Temporariness
Jul. 5th, 2006 10:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
peterbirks"Well" said the South-eastern trains worker to his (rather attractive) female co-worker on the early morning train to London Charing Cross, "none of us is getting any younger". And I thought to myself, "bleeding hell, he's right".
The point being, of course, that although we are, in the main, chronically aware of our own ageing process, (although whether we look forward to the next birthday, dread it, or simply forget the actual date and precisely how old we will be because we have got a bit muzzy-headed, depends on how old we are), we are often blissfully unaware that other people are going through exactly the same process.
This particularly seems to apply to people's analysis of their parents and grandparents. When young, the contact is relatively constant, and, since when you are 5, 35 is "old" and when you are 15, 45 is "old", the general attitude doesn't change that much. And you tend not to notice the other changes, because they are gradual.
At this point the youngster heads off on his or her gap year, or moves in with his girlfriend or boyfriend, or gets a job in London, and seems to imagine that the parents will somehow become frozen in time, that nothing will change.
It therefore comes as something of a shock when they go back home for a visit one summer and find that the people carrier has been sold in exchange for a Cabriolet, or the bathroom has been converted into a "wet room" and sauna.
"But I thought parents liked people carriers", the youngster moans. After all, all her friends' parents had people carriers as well.
"Like them? I fucking hated it", says father. "I would have bought a Porsche Boxter, but your mother said that we might have to ferry you somewhere again one day, so at least it would be an idea to have a pretence of a back seat".
Kids don't like suddently realizing that their parents are ordinary human beings who change with time, rather than "parents", a kind of non-identifiable separate breed of humanity.
Just as we are changing and growing, so is everyone else. Those people whom we have not seen for five years have not been frozen in time. They have probably changed as much as we have.
I think that I might use as an opening line for a novel the sentence, "It happened when I was at a temporary age".
We are all at temporary ages, all the time.
++++++++
Incidentally, since we call it "London Charing Cross" and "London Waterloo", surely the terminus "London Bridge" should be called "London London Bridge"?
++++++++++
Anyone listening to the new Muse album Supermassive Black Hole would quickly identify to whom Matthew Bellamy has been listening from tracks two, three and 11 - viz Pet Shop Boys, Moloko and Ennio Morricone/Kill Bill soundtrack.
But, no matter, there's enough stonking Muse-like tracks coming through as well. I love Muse. It's a bit like loving Electric Light Orchestra and Emerson Lake and Palmer in the 1970s. You know that it's overblown pomp, although these days you suspect that there's some self-knowing irony thrown in as well, but it's great fun nevertheless.
++++++++
The point being, of course, that although we are, in the main, chronically aware of our own ageing process, (although whether we look forward to the next birthday, dread it, or simply forget the actual date and precisely how old we will be because we have got a bit muzzy-headed, depends on how old we are), we are often blissfully unaware that other people are going through exactly the same process.
This particularly seems to apply to people's analysis of their parents and grandparents. When young, the contact is relatively constant, and, since when you are 5, 35 is "old" and when you are 15, 45 is "old", the general attitude doesn't change that much. And you tend not to notice the other changes, because they are gradual.
At this point the youngster heads off on his or her gap year, or moves in with his girlfriend or boyfriend, or gets a job in London, and seems to imagine that the parents will somehow become frozen in time, that nothing will change.
It therefore comes as something of a shock when they go back home for a visit one summer and find that the people carrier has been sold in exchange for a Cabriolet, or the bathroom has been converted into a "wet room" and sauna.
"But I thought parents liked people carriers", the youngster moans. After all, all her friends' parents had people carriers as well.
"Like them? I fucking hated it", says father. "I would have bought a Porsche Boxter, but your mother said that we might have to ferry you somewhere again one day, so at least it would be an idea to have a pretence of a back seat".
Kids don't like suddently realizing that their parents are ordinary human beings who change with time, rather than "parents", a kind of non-identifiable separate breed of humanity.
Just as we are changing and growing, so is everyone else. Those people whom we have not seen for five years have not been frozen in time. They have probably changed as much as we have.
I think that I might use as an opening line for a novel the sentence, "It happened when I was at a temporary age".
We are all at temporary ages, all the time.
++++++++
Incidentally, since we call it "London Charing Cross" and "London Waterloo", surely the terminus "London Bridge" should be called "London London Bridge"?
++++++++++
Anyone listening to the new Muse album Supermassive Black Hole would quickly identify to whom Matthew Bellamy has been listening from tracks two, three and 11 - viz Pet Shop Boys, Moloko and Ennio Morricone/Kill Bill soundtrack.
But, no matter, there's enough stonking Muse-like tracks coming through as well. I love Muse. It's a bit like loving Electric Light Orchestra and Emerson Lake and Palmer in the 1970s. You know that it's overblown pomp, although these days you suspect that there's some self-knowing irony thrown in as well, but it's great fun nevertheless.
++++++++
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Parental freedom
Date: 2006-07-05 09:52 am (UTC)I am hoping to be in the position soon of my kids coming back to visit and saying "Why didn't we have a 45 inch TV screen with SRS when I lived here?". Something to do with no longer spending a b****dy fortune supporting kids!
JG
no subject
Date: 2006-07-05 11:03 am (UTC)Actually, as I get more and more distanced from friends, many of whom I now see way less than once a year, I'm also having to fight against exclaiming "haven't you grown old!"
no subject
Date: 2006-07-05 12:12 pm (UTC)Well, that and the wicked TS Eliot parody that begins "As we get older we do not get any younger".
no subject
Date: 2006-07-05 12:42 pm (UTC)As we get older we do not get any younger.
Seasons return, and to-day I am fifty-five,
And this time last year I was fifty-four
And this time next year I shall be sixty-two.
And I cannot say I should like (to speak for myself)
To see my time over again - if you can call it time:
Fidgeting uneasily under a draughty stair,
Or counting sleepless nights in the crowded tube.
Marvellous. How can this man ever be out of favour?
PJ
Stability
Date: 2006-07-05 12:59 pm (UTC)This means that they are now quite change-resistant and it's important to them that things stay the same 'at home', even if they aren't actually here to see it happening. At the same time, there's probably a build-up in the need to change things that mean that at some point in the next 5 years there may be radical change they aren't quite ready for.
I notice a step-change in people I don't see for a while. An anniversary party coming on Saturday will be the opportunity to see people not glimpsed for 10 years. The chins will have multiplied and hairlines receded big-time I suspect.
I used to have Genesis's Spot the Pigeon EP, with Inside and Out on it - the last decent song they ever wrote.
growing old and getting rich
Date: 2006-07-11 03:14 pm (UTC)"Those 16 year old girtls I wanted when I was 16
I have them now
I advise you all to become rich and famous"
growing old and getting rich
Date: 2006-07-11 03:21 pm (UTC)"Those 16 year old girls I wanted when I was 16
I have them now
I advise you all to become rich and famous"