by Barry Parham

Created on: April 29, 2010

Caught Between Woodstock And Wall Street

(1970. Restless youth. Clueless, too.)

"Does he really think that's attractive?"

Yep. I said it. And no sooner had I uttered the comment than the truth hit me. I had turned into my parents.

In this dodge-ball game we call "life in America," some things sneak up on you. And one day, you realize they've been hanging around for a while, and they've laid claim to a piece of your life and your lifestyle. Other things seem to just suddenly spirit in one morning and then won't leave. They don't grow on you, they bolt onto you.

I'm not sure which is worse. Doesn't matter. You're stuck with them. And now you've crossed that generational Rubicon. You've become your parents.

"Does he really think that's attractive?"

It was at the grocery when it happened. I saw a guy with piercings. I don't mean a few ear-studs, vertically stacked like coliseum concert amps. I mean bulk piercings, as if the guy had found some obscure precious metals tax loophole that guaranteed him cash rebates by the ounce. For a minute, I thought his face was some kind of interactive Connect-The-Dots game, provided by the grocers as a kiddie diversion. The guy looked like an android was trying to escape his head.

Things sure were different, back when my generation was changing the world.

I'm not exactly sure how our culture chronologically defines the term, but I grew up in what is fondly referred to as "back in the day." And back in the day, just like now, kids got bored. But not that bored. I never got so ennui-smacked as to suggest, "Hey, Billy! Let's go drill some holes in our heads!"

In fact, on the Radical-Fashion-Meter, we were unbelievably tame, though we thought differently at the time. In our imaginations, we were fringe. We were haute couture, with fangs. We were OUT there!

Here's how totally out-of-control we were, back in the day. We wore...are you ready?...we wore denim. In public! We wore denim jeans, which, at the time, was something that polite people changed OUT of before they presented themselves to civilized society.

It gets worse.

We wore denim jeans with – now, hang on to something - with flared legs. These were called "bell-bottoms." Back in the day, bell-bottoms were radical to the point of heresy, and virtually guaranteed my generation a no-waiting, laminated uber-pass to Perdition itself.

To further impede the efforts of Big Bad Authority, some of us even bought pre-damaged denim:  jeans intentionally marred with rips and

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