"When I Was Your Age........"

Alright, be honest. How bad is it that last night, at the tender age of sixteen, I used the phrase "When I was your age....." for the first time in my life? I mean, I thought I had another few decades to go before those dreaded words slipped out of my mouth, quickly followed by the horrifying, wide-eyed realisation that I am ALREADY turning into my mother. But seriously, I think I had good reason; see what you think.

I spent the evening 'babysitting' a fourteen-year-old's party. Now, by 'babysitting' I mean that myself and two friends were in the same house at the same time and the only vaguely responsible people present, therefore apparently becoming 'in charge'. Now, as I'm sure any of you would do, I took the opportunity to try and show-off my maturity and coolness to a bunch of people too young to really see my true geeky self, but it backfired horrendously. As it transpired whilst talking to these young teens, I was in fact pretty much on a parr with them, in terms of ''maturity''. By that, I mean that they were: -
a) actually dating, rather than having six 'boyfriends' at one time and no-one really caring
b) all familiar with the concept of being drunk
c) doing things that I didn't even know the meaning of at their age.
And all I kept thrinking throughout the evening was 'You are fourteen!!' I mean, I know that's only a little younger than I am, but when you consider everything that happens between beginning your GCSEs and beginning your A-Levels, I thought I was light-years ahead of those 'kids'.

And it's not just them. My younger brother - a year nine - quite frequently refers to concepts and insults that I am clueless as to the meaning of. He calls me a 'noob' on a regular basis, and I am far to proud to ask whether this is actually a bad thing (though I'm sure it is). I also overheard him referring to someone being 'teabagged' the other day, and if my friends are to be believed, this is something overtly dirty, disturbing and (frankly) disgusting that my little brother, as far as I'm concerned, shouldn't even know the non-slang CONCEPT of.

It makes me wonder what kind of a society we're living in, when you start to feel outdated and old before you're even out of your teens. I mean, they've barely hit puberty for crying out loud! And it also makes me grudgingly agree with my mother - maybe teenagers really are growing up too fast these days. But when I ran this past the fourteen-year-olds, they snorted derisively and said simply, 'You think we're bad? You should talk to Matt.' Now I'm not sure who Matt is or what he's done, but frankly, I don't think I want to.