When I was 18, I remember the old folks hating Rock and Roll. A few years later video games. A few years later computers. A few years later every kid has a cell phone. Now. It's these kids don't want to work now adays. My confession. Eating Easter dinner, the teenagers couldn't leave their phones alone long enough to eat. I may just be getting old and grouchy, but that pissed me off. I didn't say anything, but I was irate.
We can't get anybody to work at our roofing company. Roofing is a trade that will always be available just like the medical profession. I've caught young, healthy people going in to the unemployment office and asked if they wanted a job. "no, they say--I've got an unemployment claim and I'm going to draw it out. " Our company has an excellent reputation and will / would train new hires. I'm too fuckin old to roof any more, but I stayed on the roof 'till I was over 70 and I hate to make one of those "get off my lawn" type statements, but what the hell?? Son number two now runs the company and son number one is as good a roofer as I ever saw in my illustrious roofing career and he gets disgusted at the very few who have shown up. He thinks it's the new generation that's at fault. We now have four or five plus son number two that work steady, but with more workers we could pick up lots more work. During the 60s-70s-80s nineties and on up for a while , there were hundreds and maybe thousands of good roofers working or looking for work. That shits gone.
I understand that the confession here isn't about bad table manners displayed by some at your gathering, but rather about your own anger, silent though you were about it. If some of said teenagers were not your offspring, they may not know that you have a no-phones-at-the-table rule. If they're yours, they know there's a rule, and you don't enforce that rule consistently, I can't blame them too much for ignoring the rule. At home or in the workplace, we have to be judicious about the rules we make, because every one of them will have to have some kind of monitoring and enforcement mechanism to have any effect. If they're yours, you have a rule, you otherwise enforce it consistently, and you let it go for this one day of religious significance, that was likely a wise thing to do - to set your own mind on the higher gifts for that one day. I'm going to recommend, if it needs to be said, that you announce at the start of the meal that phones need to be silenced and put away until after dessert. Similarly, it used to be widely understood that gentlemen remove their hats when going indoors. It seems to be that few men aspire to be gentlemen anymore. If you have hat-wearers at your dinner who are oblivious to indoor manners, you may also need to announce before you serve that hats are not to be worn at the table. Getting back to your original confession about your own silent anger, I'm pretty good about letting go of anger, of not embracing it. That's not by nature, but by discipline. I had a yoga instructor who frequently used to leave her class with this thought: "Carrying around anger is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die." It's true, and it helps me let go of most anger that might otherwise linger. If it isn't in any way advangageous or useful for you to embrace anger, let it go.
Thanks for all the likes. or dislikes? My point is in past I always said kids will be kids, and liked letting them play and have fun. I'm more mad at myself for getting upset. This was really first family get together since, the Covid. I remember the older generation, saying these kids now aday. I never wanted to see Me saying something like that.
