Where the Name Comes From

I’m going to go ahead and get the “where the blog name comes from” post out of the way. 

Depending on which set of numbers you look at I am either one of the older Millennials or one of the youngest Generation X members.. I like to think I get to pick the best of both since no one seems to know where to put people my age, as this blog discusses.

There is very little music I don't like. I was raised on Neil Young, CSNY, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, Joe Cocker and the like. Throughout my formative years as a teenager my music tastes were impacted by both generations. I lived through the evolution of “Grunge” to Modern Alternative Rock to the popular music today, some of which my children and I enjoy together.

My daughter and I at an Of Monsters and Men concert this past December.

I listened to music on vinyl, cassette, CD MP3, and now I’m back to Vinyl. I have Nirvana's Unplugged album serenading this entry, and is an album I’ve owned in all of the above mentioned formats.

My taste in clothing, TV shows, my sports heroes and teams, and my political views were equally mixed by the confusion of my generational ambivalence. I left High School and entered college with our country having a surplus and functioning economy. Our generation had everything to look forward to, we were going to inherit this amazing economy and be more successful than our parents (that whole American Dream thing). Well, I entered the workforce with my degree and the rumblings of the housing crisis and Recession. I fully understand the older generations wanting to know where their jet packs and houses on the moon are. We feel like we are missing something we were promised too, specifically jobs and access to capital. Those are critical to a country's economy and its ability to keep the promises to the future generations. Oh, and we STILL didn’t get jet packs and moon homes. I’m not mentioning hover boards here but I will leave this gem because you need to see it if you haven’t.

My choice to identify more with millennials has a lot to do with my students and how the generation as a whole is treated in our culture. Kids always look lazy to older generations. And I’m not about to say we are the first to be ridiculed, looked down upon, and blamed for things remarkably out of our control. But we are the first to have this happen to us in our country’s history. I absolutely abhor the litany of articles, op-eds, and commentaries belittling, degrading, ridiculing, and dismissing the Millennial generation, not taking into account the changes in our economy, and putting this new world in context.

This video is in that last link but I’ll put it here too because it’s too good for you to miss. Also, I’m sure you have seen this one. Some of the numbers are already outdated, which further shows the rapid pace of development. But it also gives some perspective. It’s good to keep what we are preparing our students for in mind. It also serves as a better conclusion to this post than I ever could.