Saturday, August 22, 2009

Generation Jones...huh?

Hello 4:00 a.m., we meet again. It's Saturday morning and there's no good reason to be up, but tell that to my restless legs. But hey! I learned something this morning. I apparently have been living under a rock because I've never heard the term Generation Jones.

I'm a frequent reader of Jen-X's blog. She identifies strongly with the Generation X crowd - those born after the Baby Boomer crowd. Born in 1961 (happy birthday to me this month) I've never really identified with the Baby Boomers or the Gen X-ers.

Yes, I was alive when Kennedy was assassinated. But I was two, people! MLK and Bobby Kennedy? I was not quite seven. The Vietnam war was background noise to my Midwestern childhood, my father just barley too old to be drafted and my brother not born until the war was waning. Race riots briefly touched Kansas City. I remember being at the mall with my mother when someone interrupted the muzak to say the mall would be closing early due to said riots. My friend Susan's Dad rushed to the University of Kansas in 1968 to retrieve a college-aged child after the Student Union was burned down and the National Guard deployed. Nixon and Watergate occupied the headlines while I concentrated on sleepovers with friends.

So I'm not really a Baby Boomer. And I'm not a Gen X-er. Generation X claims Michael Jackson as an icon. Born in 1958, Michael Jackson didn't become quite the international pop icon until I was too busy raising babies to be impressed. Personal computers, video games, the Iran hostage crisis, the end of the cold war and the fall of the Berlin Wall...all I experienced as a young adult.

But, tah dah, I just found out there's a name for us folks. Generation Jones, the generation born between roughly 1954 and 1965. Who knew. Well apparently I didn't. Key characteristics?Less optimistic, distrustful of government, and generally cynical. Mmmhmm. Now we're talking.

George Clooney, Nadia Comaneci, Lady Diana, Michael J Fox, Heather Locklear, Julia Luis-Dreyfus, Jeff Probst, Meg Ryan, and of course Barack Obama - all born in 1961. So I'm in good company. Or at least interesting company! OK, yes, Andrew Fastow (think Enron) was also born in 1961, but hey, every generation has its crooks.

So at least I have a place, sort of. I don't really think "Generation Jones" is a very cool moniker. But maybe we're just not that cool as a group. Sandwiched between the hippies and the yuppies, between free love and AIDS, we are too busy trying to keep it all together.

Maybe we should be called the Polyester Generation. Like the preferred fabric of my teen years, we are low maintenance and versatile. Now if I could only claim to be wrinkle free.

3 comments:

Jennifer Chronicles (jenx67.com) said...

i am becoming more and more of a believer in generation jones all the time. at first i resisted it, b/c i was like, hey! you're all Xers - we need all the people we can get being sandwiched between so many boomers and Yers. but, i've read so much about it generation jones. i'm starting to understand it better. i can totally see you relating to the gen jones persona. it does seem to fit you better than a Boomer - from what I've read on your blog!! The other day, the blog of note was a blog called "No Telling." It's a great blog written by a woman from Arkansas. She identifies herself as Generation. i really thought that was very cool! there are no strong gen jones blogs out there. if you were ever looking for a strong niche, there you are! we represent oklahoma well. ha!

Jennifer Chronicles (jenx67.com) said...

sorry...i left out a word. "She identifies herself as Generation Jones." Gen Jones was named the #1 trend by ??? I think a top advertising association or something like that for 2009.

Unknown said...

generation jones is actually very catchy plus it sounds like a character from mad men...lol

I suppose i fall under the genx cat but I am not sure i was present enough to claim it...

jenX sent me