By Darren Mcvey
In the barren parking annex of a featureless rectangular structure, a young zombie solemnly makes his pre-dawn pilgrimage. He makes no expression as he leaves the serene warmth inside his Corolla for the cold greeting of the steel and aluminum box.
Passing through the gate, he disposes of the coffee and cigarette that aided in concealing the residue of the previous night. Between his ears, the ambience of an early morning clamor replaces iPod-implanted notions of anarchic nihilism with less enticing notions of corporate nihilism.
Each time he removes the plugs from his ears a little reality leaks in, a little youth leaks out.
These are the contradictions of being an early 20-something in the Global Age. Legally adult, intellectually adolescent and idealistically infantile. Being 21 is much different from 17, more depressing, more difficult.
As co-ops and internships gradually guide the hopeful youth away from campus and towards the office, the students/employees must face the waning credibility of their ideals.
How does one deal with the postmodernist malaise of trying to determine if ideals will suffice in life?
It generally goes one of two ways. One can cultivate one’s audacity and refuse to submit to the status quo.
Or, one can shelve their bold plans and give in to cynicism. Most take this route; youth is not stolen, but sold.
The gradual, but unwelcome decomposition of youth can be unbearable at times. From age zero, all we wanted was to be a grown up; to partake in the forbidden pleasures of romance, responsibility and wealth, to indulge in the forbidden vices that define sophistication.
Now that we have caught a glimpse of post-pubescent reality, it is clearer why so many adults try to cope with chemical cocktails of caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, or worse.
As children, we had no idea what was so enticing about growing older, and that wonder remains today in a more immediate manifestation. The question of why adults partake in this game of material accumulation and chemical sedation is one that we never address. The answer is significance.
Significance is what adults seek, the desire to be important in a world of six billion souls. Of course, most people seek the unholy trinity of power, money and sexual pleasure, but it is always in pursuit of being important to someone, for something. Power makes you important to the weak. Money makes you important to yourself. Sex leads to real importance in terms of advancing the species, most rewarding within the confines of a family.
The urge may appear natural at age 22. But, it is more likely spread by osmosis. Ambition concentrates the corporate environment and our adolescent membranes are too porous to keep it out. We are forced to confront the usefulness of altruism. Usefulness and altruism contradict one another.
Many students escape college with their dreams intact. Most have seen their goals succumb to the pressure that the supposedly “real” world exerts. Well, here’s to hoping we don’t sell our youths and that the Global Age can be the age in which young people reconcile responsibility with restlessness.
