On January 11th, 2016, I started a daily practice of writing a joke meditation of the day called Cracked Pot Meditations. I was still recovering from the treatment of cancer, and I was having very challenging cognitive issues, so I chose just to put something simple and easy to write every day. Posting it to the blog allowed me to have some accountability. Some of those meditations were poorly written and unedited. I have gone back and begun editing these and adding an illustration, starting with the April 27th meditation. I hope you enjoy.
Meditation for August 20th
The Generations
There has been a lot of talk about the Millennial generation and how terrible they are. According to one survey, Millennials would rather play Pokémon Go than have sex. They stare at their phones. They need to be told compliments all the time. They are too soft.
Let’s look at the previous generations and see how we got to this Generation.
THE GREATEST GENERATION
1910 – 1946
The self-proclaimed Greatest Generation. What an egotistical bunch of malarkey. More like a generation of really old people that miss a simpler time when racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia were not just ok, it was encouraged.
They believe they are owed thanks for America’s greatness, but in reality, they owe us an apology for destroying a well-functioning system of government for personal gain. Guys, you fucked us. You shove your World War II down our throats, while in reality, you didn’t beat fascism; you absorbed it.
Now you vote and think Donald Trump is going to return us to the time of Eisenhower. You’re too old even to understand your system, let alone how badly off the rails it went.
We need this Generation to die finally. This way, the United States can go into a rebuilding year like a sports team after it gets rid of its last has-been, washed-up free agent. Let the young talent play.
Baby Boomers
1946 – 1963
The childrens of the Greatest Generation. Not exactly able to live up to the hype of the greater Generation. Forced to chase the dreams that the elders held for them.
Some of you grew your hair long, burned your bras, and like, fought the man, man. Some of you fought for equal rights from the institutionalized racist system that the Greatest Generation ever put in place. Some of you pretend you did interesting things then.
Some of you fought in a pointless war to protect capitalist interests overseas.
Then you got greedy. You had kids and you ditched your VWs for SAABs and chased the almighty dollar. You suddenly were making the same mistake as your parents’ Generation.
That’s why the Eagles started to suck so bad when they stopped doing SoCal country and started doing LA cocaine anthems; it was the youth becoming greedy for what they thought was owed to them.
Now you are the status quo, just like your parents. Maybe even fucked us up even worse!
Generation X
1964 – 1983 (editor’s note: this is my Generation)
Whatever, man.
Slackers.
I watched the hippie parents join the system. Watched the disillusioning era post-Vietnam. Fucking Reagan. Watched the worst recession ever hit because of Reaganomics, allowing industry and jobs to go overseas.
Not as excited about college, marriage, and having kids. Now, all of culture is playing on our childhood tastes: comic books, D&D, and what have you. We are just running the entertainment industry while the world burns.
Why are Generation Xers so disenfranchised and cynical?
The Energy Crisis of the 1970s
Watergate
Iran Contra (1980s)
Nuclear Disasters, including Three-Mile Island
Silkwood/Kerr McGee
Union Carbide and Chernobyl
Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster
Widespread Layoffs of the 1980s
Dot Com Boom and Bust of the 1990s
Corporate Greed
Clinton-Lewinsky Scandal
I’m sure there are other events, but it just seems like such influential people control this system, so why fucking care?
Xers grew up as latchkey kids from divorced, broken families and absent fathers. They spent way more time alone than the previous Generation.
Now they never want to grow up after growing up too fast. There are so many Peter Pans in their 50s to 60s now.
Many older Millennials wish they were Xers. Better music.
Millennials or Generation Why?
1984 – 2004
Now do you get it? They were screwed from the very beginning. In a system that doesn’t work, there is little hope of achieving the things great-grandparents and grandparents got with those GI bills.
Socially, they live online because they can’t stand face-to-face communication. There is no adventure in discovery anymore. They don’t even have the fun of finding nudity like previous generations – it’s just on the World Wide Web. How wonder sex is meh to them.
They are more conservative and traditional than the past two generations. They see an ancient, clunky system that is small and useless. They see the world as a whole.
They aren’t fighting the man like boomers and Xers are or were; they are grooming themselves to be the man.
Bow down to your new overlords. Being on time to work is no longer a thing. Hell, no show, no call is no reason to get fired. Millennials will make texting your excuse a regular part of etiquette. No one wants to work – why would anyone want to work?
The average family will have .25 kids.
Marriage will be three years or less.
Santa will be real.
VR will become very popular.
The US will see its first anime president and Vice President, Chris Carrabba.
Music will suck even more.
Women will want to be a purplish orange color, have the measurements of 42/34/48, and be under 5 feet.
Men will want to be orange and permanently oily. Frosted tips will make a comeback.
After so much cultural saturation of anime and Nintendo, Japan will finally be able to take over the United States of America.
We won’t notice.
Books will cease to exist.
Generation Z
2004 – 2016 (This is an update in 2025)
The most talked about Generation coming into adulthood. Post 9/11 and a child during the COVID lockdown and suffering an existential crisis of not knowing if they even have a future at all because of climate change and the Boomer governments running the world with dementia, while advertisers scramble to make money off of them and keep them from being radicalized.
The older generations are holding their breath to see how this Generation turns out as they start going to college and becoming adults. Sometimes the media paints a dark picture, and other times we sigh with relief that maybe this is the Generation that will change the course of history away from certain doom. I know I’m rooting for them.