As A Baby Boomer, It's Been Hard To Accept That Millennials Don’t See The World The Way We Do
We thought we were handing them wisdom, but most of them saw it as baggage.
Antreina Stone | Canva Editor's Note: This is a part of YourTango's Opinion section where individual authors can provide varying perspectives for wide-ranging political, social, and personal commentary on issues.
The last time your child sent you a text message or a Snapchat or a TikTok, or whatever it is they use to communicate today, how long did it take you to respond to their message? I’m guessing probably less than three minutes. If you weren’t doing anything significant, you probably responded even quicker than that.
Now, think back to the last time you texted or messaged your child. How long did it take them to respond? Sometimes, my kid doesn’t respond at all, and it ticks me off like you wouldn’t believe. Then, I say to myself, the next time he texts me, or she texts me, I’m not going to respond until the same length of time passes that they took to reply to me.
But that never happens because, in my heart, I always want to be available to them. My children aren’t kids, per se. They are all over twenty years of age, one is a mother, and one is in the military.
But how else do we get the message through to them? I’ve mentioned it hundreds of times. The last time I said something to my daughter, she called me passive-aggressive.
She lives in South Korea as part of the United States Air Force. We go through these spells of missed communication opportunities. As of late, it’s been really great, but this last time, I was a little perturbed that she hadn’t responded to one of my text messages for a couple of weeks.
In my infinite wisdom, I sent the following text: “Hey dear. Got a question for you. What is an acceptable length of time for me to text you back when you text me?”
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Her reply: “Idk? You tell me.”
Me: “Hmmm, 3 days?
Her: “Okay?”
Me: Hey, when do you go to Italy?
Her: “Yeaaa. Is there a reason why you are being passive-aggressive?”
That was the day my son told me, in anger and frustration, that he was moving out. So, maybe I was a little edgy. She and I took the next several days to explore the passive-aggressive angle and resolve the issue. I did not think I was passive-aggressive, but she did, so we addressed it.
We won’t even talk about the other one because she stopped taking my calls about a month ago. But two out of three ain’t bad, though. I have two of them on track, and it’s just a matter of time before the other one comes back around. I guess we are in the throes of our quarterly face-off!
I love my children dearly. There are times when they may not think so, but my greatest achievement in life was creating my two girls and rearing my son.
Interestingly, I watched a video on social media yesterday of a mom dropping her 10th grader off for the first day of school. The mom said to her daughter as she got out of the car, “I love you, baby. Have a great day.”
With a disgusted look on her face, as she closed the car door, not saying a word, she gave her mother her middle finger gesture. And I thought I had it bad. But these examples are not what’s driving my thoughts.
My wife and I, both Baby Boomers, were discussing the things we faced as children, as opposed to what kids today face, and our influence on our Millennial children.
We should all see what’s happening and acknowledge it. Things are no longer the way they were when we were kids. I have mentally tasked myself to engage with my children as the adults they are. All my life, I have sacrificed for them to ensure they had what they needed and wanted.
Funny story: my daughters lived in different states, so I traveled frequently to spend quality time with them. Once, during a visit with my youngest daughter, she commented after we had just finished a massive doll shopping spree, “I always get everything I want.”
That gave me a moment of pause. Maybe I was making up for the time I wasn’t present in her life. As part of the military, both my kids got frequent visits from me throughout their growing years, but I could only see them when I wasn’t out to sea or on overseas duty. So, as I watched them grow into adults, I remember having a conversation with the same young daughter, but she was a bit older.
I remember saying, “One more year and I will be all done.” I was referring to paying child support. My wise little princess looked me straight in the eye and said, “You will never be done with me.” She was right.
So, while I happen to be partial to the early 1960s, my first child was born in 1996.
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Things in the ’60s were much different than those in the ’90s. Society was different. Racial pressures were different. Teaching and learning were different, and the ways we interacted with our parents were different.
It stands to reason to believe that children born 30+ years after we were born are going to have different views and life experiences as well. Oftentimes, I hear adults say that Millennials and Gen-Z adults are different.
People say they're lazy. I don't agree. My youngest daughter is a beast. I mean, she is a hustler. She is about her money, and she is about making things happen.
Even against the advice of her parents, she does things her way, and many times, even if the decision wasn’t one we agreed with, she's come out on top. I am so incredibly proud of her and can’t wait until we are past this dry spell.
My oldest daughter is in the military. Having retired from the military myself, you can imagine that I am beaming with pride and joy over her as well. When she was in NJROTC, there were some problems, and we had to have a teacher’s conference where she and I met with all her teachers.
She was a little disheartened because she felt I sided with the teachers against her. But I explained to her that she could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and commit a crime, and I would still always be in her corner. Of course, that example wasn’t relevant at the time, but that’s the type of support I wanted her to know she would always have from me.
I feed into my son daily. As I watch him grow into manhood, I see that the lessons I have taught him throughout the years have stuck.
I wrote about when he was pulled over by the police. He successfully executed what we have taught him here. “Your primary goal is to return home.” Since he was 10 years old, I have been feeding him with my knowledge and experience on how to navigate life. He's thriving.
One day, we will turn the rungs of leadership over to the generations who follow us, so don’t be so quick to shoot them down.
Allow them to show what they have and what they know, and most importantly, in their way.
Millennials and Gen-Z adults do things differently than we do. They don’t subscribe to the societal norms we did back in the and that’s perfectly normal. I’ve been blessed with three awesome Millennials, and they will always be able to count on me.
My request to ‘us’ older people (and no, we don’t believe we are the older generation just yet) is to give them a chance. You’re going to be pleasantly surprised to see some of the same results you expect to be achieved, will be achieved, even if the route to get there is a different fashion or route we would have taken. I salute all Millennials and Gen-Z adults.
Julius Evans is a writer on Medium in Reading, Music, and Movies. He is also a Senior Editor for Illumination Integrated Publications.
