Yeah, yeah, take my man card.
Hey, this sensitive stuff will get you laid...
Last night I was watching A Walk on the Moon.
Anywho...it's 1969, we're about to walk on the moon and just a few miles away Woodstock is unfolding. What struck me about the movie is that our protagonists, Pearl and Arty are in their early 30's, Pearl is 31 years old, she has a 6 year old and a 14 year old. Thirty one years old, yet in 1969 these people are thoroughly middle-aged and part of the post war middle-brow culture.
At the end of the movie Pearl and Arty are dancing, first to Johnny Mathis, or some such, but then in a sign he's changed, Arty changes the station to rock and roll and finds Purple Haze. Pearl and Arty try to dance to it, but its clear they are middle aged squares.
Pearl is 31. That picture of her buying a ty dye is a subversive thing.
When I was 31 I was wearing T-shirts, jeans and Chuck Taylors. I was a HS sub and widely known as 'the cool one'. Don't worry I had boundaries and was also the 'trouble shooter'. When I started, the kids thought I was a nark. God, some of those kids are approaching 30, but that's another post.
Forty five years ago, if you were 31 you were a tragically uncool middle-aged doofus. Think about THAT.
41 year old single male, and I still think of middle age as something about 10-15 years away. 31 years old and a 14 year old normalcy...bugs me on so many different levels....my nephew is more my son than nephew...then again his father is 2 years younger than my own...my sister choose poorly. I still dress in jeans/khakis and polos....but what do you expect after 23 years in a uniform...Both enlisted and officer...but anyways looking forward to a Cuban invasion in your next books.
ReplyDeleteThanks. 42, three girls, wearing khaki shorts as I write this.
ReplyDelete31 is middle aged it's way older than 18.
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