Hindsight: A GenX Life

By: Evan D. Baltz

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Ultimately, this is the book’s purpose: How “these days” are different from “those days”. I am a GenXer. That means I was born between 1965 and 1980. Each generation has different characteristics and different world views than the one before and the one after. This is VERY true for us GenXers. We experienced the world differently as kids than the generations around us. And, as adults, we think differently about how things should be done and what makes sense. We are pragmatic, probably above all. We do things because it “makes sense.” Common sense is a hallmark of the Generation X person. On the negative side of that, we hate nonsense. We hate pretense. We love individualism, freedom, and independence. Most of our lives center around those principles. We are optimistic but grumpy. We love tech but also hate it when it serves no purpose. We like the outdoors, but we don’t hug trees. We have thick skin and aren’t easily offended. And, we think people who are always offended are weak or stupid, or both. We use words that some have labeled offensive, and that kind of ticks us off. They are just words, for crying out loud.

It’s a journey through this generation and my perception of that through some of my experiences. Notice I said “some”. A book about my entire life would probably get boring. There would be a lot of sitting around and watching TV and staring at my lawn. But there are moments in your life that stick out. I can’t always explain why they stick out, they just do. And in hindsight, they had meaning. They represented something. The definition of hindsight is: Perception of the significance and nature of events after they have occurred. That seems right.

Life moves at different speeds. When you are young, a day seems to last forever. As a teen, a week is the measure of time. As a young adult, you think in terms of years. As a middle-aged parent, it’s the decades. Each season has different milestones and measurements. Moments are recalled with different levels of detail. Strangely enough, the older memories have more detail, and the newer ones are more generalized.

If you like it, you like it. If you don’t, I don’t really care. That’s my completely transparent, no-nonsense GenX attitude. Can you handle that? We’ll see.