Here’s a ranty post I’ve been saving for a rainy day for a while. It may go off around the houses, and I have little idea where it’ll end up. But let’s go on this journey…
I love the internet. We got our first computer when I was 13 – a gift from my generous nanny. I loved it, and would spend most of my day on it. But the best time of day was at 6pm when the cheap rate started and I could spend 30 sweet minutes on the internet. Back in those days I loved drawing and I’ve spend hours on Devientart and Oekaki Central looking up pictures I wanted to study or copy the techniques of – then have all these windows opened and available offline for when my dad would shout “GET OFF THE INTERNET I NEED THE PHONE!!!!”
I then moved onto having my own website. I had a little space at Homestead.com (RIP), with a little chatbox and lots of pages about… I can’t even remember. It was probably lame as, and no one but my friends would go onto it. But I learnt simple HTML and taught myself how to make the internets a pretty place. Since that day, I’ve pretty much always had a space on the web to call my own.
Not only do I like having my own internet space, but I also love looking at other blogs and (as I have mentioned many times before) Youtube videos. I love tutorials, reviews, empties… the internet is such a powerful media for beauty right now. But I keep hitting the same problem over and over. I’ll find a great blog, or a great Youtube user and then realise that they are 19 or some crazy age like that, and then click out of it.
Now, I’m not agist or anything like that. It’s just, I’m 25 – hardly old – but I have a steady job, I work hard, I have student loans to pay off. I don’t want to be sat there listening to a 6th form student tell me how to spend my money. As Dove often says, “YOU DON’T KNOW MY LIFE!!!”
But where on earth are all these kids coming from?! With their apparent never-ending stream of pocket money or Saturday job wages, their better-than-I-can-afford flashy cameras, with their “pay me 100 pounds a month and I’ll advertise your blog a few times”.
I can see how, especially in certain areas of business, having a blog could boost your employment chances quite a bit, but this is pretty crazy, you must admit. I sound and feel so old when I say that things were just so much simpler back when I was younger – and this is only 10 years ago that I’m talking about!
I see it in my sisters, too. I complimented one sister (the 16 year old) on her mascara when I was back home last time, only to be told that it was from Chanel. The other sister (13 years old) is decked out in River Island and Topshop all the time. When I say “hey… isn’t this a bit much?” everyone in the world complains that they were all birthday presents, that they were gifts, that they were on offer. But the fact remains that Chanel, Topshop, River Island… none of these even entered the realm of what I could, or wanted to, possess when I was their ages. I went to a BBQ at my old upper school in the summer to embarrass the 16 year old sister and see old teachers. The field was full of the same geeky boys that I’d have seen back in my day, but also gorgeous girls in perfect make-up and amazing hair. How do they have time to look so good?! How can *I* look that good?!
On one hand, I am jealous that these girls have just grown up knowing more about looking good than I did – heck, when I was 13 the most stylish (in my eyes at least) was that I had the exact blue and yellow Adidas tracksuit as Sporty Spice did in the poster on my wall. But on the other hand I feel really sorry for these girls – they go through all that I did as a girl but with the added pressure to look amazing, even if it’s easier to do so these days.
Another (really awesome) blogger who wrote something similar (but less negative!!) on this is “How Does It Feel To Be...” Check her out, she’s pretty awesome.
Do you often feel the internet generation gap?
