Millennial struggles that the new generation will never understand
As a proud millennial, I am well aware that my teenage years are increasingly behind me. In fact, did you know that anyone born before 1996 can call themselves a millennial and that in just under four years, there will be no millennials under 30 left? Sorry, but that news caused me a bit of an existential crisis. Where has our youth gone?
What does bring me joy is seeing the next generation, who in their own way are taking over from us and wearing cropped tops and low-rise jeans as if they invented them. Photos of me from 2005 really prove the opposite, but there is one crucial difference between that girl in the photo and today's teenagers: they have access to all the knowledge in the world, while I was trying in vain to transform myself into a living copy of Christina Aguilera based on two Tina posters. And there are many more struggles that today's youth (god, how old does that sound) will never understand.
1. Stuffing your digital camera, iPod, and Motorola Razr into your bag before leaving the house. If you forgot one of the three, your whole day was ruined.
2. Spending an hour styling your hair (on fry mode) only for it to be ruined after your bike ride to school.
3. Speaking of biking: no one had an electric bike back then. Did you happen to live in another village and have to bike for 50 minutes to get to school? Hopefully, you had the wind at your back.
4. That the person in front of you in the phone booth forgot to call you when your first class was canceled, so you stood at school for nothing at 8:10 AM.
5. Having to buy phone credit at Albert Heijn to text your crush. For the price of just €0.19 per SMS, you could let your crush know you were still alive. But with as few words as possible, because if you went over your punctuation, you could end up paying that amount twice.
6. Getting nervous when the song ‘My Boo’ by Usher and Alicia Keys played at the school dance, because that was the ultimate slow dance song.
7. Not being able to find anywhere how to do your makeup, so showing up at school with that one ter-ri-ble look of way too orange Maybelline foundation mousse, concealer lips, and only eyeliner on your lower lash line. It was heartbreaking.
8. Belts. Over. Your. Shirt.
9. Having to stay home for Idols because that would later be the talk of the day. Whether you were team Jim or Jamai still says everything about you, in my opinion.
10. Not being able to talk to your friends during your vacation because texting from abroad cost a fortune and you had to leave your huge PC at home with your parents. So lame.
11. Getting such a colorful braid in your hair during that same vacation that your mom later had to cut out because it wouldn't come out no matter what.
12. Having to call from the living room where everyone could hear you because the phone was attached to a cord.
13. Not being able to join the conversation about Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden heartthrob Stefano Sanders because your dad insisted on watching the news on the only TV in the house.
14. After 48 hours of downloading music on Limewire, realizing you have no blank CDs left to burn your playlist onto.
15. Having to wait for the catalogs from your favorite stores to see what you wanted for Sinterklaas.
16. Hopeful, opening the latest Hitkrant because you wanted to replace your Orlando Bloom poster with a poster of Channing Tatum after seeing the latest Step Up.
17. Thinking of yourself as a walking fashion icon with your Björn Borg bowling bag.
18. That Juicy Couture tracksuit you never got because your parents thought it was too expensive and ‘not stylish’. What did they know?
19. Those streaky Kelly Clarkson highlights. Balayage who? We didn't know that in the roaring 2000s.
20. Not knowing how quickly you had to grab your tweezers when you saw Christina Aguilera appear at the VMAs without eyebrows (and without clothes). I'm still dealing with the consequences of that.
