of someone always getting there ahead of you, there always being a waiting line, everybody else around you always needing something from you (“My car needs tires” “The nursing home people lost my hearing aids”), and the nagging suspicion that things just really ought to be better; well a little crankiness seems justified. Don’t you think?
RECOGNIZING THE TRUTH
I will readily admit that it can be very discouraging to try to identify the truth. First off, you have to decide if that’s what you really want. Are you seeking truth or do you just want to hear an opinion that corroborates your own, not adding any new facts or evidence into the mix. Sadly, more often than not, that is the case. Just look at what people choose for their news sources. If you ask them a few simple questions, you’ll find that their news source matches their politics. They are not really that interested in learning more about a topic, only in having the news source agree with them, proving how smart they are. I think they call this staying in your echo chamber.
It is advisable to question authority and it is advisable to be skeptical of information. But this too, can be taken to an unreasonable level. Say you and I disagree about a statistic. You produce for me a scientific study to back up your data. I can simply respond by saying that the study is fraudulent and how can you believe those people anyway? This is the argument that can be played out to deny any facts that I disagree with. Even if you show me that 95% of the experts in the field agree with your data, I will just say that they have been deluded or are the puppets of some nefarious group and only my 5% truly understand the situation.
So, you see, like I said, the first problem in any truth-seeking is to determine if that’s what you really want. Lots of times it won’t be. As they say, it can be hard to swallow. I’m not saying that I am better than average about this, but I’ve given it a lot of thought and so I try to always ask myself what I’m really hoping for.
Way back in junior high I got some excellent advice from a friend that I’ve heard resaid in many ways. He was the brightest person I knew by far. He also wasn’t afraid to announce his politics and back them up. Befitting the times, he was extremely liberal. I didn’t know all that much about that kind of thing at the time but I was a fan of the news and current events. One day I noticed he was reading a publication of the John Birch Society. You don’t hear much about them these days, but the JBS was opposed to civil rights, the United Nations, that type of thing. To say the least they were a far-right conservative group. I asked my friend why he would read such things. He replied, “How can I criticize these people if I don’t even know what they stand for? If I take someone else’s word for it, I only get their version, not the real thing. And if I decide these people are my enemies, shouldn’t I understand all I can about my enemies?” Yeah, and he was only in the seventh grade.
It was really a preview for me of the “keep your friends close and your enemies closer” that would be repeated in various forms over the years. But for years after that day, I tried to get my current events information from at least two differing sources. I have discovered first hand that people can be really touchy if you question their sources. There are places you can go to see how your favorite news sources stack up in their left or right bias. Not surprisingly, liberals claim the study was conducted by a conservative group while conservatives claim it was done by a liberal bunch. Where have you gone, Walter Cronkite?