Know Who You're Wearing

As I strolled across the high school campus this morning, I saw a young man sitting on a brick border surrounding a raised planter, wearing a Metallica Master of Puppets sweatshirt while listening to The Smiths. It was a time-warp, culture clash I was not expecting and only mildly prepared for.

Did this student not understand the gravity of his cultural misstep by conjoining the metal of Metallica with the ah-ah-ah-ah of The Smiths? In public? Is there no respect for the 80's?  At least those of us who lived them showed proper reverence by wearing fluorescent clothing, ripping open the ozone with hairspray, and snorting cocaine.

Did this student not understand that those who listen to The Smiths want to cut themselves while those who listen to Metallica want to cut others? Sometimes, choices must be made. Some boundaries are for the betterment of culture, of character, of sanity. Little did the heavy-metal-wearing, pop- listening teen know that he was plummeting into an identity crisis. Kids today think they can just disregard the constructs of fashion and music genres, mixing them into a hodgepodge of expression without consequence. The nerve.

To give the student the benefit of the doubt, I reminded myself that he may not even know who Metallica is. Over the summer I learned T-shirts and sweatshirts featuring rock bands from the 80's is a fashion trend with no relevant connection to the music itself.

When I first noted students wearing Guns n' Roses Appetite for Destruction, Metallica Ride the Lightning, and Def Leppard Pyromania T-shirts, I thought they had raided their parents' closets, unearthed a piece of nostalgia prompting them to share the glory of their concert days, maybe even played a little "Welcome to the Jungle," "Fade to Black," and "Rock of Ages," and their children--being so impressed by the rock music of their antecedents, wore their parents' rock shirts to school and sparked a fashion revolution.

Nope.

While working in a writing center at Rio Hondo JC this summer, I asked a student who wore a Def Leppard Pyromania T-shirt if her parents had listened to the band.  My first concert was Def Leppard's Hysteria tour and I had Joe Elliot's face plastered all over my bedroom walls (after taking down Simon LeBon and John Taylor).

Her response was a shrug.

Can be found on Amazon

"Do you know who that band is?" I had asked, pointing the glass building aflame on her chest. She shook her head.

I am slowly accepting the music of my youth is now played on Classic Rock stations. When Neil Diamond was demoted to Easy Listening it quite dismayed my parents. I might have scoffed at the idea of Elvis Presley being The King of Rock, but if I had gone vintage and worn a Rolling Stones or Janis Joplin shirt, I would have at least known who the fuck they were. Hell, I could have busted out a few lines from "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" and "Cry Baby." And Neil Diamond? I could have karaoked the shit out "Sweet Caroline," "Forever in Blue Jeans," and "Love on the Rocks."

It's bad enough I have to endure Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train" in a Honda Pilot commercial, Aerosmith's "Dream On" in a goddamn Buick Lacrosse commercial, and Guns n' Roses'  "Paradise City" in the background of Jersey Mikes, but now I have to watch the emblems of my rowdy youth become a meaningless decoration?

I don't know how Def Leppard, Metallica, and Guns N' Roses ended up on the racks of Target and Hot Topic, as well as the warehouses of Amazon, but can merchants please include a free download of the band's biggest hits? And can parents today do as my parents did before we had such efficient, high-tech ways of channeling music into one set of ears by telling that bitch Alexa to blast Heavy Metal of the 80's (okay, and 90's). Or go hardcore and confiscate all earbuds, duck-tape the kids to kitchen chairs, pull out the boom-box and CD collection and give them some music history.

And if my rock gods of old have to sell the rights of their songs to car manufacturers, can y'all stick with Porsche, Aston Martin, and (perfectly) Corvette? 

The iGeneration Putting the "i" in Irony

I might be the Hercule Poirot of language: I've solved they mystery of why students don't capitalize the personal pronoun I.

At first, I just blamed it on technology (my go-to scapegoat along with the weather and GMOs for all ills in society). Teens socialize primarily through text, Twitter and Snapchat thereby practice and perfect the incorrect grammar teachers spend their careers trying to undo. Regardless of how much we badger them about capitalizing their personal pronoun I, they refuse to do so.

The most obvious explanation seemed to be laziness because it's not a difficult rule to remember. I suppose it is a bit taxing to stretch that pinky finger all the way over to the shift key and hit it at the same time as the 'I' key: I mean, why hit two keys when one will do?

Recently, that theory was called into question when I found several hand-written assignments littered with lower case, personal pronoun 'I's; but as with typing, it takes a little more extra effort  to make one vertical and two horizontal lines versus just having one vertical line and a dot.

I further tested these theories by berating students on their laziness; you know, trying to shame them into writing correctly.  How are they going to succeed in school, hold down a job, building healthy, lasting relationships if they can't even capitalize their fucking 'I's? Surprisingly, their English teacher's opinion meant nothing to them.

Ready to settle on the theory that teenage rebellion demands they don't do one single thing they are asked to do without a fight; it is a trait of adolescence generations of adults have been unable to eradicate.  Still, it seemed too paradoxical: why wouldn't teenagers, especially Millennials, use every tool they had to assert their individuality? To assert their ego? Aren't they self-absorbed, coddled, entitled, and solitary behind their electronic devices?

Like most people, the answer came to me while I was in the shower: Millennials are also the iGeneration, they don't need they don't need to capitalize their 'I's because the internet provides so many other venues to promote their individuality in more engaging, entertaining, far-reaching ways. They can track how many people follow them doing ordinary shit. They can snap, tweet, post, share, filter, and, well, blog. Capitalized pronouns are becoming as necessary as landlines.

To be fair, pronouns have always catered to the ego. Grammar rules that "I" must capitalize myself as the writer in order to assert my ideas, opinions, actions over any other person I might be writing about. When composing my spectacular posts, I don't introduce my voice with "I, Holly Vance" and then shift to "believe i have solved the riddle of how teenagers think (if i had, i'd be in such high demand for consultation i wouldn't have time to blog). Sure, I will capitalized the names of others, but after an initial introduction, grammar rules that I should refer to others as he/she him/her they/them--not capitalized. Capitalization means specific, unique, and important; but to be grammatically correct, I shouldn't capitalize "she" when substituted for Lisa, Cher, Laura, Karen, Mindi, and Carrie even though each woman is specific, unique, and important. 

The generation who exist in a digital extension of their egos, the generation capable of asserting their "I" in so many ways, refuse resort to a archaic, symbol of the ego: the capitalized "I". It is ironic, but also isn't it expected for teenagers to carve out a way to be different, to not do things the way their predecessors did? Maybe I needed to capitalize "I" because I didn't have any other way to do so.

Or Apple started this whole problem with their iPhone, iMac, iPod, iWatch, iBrain. Like I mentioned earlier, damn technology ruins everything.