5 completely normal millennial experiences that would totally freak Gen Z out
Jacob Lund | Canva Pro I like Gen Z. I think they’re pretty chill, calm, and relaxed. I’m a Millennial. Born in 1988, so while I’m no spring chicken, I don’t feel completely out of place when talking to Gen Zers.
I can talk to Gen Zers about politics, media, movies, culture, work, travel, and the arts the same way I can with anyone else. The differences arrive when we talk about the completely normal Millennial childhood habits that are foreign to Gen Z, revealing just how fundamentally childhood has changed in a single era. When Gen Zers talk about parties, socializing, and the rest, they speak with an almighty matter-of-fact calmness of civilized parties where the craziest thing that happened was someone smoked a cigarette.
When I went to house parties in my Millennial youth, I became obsessed with the house plant in the corner, became convinced I was the house plant, got really into photosynthesis, and sat in the corner concentrating for hours. We are the same, but our experiences of life often diverge in how we react to situations. When I tell Gen Zers these stories, they're horrified.
Here are 5 completely normal millennial experiences that would freak Gen Z out:
1. Millennials walked entire city blocks in heels because the bus system was too confusing
When I went to university in Dublin, I would socialize in and around Trinity College (I did not attend Trinity College, but the beer was cheap and the girls were pretty) in the city center or end up at house parties in north Dublin.
Whenever the night ended, usually around 3 or 4 am, I wouldn’t book a taxi. It was too expensive and, if I’m being honest, risky. Jesus, what if they reported me? Bloody nose and eyes like a reanimated corpse.
In Dublin, at least back then, the buses stopped running at midnight, so I would walk all the way from North Dublin to my digs in the south of the city limits. It took hours, but by god, I did it anyway.
Honestly, when we were tipsy, even during the day, we’d walk to avoid public transport. Buses can be confusing and rarely get you to where you really want to be. For a millennial, a 6-hour walk at 4 am completely out of your mind was normal behavior. Gen Z might call this unsafe. We called it getting where we needed to be, no matter what.
2. Millennials fell asleep on public transport
Ketut Subiyanto / Pexels
If we did use public transport, it would usually be in other European capitals. Visa-free travel and cheap flights were and still are a real thing for Europeans, so forgive the privilege if you are reading this from outside the Eurozone.
We always felt safe falling asleep on public transport. If we missed our stop, so what? One time in Brussels, I was drinking absinthe in a place called The Pink Elephant, sat down on a train, and shut my eyes. I needed some sleep and figured my internal clock would wake me up when I reached the suburbs where I was staying.
I woke up in Holland. No Google Maps. Just a strung-out 16-year-old shrugging in the Dutch rain. I got back on a train going in the opposite direction and went back to sleep. Gen-Z would have three friends tracking them and an emergency plan, but honestly, with how dangerous public transportation has gotten, who can blame them?
3. Millennials broke into houses they don’t live in anymore
MD_JERRY / Unsplash
At university, I used to live in a granny flat. A granny flat is just a house built in the 30s that smells like wet carpet. Great memories, but in 2010, I moved out before flying off to Reunion Island for a few months to teach English. I had no return ticket and was stuck on that blasted island for two years.
When I came back to Dublin to sort my Beijing visa before my flight the next morning (I’d just been offered a university job), I went for a drink with a few friends. I ended up in a flat across town with a girl. We drank, kissed, and then we passed out. I woke up at 3 am discombobulated and for some odd reason, decided to walk 4 hours across the city to the old granny flat I used to live in 3 years earlier.
Convinced I still lived there, I broke in. I squeezed through a window before watching pay-per-view TV until I fell asleep. Luckily, no one was home. Even more luckier, it was my friend's grandmother's house, and they didn’t press charges.
This is pure millennial: you return to an old life you no longer have, you force entry because the reality of the now is too much. I woke up panicked and realized I had missed my China flight.
Back at my friend's apartment — the place I should’ve walked back to in the first place — I scrolled through the other jobs I had been offered. I saw one for Turkiye. The flights were cheap. I have been in Turkiye ever since. Gen Z would call this manic and irresponsible. I was actually pretty calm during the ordeal.
4. Millennials fought to not break the seal
Breaking the seal basically meant we would refuse to pee on nights out because we knew that we would need to pee more once we went. Strange logic.
You need to pee, but if you pee, you will need to pee again, so best to be in agony so you don’t have to experience relief for it to be ruined by needing to pee again. Yeah, I don’t get it either, but it was a bizarre Millennial rule. Gen Z would be freaked out.
5. Millennials grew up with answering machine messages that felt like psychological warfare
I had an answering machine message that was basically psychological warfare. I miss voicemail like you wouldn’t believe. My answering machine started like this: “Hello? Yeah, yeah… sorry — didn’t catch that… say again?”
Then I’d leave a pause, like I was listening. Then another line. “Hold on … you’re breaking up … say that again.” I kept it going for ages. Full fake conversation. And only after about five minutes would I go: “Leave a message after the beep.”
People loathed me. Rightfully. I would sit down with my little Nokia 3210 and waste phone credit listening to my loved ones cursing me to high heaven, laughing my head off as if I had just written the greatest SNL sketch ever. Gen Z would send a text.
Peter William Murphy is a writer, teacher, and musician. He has published over 250 articles on Medium and has been selected for curation on 26 occasions. His work explores society, culture, politics, and mental health.
