I don't want to grow up

I'm not affluent, high-tech, or stylish enough to be a "grup," but I do see something of my 36-year-old self (or future) in this silly New York magazine article, which begins: "He owns eleven pairs of sneakers, hasn't worn anything but jeans in a year, and won't shut up about the latest Death Cab for Cutie CD. But he is no kid. He is among the ascendant breed of grown-up who has redefined adulthood as we once knew it and killed off the generation gap." Nothing in that first sentence describes me, in fact, but I have worn a commuter bag well past the time when I bicycled everywhere, and I am also often the oldest guy at the rap show or punk show. Music journalism keeps you young. To tell the truth, I skipped most of this article. It's filled with people who make me want to flip the old Dead Kennedys lyric from "Life Sentence" ("I'd rather stay a child and keep my self-respect/If being an adult means being like you"): I'd rather grow up if being a child means being like these knobs. But the ILM discussion is hilarious, and there's no question that the "generation gap" increased for a few generations there (after the social invention of "childhood" in the first place in recent centuries) and that in many ways childhood and adulthood have blurred again.