I'm Wondering

I'm wondering if aging is more stressful for baby boomers than previous generations.

Nobody wants to get old because the final result of aging is rather final. But baby boomers were/are this vital generation that rocked the world and had higher hopes, had the hopes dashed, wimped out and sold out, and now are slipping into the dark years.

Could be a tad pretentious to say they had higher hopes; maybe they were just more vocal about it.

On the other hand they did create a revolution. They acted on their ideals in a dramatic way and fought to bring about change.

Life beat them back and yuppies were born. Suddenly baby boomers were businessmen, pretentious in dress and attitude. Over the last ten years or so I see a shift from sell out mode to mellow mode. People who leave the business world to craft leather goods. Kind of an aged reflection of the more peaceful aspects of sixties' hippie-ness.

Now they are seniors.

I wonder if disappointment has more bite at this stage. Having tasted and instigated gigantic moral and social changes only to see those changes eroded and negated, even in the year 2013 and beyond considering the regressive fools we have in office, I wonder if the sting is more severe.

Maybe it depends on whether you maintained a rebellious attitude over the decades, or whether you accepted the fact that life steam rolls over you and rebuffs major change thanks to the moneyed elite.

I call the baby boomers "they" even though I am one of them, because I was never really one of them. Not actively.

I dressed the part, I drank and enjoyed drugs, I was rebellious in my mind and in my hair but not in my actions.

I knew as a teenager that I did not want the middle class lifestyle but I never acted upon it. I did not live a unique and expressive life. I dove right in and strapped myself to a mortgage and a boring predictable job and skipped lazily through the decades.

So I am a senior now or damn close to it, and my disappointment is huge. I have a festering need to break free somehow, someway in order to validate my existence, even at this late stage.

A large void exists in my gut that needs to be filled. A large void that will slowly suck me into it and make me invisible if I do not fill it.

I imagine having tasted rebellion, having lived it, and then being forced to sell out just to be able to eat, creates a more pointed bitterness.

It must have been a heady feeling to be involved in social rebellion, a sense of power and hope. It must have been exciting to experiment with new lifestyles.

Maybe there is a sense of satisfaction from at least being involved in these things that beats back disappointment in the senior years.

I don't know.

The only thing I do know is I ain't done yet.