ponder this

A college student challenged a senior citizen, saying it was impossible for their generation to understand his. "You grew up in a different world," the student said. "Today we have television, jet planes, space travel, nuclear energy, computers..."

Taking advantage of a pause in the student's litany, the geezer said, "You're right. We didn't have those things when we were young; so we invented them! What are you doing for the next generation??"


now i'm not as old as say, a rock, or a redwood. but i'm coming to the realization that i'm no longer in the lower 25th percentile for age. my kid and i were talking about some of the developements i've witnessed growing up. i remember when the first telecommunications satellite TELSTAR was launched. my dad let us stay up and watch the launch (on our black and white tv), saying it was an historical thing. and when i was in high school, a scientist from Bell Labs had this big "get interested in science" presentation. i remember being facinated by the really cool colored lights he was bouncing off of mirrors, making beams of light take 90 degree turns and other visually captivating displays, like lighting a cigarette (!! on school campus), turning out the main lights, then blowing smoke across the beams to make them visible. he said they didn't know what they'd be doing with the laser, but wasn't it cool? hell, i can fill a page from what they can do with a laser, starting with using it to accurately measure the distance from the earth to the moon, and ending with turning up the volume on my compact disc player. i wonder what my grandkids will be taking for granted that we haven't even thought of yet.