Let me start this by saying I never wanted to be Garth Brooks.
I did, however, want to be in his band, rocking out show after show with the G-man all over America. I’d bask in that warm ’90s glow. That was the time. This was America before we used our last dose of innocence.
Many say the U.S. lost its innocence in the 1960s and 1970s – I say we just started losing it. It has taken us a good four decades to go from virginal schoolgirl, the veritable “Sandy Dee” of the world stage, to become the tired, third-time divorced, middle-aged woman with a bad smokers’ cough at the local bingo emporium – not to say anything about the character of those who frequent a bingo hall or parlor.
Nonetheless, the ’90s, for us, was a shining time. We won wars in less than 100 hours. Record companies weren’t suing people. There was only one animated family sitcom.
We’re worn out now, desperate for the monthly alimony check our fair ex-husband sends us. Dollar margarita night at the local Chili’s – the only way middle-aged women can do it. This is it. We’re getting old. The once virile plaything and one true knockout is no more. She’s a tarnished beauty; like seeing an older lady you can tell was once beautiful. Are you sad because she’s no longer beautiful or just sad you never saw the beauty?
We’re divorcee-only cruises old, just thrice as bitter.
We can look back on it and wonder, “Where’d we go wrong?” If it’s your manifest destiny, then no one can really get hurt. It was college; we were experimenting. We started believing the pipe dream we sold the world. America really can do anything.
As the decade wore on, we got some new “Friends” and our neighborhood started to get crowded in more ways than one.
We held on for so long. We weren’t going to let ourselves go like our European big sister. Now, we’re having lunch with her at least twice a week. We’re the people-just-now-getting-on-Facebook old. Lolz.
This is our post-modern hangover.
Life grows more complicated by the day. There is unrelenting tension, constant bombardment by media and marketing and the moneychangers and their never-ceasing bid for your dollars. “Buy these!” Bastards. We’re Britney Spears in her 40s, Billy Mays on coke.
The Greatest Generation gave way to the Baby Boom and they to us. The product of the Great Depression scrimped and saved to put a nice Chevy in the driveway and get Mom a washer and dryer combo from Sears.
Then we went off to college, protested the war and still managed to graduate. We headed to subdivisions and named kids Mary Catherine, Tucker and Taylor, which brings us to now.
We’re wholly mortgaged up to our eyeballs in a McMansion in a former pasture-turned-subdivision with a Lexus on lease in the driveway. We’re a wholly-owned subsidiary. We’ve just been outsourced.
We’ve got a new man – a rebound if you will. He’s black. We’ve never done that before. We’ll see how it all works out.
Garth Brooks no longer tours.
David Breland is a junior majoring in communication. He can be contacted at [email protected].