One time while I was mowing the lawn, the greatest little riff just popped into my head. It was perfect. I knew I had an instant hit on my hands. I was literally running behind the lawnmower in hopes that I could get the job done and get inside to write it down before it left my simple little mind forever. It was short. It was simple. It was catchy. It was written at least 30 years before I was born by Dizzy Gillespie. What a jackass I am.
Fast forward about 10 years. I?m sitting in my little cubicle that made that Dilbert guy so goddamned rich wondering why everybody at work is so much older than me and why there aren?t any attractive women with which to cheat on my wife (This will be the subject of a later article that I will write ?someday?. That?s ?next Tuesday? to those of you who know me). I am literally the youngest employee in the building. I am surrounded by a virtual gaggle of grandparents and just general old people. The smell of coffee and my dad?s aftershave permeate the building. Despite these facts, I am feeling old. My life is passing me by and I?m not doing a goddamned thing about it. Why, given the environment that I am sitting in, do I entertain this emotion? Because the night before I made a disgusting discovery?I am now officially older than the average professional athlete. Obviously I don?t know this. And no, I don?t care to debate which activities are actually sports and which ones aren?t. What I am trying to say is that within the sports that I give a crap about, whenever someone is mentioned or is otherwise focused upon, more often than not, I am older than they are. The months of subconscious research that I have done on the subject have done irreparable harm to my ego.
I started thinking about this phenomenon and wondering if I?m the only one who has experienced this terrible occurrence. I concluded that it was impossible that I was the only one and that this life-changing event needed a name. After 4.637 seconds of deep ponderance (no, that?s not a real word) I decided that the term for this phenomenon would be a quarter life crisis. At this point I was very pleased with myself and resolved that this new phrase would be the subject in my first article since May (either you?re welcome or I?m sorry about that). I figured that I would do the Google search thing just for posterity to maintain the little theme we?ve got going on here.
11,400 hits later it?s Dizzy Gillespie all over again. They got books by that name at Amazon, at least one punk band in L.A. that appears to be fronted by Susan Summers by that name, and every other possible little angle a person could think of ? 500 times. Lord help me, I?m just not very bright. Oh well. Fuck it. Back to the cube and dreaming of the day that they bring in a mid-twenties slutty intern. Here are some of the ones I liked:
? hiphopanonymous.net ? Nothing about the site is particularly impressive, but I am glad to report that there is a hiphopanonymous.net. Little Robbie Schneider must be proud.
"It's a phenomenon sweeping over all twenty-somethings who are out there struggling to make something of themselves. The quarter-life crisis speaks to the unique challenges of life in your twenties. The transition from college into the real world can be traumatic, a stage in life that has never been studied before, according to quarterlifecrisis.com.
Similar to a midlife crisis, a quarter-life crisis affects young adults who find themselves out of college and clinging to the bottom rung of the corporate ladder..."
Apparently these fuckers aren?t sports fans. And yes, there?s even a quarterlifecrisis.com.
? quarterlifecrisis.com ? these bitches come up fourth in a search for ?quarter life crisis?. They must be some sort of slacking, don?t give a crap about anything, bunch of generation Y?ers.
Can you people believe this? I am too old to be experiencing the phrase that I thought I coined. This friggin? planet?