Generation-X

Everyone has a computer nowadays. It's almost alien to not have one or know how to use one even at the most basic level. We recently bought a new computer; you know how it is, the specs get updated so quickly that it's just as hard keeping up with technology as it is keeping up with the latest fashion trends.

So anyway, my sister and dad had a rough idea of what they needed in the new CPU (none of us are super techy or anything), but we had to work through my mum because her friend's son was the one who would be buying it for us. This posed many many problems, but they eventually got it done. Okay, my point to this is that when we had to send it back because of some software installation problems, I was listening to my mum try and talk computers with the salesperson, and it was awful. I got so irritated at how it was a really basic problem, but she was totally saying the wrong thing and confusing the guy even more.

I mean here was my mum, who knows even less than I do about IT, trying to explain what was wrong. I felt bad for getting annoyed because she does try really hard to make sense of it all and isn't deterred by the completely foreign topic of operating systems or hard disk space. (I'm actually really proud of my mummy.)

It's like having to figure out a whole new language, and because the dot-com explosion brought tech-talk to the masses in what was, quite literally, an explosion, we've isolated the older generations. Change so late in life is never easy, but even more so when it's absolutely necessary and you can't take your own sweet time to figure it out.

It must be terrible to grow up being in control of the situation around you, and suddenly this new-fangled computer stuff kicks in and you've gotta start from scratch just to be able to talk to your children. I think we all need a little more patience in teaching our parents, aunties, and uncles, and refrain from freaking out when they don't know what RAM is.