Hippies
I mentioned in Met Haar Groot Toon Om that I've been thinking about college. Saying that I have found the college searching process to be "a relatively pleasant experience" is quite the understatement: I am very excited. Since I published my last post, I have developed an antsy anticipation I would expect as a symptom of Senioritis... It seems mine has come a year early.
Catalyzing the growth of this anticipation is the fact that we have reached the latter half of the 20th century in APUSH, the time I consider to be the birth of the modern college experience. It is exhilarating to read about the Hippie movement, about its protests, the culture boom, the paradigm shift. Though I certainly don't agree with all the things they did and said, I have an incredible degree of respect for the Baby Boom generation and its close successors, the young people of the 60's and 70's and perhaps the early 80's. The more I read, the more I got wrapped up in their fantastic little world, and the more I began to dream, Wow, these people are really doing something. They have a vision, a purpose, a destination, a genuine desire to get there, a genuine belief that they will! Maybe they'll actually do it, maybe they will change the world! Then I remembered that these things all happened a generation and a half ago, and that if they had changed the world, whatever they were changing must have already changed. Reflecting back on the past three decades, I suddenly wondered what happened of the most epic generation that had ever existed, and whether I might find some of these people and get to know them.
And then I realized they're my parents. Yes, my parents and my friends' parents, the generation (other than mine) that I have had the most contact with in my life, for my entire life. A shadow of disillusionment passed over my thoughts and I sunk back in naïve disappointment. What happened? What happened to their life, their spirit? Where did they go, now that they've all grown up, now that they comprise the whole of mature society? Is college truly the only place we can find that life and spirit? Do we all die when we grow up? (The pattern of thought is awfully reminiscent of Peter Pan.)
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Over the last couple weeks I have been engrossed in and awed by the simple hope, the direct vision, the straightforward aura of vivacity surrounding the college experience. A certain claustrophobia has been born in the back of my mind, or perhaps as a haze over my eyes and my ears. It bothers me how predictable these feelings are: I am seventeen years old. I go to a tiny private Christian school replete with the youthful projections of comfortable, conservative, middle-aged white folk. I have no car and no license, with nowhere within a 10-mile radius to walk or bike to if I tried. I spend a strikingly large percentage of my time sitting in a 10x11x12 cube of wood and plaster, staring out at a liberated world through a screen-sized window. A fresh look at my education makes me wonder why (for all that my school is obsessed with intellectual virtue) there is such a shocking stagnancy in the flow of ideas here. An impatient, worried spirit of urgency rises in me when I step back and see what reserved conservatism I am living in, and how much I love it. And the little voice in the back of my head begins to whisper, It is time to get out, It is time to move, It is time to live, It is time to change. And I do not wish to ever come back.
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I aired these thoughts in my father's company several days ago. He responded by conjecturing an answer to my disappointed musings about the incongruence between the politically correct, overprotective modern adult society and the near-anarchical spirit the generation used to embody. Almost seeming to wonder aloud, he proposed that perhaps the rejection of authority and and growing respect for others' views is exactly what made hippies so politically-correct once they were the new authorities. The rejection of a strict, unified, discriminatory social authority leads to a new discrimination against discrimination. (What a stellar reflection of the greatest paradox in all of Post Modernism!) And perhaps the loss of innocence that had become norm by the end of the 80's and into the 90's resulted in a backlash against the freedom of the young spirit. Now that teenagers from the 80's have matured and abandoned their rebellious ways and settled down with their own children, they are extra-wary of all the things teenagers might do, all the ways children might be corrupted, all the ways that people might be offended.
I see a sluggishness in modern-day society that makes me feel strangely reminiscent of a time I never even lived through. A time when activity wasn't burdened by copious rules and regulations and checks and balances and taboos and social requirements. A time when teenagers might jump in a car together and gallivant around the state for fun. Have parties with bonfires and sleep under the stars. Perhaps it's just my own upbringing, but I believe it to be generally true that my generation would be laughed at if we even suggested going out with our friends for more than ten hours at a time. Gas is expensive, roads are dangerous, the world is too scary and exposing. Heaven forbid we leave the state or spend the night away from home. It would simply never happen. I'm not sure I would allow my children to do any of this, either. The world has changed.
But beyond just teenagers, the world feels restricted by so many laws and regulations. It feels as though the world has run out of spontaneity. Out of sincerity. I miss that naïve simplicity, that fresh and unburdened excitement to just head out and find the world, that sense of whimsical adventure. But today, meetings are held. Potential plans are proposed. Ideas are discussed with the all the people involved, and each person ponders each idea extensively over the course of hours, or days, or weeks. Then the idea is run by authorities, who do the same; then it is taken to the authorities' authorities, and their authorities, so that no one is caught off-guard or presented with something they didn't anticipate. The law of the land is Better Safe Than Sorry, better to do nothing and avoid the risk of insulting someone. Social boundaries are violated so quickly and easily. There is such a great fear of the unknown. The personal bubble has grown with such feracity that I sometimes feel we have lost touch with one another. I resent that things have become this way, but can offer no alternative, no solution... I simply pray that this bubble might be the next bubble to pop.
Catalyzing the growth of this anticipation is the fact that we have reached the latter half of the 20th century in APUSH, the time I consider to be the birth of the modern college experience. It is exhilarating to read about the Hippie movement, about its protests, the culture boom, the paradigm shift. Though I certainly don't agree with all the things they did and said, I have an incredible degree of respect for the Baby Boom generation and its close successors, the young people of the 60's and 70's and perhaps the early 80's. The more I read, the more I got wrapped up in their fantastic little world, and the more I began to dream, Wow, these people are really doing something. They have a vision, a purpose, a destination, a genuine desire to get there, a genuine belief that they will! Maybe they'll actually do it, maybe they will change the world! Then I remembered that these things all happened a generation and a half ago, and that if they had changed the world, whatever they were changing must have already changed. Reflecting back on the past three decades, I suddenly wondered what happened of the most epic generation that had ever existed, and whether I might find some of these people and get to know them.
And then I realized they're my parents. Yes, my parents and my friends' parents, the generation (other than mine) that I have had the most contact with in my life, for my entire life. A shadow of disillusionment passed over my thoughts and I sunk back in naïve disappointment. What happened? What happened to their life, their spirit? Where did they go, now that they've all grown up, now that they comprise the whole of mature society? Is college truly the only place we can find that life and spirit? Do we all die when we grow up? (The pattern of thought is awfully reminiscent of Peter Pan.)
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Over the last couple weeks I have been engrossed in and awed by the simple hope, the direct vision, the straightforward aura of vivacity surrounding the college experience. A certain claustrophobia has been born in the back of my mind, or perhaps as a haze over my eyes and my ears. It bothers me how predictable these feelings are: I am seventeen years old. I go to a tiny private Christian school replete with the youthful projections of comfortable, conservative, middle-aged white folk. I have no car and no license, with nowhere within a 10-mile radius to walk or bike to if I tried. I spend a strikingly large percentage of my time sitting in a 10x11x12 cube of wood and plaster, staring out at a liberated world through a screen-sized window. A fresh look at my education makes me wonder why (for all that my school is obsessed with intellectual virtue) there is such a shocking stagnancy in the flow of ideas here. An impatient, worried spirit of urgency rises in me when I step back and see what reserved conservatism I am living in, and how much I love it. And the little voice in the back of my head begins to whisper, It is time to get out, It is time to move, It is time to live, It is time to change. And I do not wish to ever come back.
_______________________________________________________________________________________
I aired these thoughts in my father's company several days ago. He responded by conjecturing an answer to my disappointed musings about the incongruence between the politically correct, overprotective modern adult society and the near-anarchical spirit the generation used to embody. Almost seeming to wonder aloud, he proposed that perhaps the rejection of authority and and growing respect for others' views is exactly what made hippies so politically-correct once they were the new authorities. The rejection of a strict, unified, discriminatory social authority leads to a new discrimination against discrimination. (What a stellar reflection of the greatest paradox in all of Post Modernism!) And perhaps the loss of innocence that had become norm by the end of the 80's and into the 90's resulted in a backlash against the freedom of the young spirit. Now that teenagers from the 80's have matured and abandoned their rebellious ways and settled down with their own children, they are extra-wary of all the things teenagers might do, all the ways children might be corrupted, all the ways that people might be offended.
I see a sluggishness in modern-day society that makes me feel strangely reminiscent of a time I never even lived through. A time when activity wasn't burdened by copious rules and regulations and checks and balances and taboos and social requirements. A time when teenagers might jump in a car together and gallivant around the state for fun. Have parties with bonfires and sleep under the stars. Perhaps it's just my own upbringing, but I believe it to be generally true that my generation would be laughed at if we even suggested going out with our friends for more than ten hours at a time. Gas is expensive, roads are dangerous, the world is too scary and exposing. Heaven forbid we leave the state or spend the night away from home. It would simply never happen. I'm not sure I would allow my children to do any of this, either. The world has changed.
But beyond just teenagers, the world feels restricted by so many laws and regulations. It feels as though the world has run out of spontaneity. Out of sincerity. I miss that naïve simplicity, that fresh and unburdened excitement to just head out and find the world, that sense of whimsical adventure. But today, meetings are held. Potential plans are proposed. Ideas are discussed with the all the people involved, and each person ponders each idea extensively over the course of hours, or days, or weeks. Then the idea is run by authorities, who do the same; then it is taken to the authorities' authorities, and their authorities, so that no one is caught off-guard or presented with something they didn't anticipate. The law of the land is Better Safe Than Sorry, better to do nothing and avoid the risk of insulting someone. Social boundaries are violated so quickly and easily. There is such a great fear of the unknown. The personal bubble has grown with such feracity that I sometimes feel we have lost touch with one another. I resent that things have become this way, but can offer no alternative, no solution... I simply pray that this bubble might be the next bubble to pop.
Too long; did not read
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