Getting in touch with my inner 25-year-old

Yes, I know full well that most young people these days regard baby boomers as Demons Incarnate. We are responsible for all the evil in the world, we've all sold out, we elected George W. Bush (WE didn't, THEY did -- and so did their grandparents), we crucified Jesus, we kidnapped the Lindbergh baby. If you're a Jewish baby boomer, you get double the guilt for your money.

Because I don't have children, I have been able to delude myself for a long time that I am still cool. And there are people who allow me to continue that delusion -- my Gen-X friends at Cinemarati, who, like the anti-Semites I went to college with, insist that they don't mean ME when they talk about Evil Boomers; the kids at the gas station who are amused because I am this short, middle-aged woman pumping her own gas in the last full-serve state in the country; and I would dare say most of the people who read this blog.

I'm not a complete idiot, though. I look in the mirror every day and wonder who that person with the encroaching jowls is. Then I get in the car, pop in something like Nimrod and sing "Minority" at the top of my lungs all the way to work and try not to think about it.

In short, I am one of those insufferable middle-aged assholes that Ameriprise is targeting with their awful commercials that make even me want to put my fist through the TV.

So when a Real And Actual Young Person thinks enough of this here blog to blogroll me, it allows me a few minutes of believing that even if I am not Still Cool, I am at least the Wise Old Tribal Elder surrounded by wide-eyed young people hoping to learn from my vast experience.

I don't add people to the blogroll very often, and when I do, it's usually serious blogs dealing with the Major Issues Of Our Time. But this morning, while sighing over yesterday's diminished traffic because the New York Times seems to have gotten wise to me, I found a referral from leftygrrrl and decided to take a look. And I read her entire first page. Leftygrrrl is, apparently, a coffee bar barista with some political awareness. Those of us who are still lucky enough to work in professional jobs really don't have any idea what it's like to be 25 in the job market of the Bush years. I think it's good for us to take a peek into that world, and so I'm adding leftygrrl to our blogroll today.