Life and Such had me on a rooftop party in Brooklyn this past weekend. The party was an I’m-going-away-for-two-months-so-I-need-to-have-a-going-away party, which was hosted by a Millennial. Go figure. The host was a student at Pratt, and except for my friend and I, all the attendees were her peers, either at school, or in age range.
One [...]
Entries Tagged as ‘Generational Musings’
July 6, 2009
The *other* generations …
June 9, 2009
Gen Y: A graphic depiction
Sent to me by @annathema. Found it charming, in its own way.
June 4, 2009
The Terrible Octomom
I wrote this piece several months back. It’s long. I’m figuring most readers will frown and not like what I write. Others may find it surprisingly clear and forward-thinking. This piece is my perspective of what I think the next wave and change in societal attitude toward child-bearing and child-rearing. It’s a touchy subject all [...]
June 3, 2009
Twitter: It’s a GenX Thing
I find what and how different generations adopt communication technology to be most fascinating. I am strongly of the belief that Twitter is a tool attractive mostly to GenXers (born 1961-1981). And here’s why: GenXers (the Nomad archetype, via Strauss & Howe’s brilliant work on generations) grow up behind a culturally dominant and turf-squatting gen [...]
May 26, 2009
Sprinklings of a dying trend
There’s a TV commercial from Verizon I don’t like. And I’ll tell you why. It’s the sprinkles commercial. The one where, after the father pours a crazy amount of ice cream sprinkles on the counter, the guy says, “Would you like whipped cream with that?”
Here’s why I don’t like it. It’s [...]
April 18, 2009
Brilliant GenX + Millennial Statement
My sister sent me this vid. It’s a seemingly spontaneous performance inside an Belgian train station. It’s 4:01-min in length, and, I believe, a brilliant example of GenX plus Millennial natural energies.
What I see, through a gen lens: GenXers understand small spaces, gaps and making-do with existing resources/repurposing, in a way [...]
April 11, 2009
The power of community marketing
Community marketing. The next buzzword? Basic common sense? The new frontier of business opportunities in a down market? This article speaks much to the subject of community-centric marketing. Recommend it, I do.
Particularly when people feel more concern about the economy and their futures, their need for community participation heightens. This is classic Fourth Turning stuff, [...]
April 2, 2009
The trouble with generations
Mercy. Can a month pass without someone somewhere making up a new name for a generation? Millennials, Gen Y, Gen X, Echo Boomers, Generation Jones … I even heard Generation C recently. Silent, Veterans, the Lucky Few, The Greatest, The GIs … come on, people. Oh, and then the years. Ask “the experts” (read: people [...]
March 25, 2009
Get out of the way: A message to Boomers everywhere
My good friend Carrie describes the GenX-to-Boomer key message in terms of the relationship between the garbage collector and someone standing in front of a garbage can on collection day. It goes like this:
Garbage Collector: “Hey, look, I don’t care what you do before I’m at your house. I don’t care where you stand [...]
March 13, 2009
Vera, Lucille and Hazel are dead
Yep. These three gals — all in the 75-85-year-old range died recently, according to my local paper, The Columbia Flier. Why did this strike me as curious? Not their ages, of course. Their names and their generation. These gals are all of The Silent Generation, the Artist archetype from the last generational cycle, which is [...]
March 5, 2009
Millennials and “the economic crisis”
Will Millennials change their expectations in “an economic crisis” ? That was the question on @GeoffLiving’s blog a month or so back. The subject has popped up on my radar again, so here’s my take on answering this question, vis-a-vis my understanding of generational theory.
The conversation among the comments on The Buzz Bin is lengthy. [...]
February 20, 2009
Sun-ripened tomatoes in February?
I live in the mid-Atlantic region of the U.S. I know a bit about gardening, a bit about seasons and the earth moving around the sun, a bit about generations and a bit about trends.
And while I jus’ luvs me our new president and feel he is, indeed, The Man for the Times, I do [...]
January 21, 2009
GenX Prez: GenX speech writer
As one who sees many an event through the lens of generational theory, I find Prez Obama’s choice of a speech writer quite fascinating.
There’s been much talk of late of this amazing 27-year-old, Jon Favreau, who wrote Obama’s inauguration speech. Well, unless this guy celebrated his 28th birthday in the first week or two of [...]
January 13, 2009
And … what were you thinking?
OK, I can analyze this. I get the Millennial kid/Boomer parent dynamic. I can bring all kinds of layered nuance and understanding of what is going on here and the cycles of why and what, etc., but I don’t feel like being sensitive and thoughtful right now. I’m just in a sort of slack-jawed awe [...]
November 4, 2008
A new day is dawning
It really is a new era. Literally. A significant cultural shift occurs approximately every 20 years in America, in a dominant-recessive-dominant-recessive pattern. This is the first election in which a GenXer will be in the White House, whether it be — as things seem to be going — Barack Obama as our new president, or [...]
November 2, 2008
You gotta be cruel to be kind
Lord, have mercy. If that ain’t a big part of the GenX Manifesto: You gotta to be cruel to be kind, but I’ll get to that later. Hi there, my fellow Americans. My name is JessieX, and I’m asking for your vote (or at least a moment of your time) in my bid to become [...]
October 26, 2008
JessieX for President
My fellow Americans, I’m asking for your support and your vote in my bid to be president of the United States of Americuh. Why? Because I’m logical, and I’m smart enough not to promise you jack. And all them other candidates, well, they’re promisin’ this and promisin’ that. Heck. Who can trust ‘em to make [...]
