Generation Gap
Sometimes I forget my age. One time, while working late, a young co-worker made a brilliant contribution to our project.
“Good thinking Wonder Dog!” I exclaimed.
She took that as a very negative sexist remark. Lost in translation was the context. She was just too young to have caught the Saturday Fun Machine edition of “Super Friends”.
“Good thinking Wonder Dog,” is a perfectly harmless remark, I explained. Wendy or Marvin always gets to say that at least one time each episode. She was hardly convinced.
I felt my age. I was, for the first time, on the other side of the generation gap.
I still vaguely remember the first time someone referred to me as “manong”. It was a little boy begging for coins that ushered my official entry into manhood. I was just fourteen, but had shot six inches the past summer. I was no longer “boy”. Almost overnight, I’ve become manong.
And before I could save enough for a beeper, Generation X would be superseded by Generation Y, and now have to watch myself lest I be unfairly accused of sexism.
Suddenly, “don’t touch that dial” no longer means anything. I have not seen a TV with a dial at least the last 15 years. “Dialing” still works for phones, but no longer in the literal sense. And adjusting the ringtone no longer means just tinkering with the ringer volume control.
I get confused still by all the ym-ing, mms-ing, and sms-ing. I know google. I can text and email. But I can do without twittering. And no, I don’t want to be friendsters with you. I can, however, still rename files using DOS. Copy and move files line by arduous line. But for the most part, the world just moved a little too fast for me. Hard to believe, but hardly anyone faxes anymore. Anyone still recall what F10 does in Wordstar?
These young graduates never got to know the gentle lullaby of someone pounding away at a typewriter late into the night in the dorm. I miss that clackety-clack sound and the ping at the end of each line.
I miss Voltes V, for all you too young to know, the “V” is Roman numeral and pronounced as “five”.
“Good thinking Wonder Dog!” I exclaimed.
She took that as a very negative sexist remark. Lost in translation was the context. She was just too young to have caught the Saturday Fun Machine edition of “Super Friends”.
“Good thinking Wonder Dog,” is a perfectly harmless remark, I explained. Wendy or Marvin always gets to say that at least one time each episode. She was hardly convinced.
I felt my age. I was, for the first time, on the other side of the generation gap.
I still vaguely remember the first time someone referred to me as “manong”. It was a little boy begging for coins that ushered my official entry into manhood. I was just fourteen, but had shot six inches the past summer. I was no longer “boy”. Almost overnight, I’ve become manong.
And before I could save enough for a beeper, Generation X would be superseded by Generation Y, and now have to watch myself lest I be unfairly accused of sexism.
Suddenly, “don’t touch that dial” no longer means anything. I have not seen a TV with a dial at least the last 15 years. “Dialing” still works for phones, but no longer in the literal sense. And adjusting the ringtone no longer means just tinkering with the ringer volume control.
I get confused still by all the ym-ing, mms-ing, and sms-ing. I know google. I can text and email. But I can do without twittering. And no, I don’t want to be friendsters with you. I can, however, still rename files using DOS. Copy and move files line by arduous line. But for the most part, the world just moved a little too fast for me. Hard to believe, but hardly anyone faxes anymore. Anyone still recall what F10 does in Wordstar?
These young graduates never got to know the gentle lullaby of someone pounding away at a typewriter late into the night in the dorm. I miss that clackety-clack sound and the ping at the end of each line.
I miss Voltes V, for all you too young to know, the “V” is Roman numeral and pronounced as “five”.
Wordstar! Hahaha! Those were the good old days! I think I was in Grade 1 when we were taught how to use Wordstar. Good times!
ReplyDeleteGrade 1? Really? I was using that to write scripts (for my tv show). LOL!
ReplyDeletetalk about age gap. an ex-office mate wanted to catch up with some of the x-geners at work by asking every celebrity na di nya kilala pag na-encounter nya ang name online. a celebrity from the '90s was brought up. i suddenly felt old coz I knew so much about the celeb. -- (my blog) finelifeonabudget.weebly.com
ReplyDeleteHmmm... Smokey Manoloto? Herbert Bautista? Jobelle Salvador? :D
ReplyDeleteBaka si Caselyn Francisco. :)
ReplyDeleteAlam kong matanda na ako nang napapakinggan ko na yung mga kanta ng Eraserheads sa retro segment ng mga pop stations tuwing Linggo.
hinde ko na matandaan ung F10, pero inabutan ko din ung lotus 123, quatro, basica. I still use DOS sa company namin heheheeh
ReplyDeleteHmm, maybe I'm not that old. Ang naabutan ko kasing phase ay yung transition from DOS to Windows.
ReplyDeleteUp to now, I'm still more comfortable with keystrokes rather than with the mouse. I feel its much faster that way. Kaya nga asar na asar ako nun nung inilabas yung MS Office 2007.
Lahat ng mga basic keyboard shortcuts, pinalitan. Instead na Alt+F+V lang para sa "Print Preview", ginawa nilang Alt+F+W+V. Nasayang ang muscle memory ng kamay ko nun. Kinailangan kong mag adjust ng matagal.
If you ask me, I'd just say its just a marketing strategy from Microsoft. Since nabago lahat, kailangan mo nga namang ipa train ulit sa kanila mga empleyado mo. hehehe.
Pero naabutan ko rin yung Wordstar. But sadly, Lotus 123 was the only thing I got to work on back then.
D*mn, I'm missing my old Second-hand Hand-me-down Underwood mini-typewriter. Kinain na ng kalawang. :(