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I gotta interrupt the nostalgia for a brief interlude here to address something that’s been on my mind for far too long. Indulge me, please, because I have got to get this out. I’ll try hard not to be obnoxious.
I am not a Millennial, and I’m really tired of being classified as one. Unfortunately, more often than not, people born in the early 1980s, like myself, get grouped into the Millennial Generation.[1] More unfortunately, we have to constantly deal with people telling us, “You don’t know a life without screens,” or “You don’t know how to use a library,” or “You never held a pencil.” Excuse me. None of those things are even possible – for me or for anyone else born in 1981.
So. For those who have mislabeled us one too many times, I have a proposal: Allow me to escort you back in time and walk you through “a day in the life” of my fellow ’81ers, spread out across Middle School, High School, and college. Get those imaginations fired up!
It’s 1991, and my sister has just left for college. I am heartbroken that she is no longer home with me, and I don’t know how I am going to get by without joking around with her, talking to her in our invented language, or just plain bothering her. Sometimes we chat on the phone, but only briefly – those minutes on long distance calls really add up! But not to worry – we had another method of communication, one where my parents weren’t able to eavesdrop on our conversations: handwritten letters. You think Millennials know anything about those?
Fast forward to 1994, and I’m doing my English homework. I have to type up my vocab list. After using a dictionary to look up definitions for the assigned words, I turn to my new favorite toy, a handy machine that bridged the gap between typewriters and PCs: the word processor. The Brother Word Processor consisted of a keyboard and a small screen that sat just above the keyboard so that you could read what you were typing before printing it. Once you completed your work and made any necessary corrections, you hit the “print” button and the machine would print your document on sprocket-feed paper. What an improvement over the typewriter (which I’d used for many assignments in the past)! Now I could delete mistakes easily without having to use eraser ribbon or Wite-Out. You tell me: Has any Millennial manually aligned typeface?
It’s 1996, and my friends and I just got out of a showing of Baz Luhrmann’s “Romeo + Juliet.” And yes, we’re swooning over DiCaprio. But now that the movie’s over, we need a ride home. So we look around for the nearest payphone to call one of our parents and we pool our pocket change. Hopefully, we have enough – wouldn’t want to have to dial C-O-L-L-E-C-T.
Let’s jump to 1998. I’m anxious to check my America Online email account for any word on college admissions. But with dial-up, I had to first check that the phone lines were clear so they could be repurposed for getting online and then warn everyone else in the house not to pick up the phone. Otherwise, I’d get kicked off. Thankfully, I’d remembered to update my software to the latest version with the AOL CD-ROM that arrived in the mail, so chances were that it was going to be a relatively smooth session. I bet true Millennials would run for the hills if they heard that screechy dial-up sound.
One year later, I am officially in college and thrilled to discover the magic of Ethernet cables in my dorm room. Such speed and convenience! And no more irksome dial-up racket. By the way, you can forget about wireless connections because those weren’t available yet on my campus. Still not convinced that I’m not a Millennial? That’s cool. I’ve got one more for ya.
Head on over to 2001. I’m behind the library circulation desk, where I worked. In addition to checking out books for patrons, my responsibilities included shelving scientific journals, assisting students with research, and repairing the microfiche machines. But today, I’m stumped on a research issue a student has raised. I discuss it with the Reference Librarian. She listens to my dilemma and then peers at me over the top of her glasses. “You know,” she says, “I’ve been using this new search engine. It’s called ‘Google.’ Have you tried it?” I hadn’t even heard of it, and I think to myself, “That sounds like a word for a baby noise. I’ll stick with my trusty Lycos and Ask Jeeves, thanks.” I literally picked Lycos over Google – and at the time, most people would have understood that choice. For the record, a Millennial would never doubt Google.
I could go on and on. To call my best friend, I didn’t tap her avatar – I dialed her number using my land line. Facebook wasn’t around in college, so my social networks were AIM, Friendster, and LiveJournal. Wikipedia? Ha! Try World Book Encyclopedia. And forget about Spotify playlists. In my day, it was all about getting creative with your CD collection to make mixed tapes.
Now, my near-and-dear peers may be wondering, “What generation are we?” It’s not X. Sorry . We’re too young for that (even though we’d love for them to have us). But, as I’ve demonstrated here, whoever decided to start the Millennial generation on the heels of Gen X didn’t think it through.
I’ve been grappling with this question of where we belong for a long time, and the best options I can think of are (a) that we are a blink-of-an-eye, in-between generation or (b) we don’t get a generation label at all, either of which is completely fine with me. It is better than the alternative – the one we are unwillingly living under today.
Until now. Please, join me, tell everyone you know. It’s important. Dear World: Unless you’re willing to take the millennium out of the Millennial, we out.
[1] No Millennials were harmed in the making of this blog post. Seriously, I mean no offense to Millennials. We think you’re great. We’re just . . . not you. We are us, and we want to be recognized as us.