Well, I'll be darned!

I think I'm gonna give this a shot! I'm not technologist. Hell, last year I just updated my Billy Joel catalog to cassette tape! Two months ago, we finally got a car with a CD player in it. (Tiny steps.)

I figure that I see all the young kids doing it ... and dag-nab it if I'm gonna get left behind anymore. Maybe someday I'll be downloading songs and using Blue Tooth and watching things in high definition. But for now ... this is as close to it as I get.

Why?

Because I'm stuck in the 1970's.

I have a working knowledge of Paul Williams and Patty Hearst and Three Mile Island. I have a large majority of the back catalog of Harry Nilsson .... and I almost always dress in earth tones. I can talk about the '72 Munich Olympics and Charlie Finley and episodes of "Soap" and primal scream therapy.

My idea of fine art probably involves velvet paintings. I'm as likely to want carpeting on the walls as I would the floors. And if given a choice - polyester bests cotton every time.

I guess the only thing slightly off about my love of the Me Decade ... was the fact that I was born in it. While the rest of my peer group gets nostalgic for MTV and women's clothes with thick shoulder pads and Claire Peller saying, "Where's the Beef?" --- I'm happy with the arcane knowledge of Paul Lynde and Squeaky Fromme and those pill-box baseball hats the Pittsburgh Pirates had.

Why the 70's? I think it's because it's before everything started. Computers, VCRs, video games, corporate America, the Christian Coalition, AIDS, crack, Bernie Goetz, hypodermics on the shores, China's under martial law, Rock 'n' Rolla cola wars ... actually, I didn't mind the Rock'n' Rolla Cola Wars. (My cousin fought in that. Two tours of duty. One in the mountains of RC Cola --- the other, an internment with Mr. Pibb.)

The 80's just turned ugly. Now hold on, you say? Anybody who remembers the other two Gibb brothers can't say that the 70's didn't have it's share of ugliness. Cocaine and David Berkowitz to name a couple. Right up there with Anita Bryant and anything starring Robby Benson.

But the 80's was like ten years of plastic and hair spray and Madonna. Fake, mean, hostile shit. Top Gun and Jerry Fallwell and TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes. When I think of the 80's, I think of Len Bias and Pelle Lindburgh and Grenada and Keith Hernandez's moustache. I think of Sammy Hagar screwing up Van Halen and Brian Mulroney screwing up Canada. I think of the PMRC and wanting to punch Mary Lou Retton in the face. I think of being terrified after watching "The Day After" and sickened after reading about that town in Indiana with the kid with AIDS.

I think I stick with the 70's because that's where my favorite memories come from. Watching Star Wars in an empty theatre in Melfort, Saskatchewan. My Uncle Ivan teaching me to ride bike. The way my Dad breathed when he tied my shoes. Polaroid pictures and eight tracks and AM radio and the red haired girl in Kindergarten. It's my childhood friends and Tiger the dog and afternoon naps with my Mom.

My youngest son was born in 2003. Thirty years from now how is he going to remember this time? Is he gonna tell jokes about Mark Foley and OutKast? Will he remember that "Boulevard Of Broken Dreams" and "Stacey's Mom" were his favorite songs? Will he still own CDs and books and use dollar bills? Will they still sell cigarettes and food with trans-fat in it?

Who knows?