IN ANOTHER place and time, one kid had asked her seatmate who was busy taking a selfie “What’s with the duckface, it’s ugly.”
“Oh I don’t know, our neighbor does it on her Instagram, these ‘Ayshuns’ do it a lot nowadays.” replied the other. “But you’re Asian too!” Covering her tanned skin, as though suddenly aware of it, the seatmate answers back, “Of course not, I’m Aussie, I was born here.” And so it goes.
Even as there’s a certain sadness there, one can only look to the environs today and quietly ask, who can blame these little ones? No fault they see color and perceive others as different. Peer pressure lives on no matter what generation one is in, a former classmate-now-parent proclaims. Just as long as they’re brought up learning to be kind to others, that’s enough, she adds.
To recall, even during our early baby boomer days, the oldies liked to brush this off as ‘kids will be kids’, as though there’s a molding available at the local store when parents want one. The only difference between then and now perhaps might be, during those times, we were pretty much left to ourselves. In a sense, you fought your own battles.
But going back to that kid-molding, one essential part has remained, the natural desire to imitate or fandom. I recall our eldest brother wanted to be Elvis… low-waist blue jeans, rolled-up Tees, and heavily pomaded hair. When my turn came in high school, it was for a time, elephant pants, Converse, and loose polo shirts. Then it was tight jeans, tie-dyed T-shirts, ala Rolling Stones. By the time it was the college years, nobody cared anymore. You dressed as you pleased, but sometimes my jeans went for a week without washing. Our grand old lady of the house then, Manang Torina always liked to say our Levi’s could literally stand on its own in the corner and not topple. At this stage, have we discovered individuality then?
In the new gens, it might generally have been boomer parents who first preached the “I’ll never let my children experience what we’ve undergone” formula. As a result of this, many (including TIME magazine) have seriously said we have brought on the beginnings of the “I generation” or the entitled ones. While it may appear true that generations today have access to all we’ve never had, resorting to gross generalization might not be the accurate course as yet. We’ve not bred unthinking batches if that’s what one is aiming at. Individuality still exists…just find the time to look beneath those Comicon faces and goth attire, methinks.
So where is all this going? In high school, in order to come to grips with the confusion called the adolescent stage, were taught about ‘Who Am I’ and learning to discover yourself. Find your Identity, they said.
I realize from the boomers to the Z generation, kids will tinker, discover, throw away, and then move on to the next “what’s hot” item. Nothing has changed. I’ve learned to look at my nephews and nieces and just say, let them be. Adolescence, and yes, hormones continually mold you into the self-conscious and pimple-wary being that defines youth. Time will come, and everyone will sober up and then grow old. The drama ends and those endless conversations will all have been for naught.
