Cutting The Cord

I remember the day it happened. Just moments before, I had been sitting in my office, killing time playing with some extra rubber bands and paperclips. I was pretty intent on making a toy of some sort, and with my mind so occupied, I wasn't paying attention. Then I heard a noise.

Out in the office parking lot, four teens had suddenly formed an adolescent knot of collusion. Without warning, they separated, revealing four worn and battered skateboards with which they began to circle and glide.

I was instantly annoyed, and before I knew it, I was out of my chair and headed for the door. "Hey," I yelled, bounding down the steps. "What do you think you're doing?"

They all froze in place and stared at me mutely, like they had just seen their first dinosaur. "Do any of you have insurance?," I demanded, already sure of the response. Again, they stood strangely silent, looking askance at a beet-faced fossil in a starched shirt.

I tried again. "Well, I do. It's called Liability Insurance, and let me tell you, it's pretty expensive stuff. And if one of you falls and gets hurt and I get sued, and it'll cost even more."

With that, they sort of shifted their feet, and looked at one another as if to say, "Oh, no, an Adult."

I rattled on a few more minutes about responsibility, property rights, permission, maturity, good grades, personal hygiene, eating right, and tied shoelaces. Their eyes began to glaze over.

When I ran out of clichés and truisms, they turned and straggled away down the street. I straightened my tie, brushed myself off, and went back inside. "The nerve of those kids," I told my secretary. "Somebody could have gotten hurt. Who do they think they are, anyway?"

Returning to my office, I was unaware of any pain. But I did hear a sound, a tiny snipping noise from just beyond my ego. That's when I first saw it - my generational umbilical cord had been cut and I didn't even know it.

"Wait!," I cried out. "I'm only forty-five, I sometimes watch MTV, and I have facial hair."

But it was too late. By now, the skateboarders had run into some of their friends, and they were telling them about the old grump down the street. I was no longer an "us". I had become a "them".

"But I'm too young not to be young anymore," I told my wife later. Right after that, she reminded me that the mortgage payment was due, she told me she me that we needed a new dishwasher and all the kids needed braces.

I was still muttering to myself while changing my clothes. "Honey, where are my Levis?"

"I gave them away, dear. They don't fit you so good anymore. Here, put on these slacks with the expandable waistband."

Devastated, I sat on the bed and scratched the sides of my belly. I looked at the slacks and thought about my severed cord. "Does this mean I won't be going to the Pearl Jam concert this weekend?"

"Not at all, dear," she consoled me. "I volunteered you to be a chaperon for some of the kids down the street."

Which ones?," I asked, puzzled.

"You know. Those cute boys that ride the skateboards everywhere."

With a groan, I fell back on the bed, the ever-widening generation gap making my head spin. As I drifted in and out of consciousness, I could hear my wife quietly whispering on the phone. "Yes, okay. Just a little peroxide on the cut for a few days? And will he remember anything after he grows up? No? Good. Thank you, doctor."

I did make it to the concert later in the week. The music was way too loud, so I spent most of my time outside talking to the security guard. We compared our umbilical scars. "Never look back," he told me.

It was good advice and I took it. I don't mind being a "them" after all. Still, I wish my wife had asked me before she threw away my jeans. I went to a lot of trouble to get them to fit so badly.