Singles: the Film of the GenX Experience

Several years ago, I wrote a reflection on Cameron Crowe's 1992 film Singles. As the classic 90s film passes another birthday, I noticed quite a few posts on social media about watching the film and wondering if it holds up. Of course, everyone notes the incredible soundtrack, and many point out the cameos for grunge bands like Alice in Chains and acting(ish) cameos from Eddie Vedder and Stone Gossard. When I posted a link to my piece, the reception was quite positive, so I thought I'd repost here:

As Generation X meanders its way through middle age, occasionally pondering with a distinct sardonic glance who they are and how they got here in a Talking Heads-esque “Letting the Days Go By” montage, they need look no further than the box office poster for Cameron Crowe’s 1992 low-budget cult film Singles. In that image of the twentysomethings profiled in the movie resides the spirit of a generation of young people making the most of an uncertain time by focusing on their pursuit of lifestyle over career and depending on the “neighbors” who subbed in as family. Cliff and Janet on the park bench as Steve and Linda stroll pass enmeshed in a kiss, the image evokes a sense of socialness and community — they are friends and neighbors, bonded by their proximity and hopeful about the decades of adulthood out in front of them. The poster and film offer hope, promise, and above all, authenticity.

When the twenty-fifth anniversary of the film basically coincided with the passing of Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell, watching the film again brought a hard dose of nostalgia against a reality check of middle age. It was the untimely and emotionally heavy death of Chris Cornell, just a month shy of the quarter century mark for the soundtrack’s release, that led me back to the first and only film that spoke to us with generational authenticity. And, when I’m feeling that generational tug and that middle age nostalgia, I look back to the gang from Seattle to remind me how it once was, and why today looks pretty good.

Read the rest of the story on Medium 

The Em Dash & ChatGPT

Oh, the em dash.

I have long used this exquisite tool of punctuation to great effect, as have so many authors from Dickens to Fitzgerald to Salinger to even the contemporary John Green. At times, some readers and editors have actually pointed out their confusion at what exactly this mark is, comments which befuddled and amused me. 

As an editor of student writing, I was often bemused by students' inability to distinguish the hyphen from the dash, and programs like GoogleDocs were actually a bit slow to adapt coding to reflect the actual look, meaning location and length, of the dash.

Anyway, until recently I was aloof to the apparent issue that ChatGPT has with the em dash. And, while I have accepted the presence and even utility of the AI software, I am quite miffed at the tarnish and shadow the program has cast upon my beloved piece of punctuation. I first heard of the controversy a couple days ago while listening to our composition teacher mention it to the class, as the class discussed an essay from Green's The Anthropocene Reviewed.   

And then coincidentally, the New York Times weighed in yesterday with a feature article:  "With the Em Dash, AI Embraces a Fading Tradition"

There are countless signals you might look for to determine whether a piece of writing was generated by A.I., but earlier this year the world seemed to fixate on one in particular: the em dash. ChatGPT was using it constantly — like so, and even if you begged it not to.

As this observation traveled the internet, a weird consensus congealed: that humans do not use dashes. Posters on tech forums called them a “GPT-ism,” a robotic artifact that “does not match modern day communication.” Someone on an OpenAI forum complained that the dashes made it harder to use ChatGPT for customer service without customers catching on. All sorts of people seemed mystifyingly confident that no flesh-and-bone human had any use for this punctuation, and that any deviant who did would henceforth be mistaken for a computer.

Those deviants were appalled, obviously. I am one;

The Atlantic Gives Free Access to all Public High Schools

In great news for schools, for education, for research, for the free exchange of ideas, for corporate altruism and philanthropy, The Atlantic announced yesterday that all public high schools will be give 100% free digital access to the magazine and its nearly 140 years of archives.

I am tremendously excited about this new offering, and I have already signed up the library-media center at the high school where I work. The Atlantic is an exceptional resource for long-form journalism, and the archives are an opportunity for students to explore criticism and essays reaching back to the time of Henry Thoreau and his fellow Transcendentalists. 

Thank you to the ownership and editorial team of this esteemed institution of the Fourth Estate. 

Starting today, The Atlantic is offering every public high school in the United States free digital access to its journalism and 168-year archive. All public high schools and districts can register with The Atlantic to give their students, teachers, and administrators unlimited access to TheAtlantic.com while on campus at no cost: all articles, full magazine issues, podcasts and audio articles, Atlantic Games, and the complete archive.

The Atlantic is already widely used as a teaching resource and read by millions of educators and students––and its archive contains landmark essays from many of history’s greatest writers and thinkers. This new offering removes financial and technical barriers for public high schools and introduces The Atlantic’s journalism to new generations of readers. Since launching an academic group subscription in July 2023, The Atlantic has enrolled more than 200 colleges, universities, and high schools in this program, reaching more than 1.2 million readers.

Foggy Sunrise

It was a cool, kind of spooky, almost ethereal sunrise on the eastern plains of Colorado this morning with a bright sunrise backlighting a thick, mysterious blanket of fog.

Images of the horses and cows lazily grazing, at ease with the natural phenomena all around, peppered the landscape of rolling hills and small bodies of water. 

My morning drives to my position as a high school librarian almost always makes me smile, giving hints and glimpses of the southern Illinois landscape where I grew up.

Sunrise Lightning

As I drove to work this morning, out Hwy14 across the eastern plains of Colorado, I saw the most unusual scene. It was a reasonably sunny horizon, as the sun peaked through some remaining clouds up high. I noticed a bit of virga, streaming down, a phenomenon I always find interestingly beautiful. And, then the sky lit up with an impressive ground strike. Aren't they always though?

It was close enough, though I couldn't hear the thunder. Several more times as the sky brightened, I witnessed a few more bolts and even caught a bit of the thunder as a few unnervingly large raindrops splattered my windshield. It was a most interesting weather event, and reminded me of how, growing up in the Midwest, I always anticipated and sort of reveled in watching storm clouds build on the horizon and roll in with calm but riveting spectacle. 

Exploring Two Sides of Murakami

My wife is an avid fan and reader of Japanese writer Haruki Murakami, and while I have tried to get into his book Norwegian Wood a few times, his work has just never quite grabbed me as a reader. And, yet, currently I find myself immersed in two of his works, and I am intrigued. 

I began by delving into his 1200 word opus 1Q84, which is a fascinating play on George Orwell's masterpiece of dystopian political literature. Murakami's work is set in Tokyo and follows two distinct and divergent storylines which seem destined to collide. The high school library where I work has not one but two copies, which I found rather surprising. And I opened one up earlier this year during the times that I'm on the floor, casually monitoring student behavior. During these times, I've slowly read several books, a few pages at a time. I figured I could be through 1Q84 by the end of the year.

I am also reading one of Murakami's two forays into non-fiction, What I Think About When I Think About Running. Murakami is a long-time distance runner, and I got to talking about the book when I discussed Chris McDougal's Born to Run with a colleague who is a runner and a reader. I was familiar with Murakami's title, and I was actually kind of intrigued by the idea. So, I picked it up a copy and have enjoyed the calm meditative prose. 

So, that's me this week -- looking at two sides of Murakami.

Gatsby at 100 ... from Myrtle's View

A leading contender for "the Great American Novel," Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby turns 100 years old this year, and while there are undoubtedly many writers, professors, artists, and critics weighing in on this anniversary, I am particularly intrigued by a clever retelling of the story from Colorado-based writer Allyson Reedy. Known primarily as a food writer, Reedy has surprised me with news of the upcoming release of Mrs. Wilson's Affair, the story of Gatsby from the perspective of ill-fated Myrtle Wilson. 

It's a fun conceit to take classic stories and re-imagine and re-tell them from alternative views. One of the best, of course, is Stoppard's Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead. And another exceptional re-telling was Percival Everett's James, the story of Huck Finn from Jim's perspective, which went on to win the National Book Award.

Son Volt's "Trace" & the rise of Alt-Country Indie Folk

30 years ago a nearly perfect album was made that defined the birth and rise of alt-country, indie folk.

Music writer, fan, and real historian, Steve Hyden recently reflected on The Quiet Legacy Of Son Volt's "Trace" , and I truly love this line: “Alt-country” refers specifically to the generation of ’80s punks and indie rockers who picked up acoustic guitars and wrote songs about small-town drunks."

While I was living abroad at the time of its release and probably didn't discover it for a few years, Son Volt and the alt-country/indie folk rob vibe that it played a prominent role in establishing has a special place in my heart, having grown up in southern Illinois not far from Belleville where Uncle Tupelo formed. 

I can still recall sometime in the summer of 1990 when my mom handed me a copy of the groundbreaking, genre-defying "No Depression."  Amusingly, it was a preview copy, I believe, sent to the newspaper where she was a lifestyle writer and features editor, and the CD had been sent to the paper for a review. I truly wish I still had the copy.

Thoreau Leaves Walden Pond ... Again

For the second time in nearly two-hundred years, Henry Thoreau has left Walden Pond. This time his stay was closer to twenty-six years, unlike the roughly two years Thoreau spent there from July 4, 1845 to September 1847. Of course, I'm speaking of "Henry Thoreau," as played by historian Richard Smith of Concord, MA. 

The New York Times profiled this "Thoreau" in a lovely reflection, fitting of a life spent living a Transcendentalist experience in Walden Woods -- A Thoreau Impersonator Bids a Fond Farewell to Walden Pond:  After 26 years in character as the 19th-century transcendentalist writer, Richard Smith is hanging up his straw hat.

This is a great story, and I had the distinct pleasure of meeting Richard Smith this summer at the Thoreau Society's Annual Gathering in Concord. Richard is truly a great guy, a talented historian, and a true Thoreauvian. 

A bearded man in a waistcoat and tall straw hat emerged from a cabin on Walden Pond and faced a group of people wearing shorts and sunglasses. They were curious about his solitary life in the woods.

They addressed him as Henry David Thoreau, the 19th-century transcendentalist writer, but they were speaking to Richard Smith, a historian who has been Walden Pond State Reservation’s resident Thoreau impersonator since 1999.

Enjoy the rest of the story at the New York Times.

GenZ living its Parents' GenX life

In a new piece of commentary, which seems to somewhat masquarade as policy analysis and reporting, writer Alice Lassman informs us that Gen Z is Forcing Us to Rethink the American Dream | TIME

Lassman's online profiles describe her as a "policy expert with a focus on the global economy and gender." As a former high school teacher and writer who has done a fair bit of writing about Generation X, beginning with my master's thesis which analyzed work, life, and culture in the novels of Douglas Coupland, I key in on generational stories about Gen X and its offspring in Gen Z. And I often view writing about both with a fair amount of skepticism. For example, this line:

"America has never reckoned with a generation unwilling to blame themselves for the failure of its Dream. Gen Z might be the first to reject these goalposts, but they likely won’t be the last. This fracture should be alarming for a nation whose identity rests on the idea that even if you don’t make it, your children might—so long as you work hard."

I immediately took a double take on the idea that "America has never reckoned with a generation ..." For, the subsequent descriptors Lassman makes are the exact characterization made of Generation X in the 1990s. Like, a textbook reiteration of the exact same commentary made of the parents of Gen Z. 

Generation X was the "Nation at Risk," the first generation predicted and expected to have a lower standard of living than its parents. Gen X was the group that heard endlessly about but rejected its parents story of corporate loyalty and a respectable retirement, and the first that chose, and often had no choice but to choose, "lifestyle over career." The recession of the 1990s, the downsizing of factory populations, the off-shoring of jobs, the rise of contract or "gig work" that lacked benefits and security but was housed in the same companies that once employed Boomers and Silent Generationers for a lifetime, ... all these factors played a prime role in Xers quickly souring on and losing faith in the American Dream.

Heck, this was the first generation that grew up suspicious of societal institutions like government, education, and church, and it was a group who watched a president resign in disgrace as the US military withdrew from a decades long military quagmire. 

So, I have to say, I don't think Lassman is much of a policy expert and certainly not one who has done any significant research into her parents' generation, the parents of Gen Z.

What Literature Can Do

A student is writing a piece about literature and the impact it can have on individuals and beyond. Specifically, she is asking people about favorite books, the personal impact of such books, and ideas about "the weight a book can carry." And two particular books and quotes came to mind.

When Abraham Lincoln met Uncle Tom's Cabin author Harriet Beecher Stowe, he supposedly said, "So, you're the lady whose book started this war."

And, when Upton Sinclair was interviewed about the success and impact of his book The Jungle, he responded, "I aimed for the country's heart, and I hit its stomach."

David French & GenX Parenting

Columnist David French poses an interesting and important question in his recent New York Times column:  "How Did the Latchkey Kids of Gen X Become the Helicopter Parents of Gen Z?"

It's not unreasonable to suggest that parents of a certain age should be a bit less obsessive about micromanaging every detail of their children's lives. And, to be clear, the current generation of parents did not invent the idea of helicoptering in the child rearing game. That's reserved for the Baby Boomers who coddled their Millennial offspring to ridiculous and unprecedented degrees. Subsequently, anyone with much experience with the youngest of young people these days might suspect that the Boomers' parenting was not particularly effective in that Millennials are specifically bad at the parenting game. 

Granted, all this talk of generational trends and inclinations is obviously greatly overgeneralized. There are effective and ... pathetic parents at all ages in all eras. I wrote about GenX and the parenting game five years ago, though I had a different view than French. In fact, my piece suggests that "GenX Parenting" is the opposite of helicopter parenting. Of course, that view also implies that the very concept of "Generation X," at least in the manner that sociologist Paul Fussel and writer Douglas Coupland used it, is more about an attitude and lifestyle choice as opposed to an age range.

Gen X parents don’t hover, they don’t helicopter, and they certainly don’t snowplow. However, they are neither aloof nor disengaged. Generational writer and sociologist Neil Howe has termed Gen X parents “Stealth Fighter Parents.” They are aware and involved in the lives of their children, choosing where and when and how much. If an issue “seems below their threshold of importance,” they will let it go, “saving their energy” and probably their nerves. But if the situation “shows up on their radar … they will strike, rapidly and in force, and often without warning.” The target might be their kids’ friends or their teachers or a neighbor, or most likely the kids themselves. Gen Xers are post-9/11 “security moms” and hands-on dads. And our kids, the neXt generation, share our pragmatic, somewhat jaded, and pessimistic view of society while also being rather attentive to themselves, like Xers who had to be while we let ourselves in to the houses after school and fixed our own snacks while waiting for our parents to get home. They are woke, and to borrow from David Bowie (and John Hughes) “quite aware of what they’re going through.” That’s the scoop on Gen Z, a derivative nickname for Xer’s kids, who are out, open, authentic, transparent, and inclined to change the world themselves rather than wait for their elders.