Two Body Problem (orig)

Up until recently I've pretty much assumed I was in Generation X. I knew I was on the tail end, but after all, I bought Nirvana's Nevermind the year it came out, I used to have boxes of stuff that I bought ironically, and the first R-rated movie I saw was The Breakfast Club*. And what's the alternative? Generation Y? That hardly seemed appropriate. It takes me a good half hour to compose a text-message, I've only rarely used instant messaging or social networking sites, and I think Emo is pretty retarded.

Now that we're making all the preparations for The Kid, my "I'm in Generation X" worldview has taken a beating. It started when we picked up this baby name book geared toward Generation X. We liked the name suggestions in the book, some of them were funky, there weren't too many, and it's laced with pop culture references (even if they are a little dated - the book was published in 1999). However, upon reading some of the name suggestions, I could tell that no matter what I thought, I wasn't really Generation X. Case in point, the entry on Zelda mentions how the kid might be compared to Zelda Fitzgerald. What?!? Say "Zelda" to anyone my age and the first thing they will think of is "Legend of".** It's just spiraled down from there. A recent Babble post about why GenX parents complain so much, mentioned how "we came of age during Watergate.." I thought that was the "Me generation". I wasn't even born then!

I guess there's no denying it - I'm in Generation Y or a Millennial or whatever the marketing guys say. Maybe Emo isn't all bad. And of course, moving back in with the parents would be a big help with The Kid.

* This may be a stretch. My cousin (who's definitely a Gen-Xer) let my sister and me watch it on TV when she was babysitting us. She tried to sing over the swearing and we'd dance around during the commercials. Unfortunately, this was the last time she babysat for us.