Reflections of a Boomer

ML VanBlaricum

VVV Open Mic 5 31 2020 Reflections of a Boomer

Pinterest.com

I have to wonder what such delight could happen if lyrics of music of the 80s + were collaged?

Infinite Jest--Time will find us

From one media to another

Times change, without a doubt.  As technology made photographs more accessible and cheap, almost every family documented big events.  Burgeoning photo albums showed the styles of the 1960s and the 1970s.  Silly hair styles and mini-skirts were part of the albums.

Just don't bend over.

Movie cameras shrank from complicated monsters with four blinding headlights to hand-held quiet 8mm cameras, capturing the silliness of my era. 

We were the hippy generation, the postwar baby boomers.  Long straight hair and ‘hot pants’ were the style; leisure suits were dressing up.  We documented our life together with photo and film. 

Hot babe

At Christmas 2012, I arranged to transfer a big box of 8 mm film to DVD, with my narration and background music. 

From our early marriage days, through our children era, and then to the mid 90s, I soon found myself smiling big and a little teary.  I don’t know what reaction I expected from our now adult kids. Oh, Mom! These are so great! Thank you so much!

Because we were diligent in recording our history and obsessive about keeping those films, we have a new position in the minds of our grown children:

                           We are their source of INFINITE JEST.

  

What we did get were peals of laughter, OMG-dad-you-were-such-a-geek, and LOL-mom-you-were-so-hot.

Our grandchildren will have hours of diversion and entertainment with our visual legacy to our progeny.  

Hours and hours of infinite jest. Yes, our legacy is digital.

Times Have Changed

The world is a scary place in this generation.  Perhaps it has always been scary, but in the 1950s, it did not seem so. 

“Baby Boomers” all share stories of the freedom we had in riding our bikes from the house to remote places, returning only for meals.  The neighbors knew us and we knew them.  We also knew who the strangers were.

Technology gave us radios and televisions, which opened a world view known by our parent after a horrible war.  Documentaries showed us what happened beyond the streets of our town.  We didn’t know, we just hadn’t known.

Recently my daughter shared a video that details perhaps the scariest and frightening of all the world has shown us.  Here it is:

In all the scariest experiences seen in our time on earth, this is the closest to home.