Hello Millennial Boomers! I hope you’ve had a happy day. Mine was great considering all day yesterday I thought it was Thursday. I sent out my Thursday emails and everything. Only found out I had it wrong when I sat down to emails this morning and realized it was still Thursday. I’m not really sure if that was an actual ‘Senior Moment’, or a lapse in focus from too many emails. Either way, I made it through the day with all my emails and started planning for tomorrow.
Now that I have the bones in place, I need to flesh out this blog. That’s where you come in. I need help making this a fun place to spend a bit of time. I will learn about adding pages and cool formatting and such. But first, I would like to know what you’d find interesting.
Here’s my ideas:
Share random stories that highlight the fun and folly of getting older in a younger world. work, family, friends, finances, health
Discuss age-related topics in a respectful, uplifting way.
Share old-timey pictures of fun stuff people don’t do anymore.
Links to stuff that is interesting – your ideas here.
The truth is, I could ramble on and on about nothing for a looong time. In fact, I might do that sometimes. But I also have to ask myself, “What would Oprah do?” I’m not exactly sure because I don’t really follow Oprah, but I think she would tell me to do what I love, celebrate who I am, focus on where I want to be and get going.
With that sentiment, I am going to continue like it’s Thursday and focus on this blog until I get it right!
First of all, thanks to the invincible R.C., we now have a subscribe button so you can follow along with this busy Boomer.
Second, I have to tell you about the coffee shop where the web page fixing went down. It had that “fresh brewed coffee in your comfy clothes and no where else to be” smell of anticipation and relaxation. They served amazing coffee, donuts, AND they had vinyl records for sale. The same vinyl records I might have owned a few decades ago. (Caydence Records & Coffee)
It was fun to be out visiting on a sunny day over coffee and donuts. We chatted about work and family and pets. We shared stories and compared notes about all three and let R.C. work on the web page. This was an inter-generational coffee klatch at a super millennial coffee house and we enjoyed every moment. The synergy of old and new is envigorating for all.
But beyond the chit chat and coffee and sweet treats and interweb, I left with a sense of nostalgia. Memories of my last elementary school birthday party with friends and home made cake. My mom bought me the Bobby Sherman album and we sang along with goo goo eyes and loving hearts to Julie, Julie, Julie do you love me? And when my sister had her birthday and MY MOM bought her the Steppenwolf album with “Born to be Wild”.
But mostly I thought about how the modern coffee klatch takes place in the coffee shop with the wi fi and how it used to be in homes at the kitchen table. I am old enough to have enjoyed both. And while I can’t say one is better than the other, I will admit I miss the days when anyone could drop in at anytime and the coffee pot was always on. You were likely to get Folgers, or Sanka instant on a rough day. But no one worried if your hair was in curlers or the house was a mess; you were just glad to have the company.
Spent a bit of time tonight trying to figure out what I had done to this website that was making it inaccessible. Who knows? Actually, who even cares? Just make it work, right? Turns out they have Support to help me with that. In just a few short minutes, the website was fixed and all is well.
So this is the world we live in. We often know what we want to do, but have no idea how to do it. If you want to know the secrets, you have to learn and study and practice your craft. Such is the world of technology.
I think it is confusing to an old beginner like me because I don’t want to start at the beginning. I want to start my blogging journey at the end, with the professional bloggers. I want to produce the finished product without taking the time to know the ingredients. Adult learners do not have the patience of young learners. Millennial techies played with computers, internet, smart phones and such the way Boomers played cards, board games, and neighborhood outdoor games. Young people know technology and old people know people.
Many young people seem to have anxiety and discomfort in social situations and being with people. I think it’s because they are trying to start at the end, where everything is figured out and it all works the way they imagine it should be. But relationships take time, practice, error and diligence. You have to spend time being with people and weaving your way through failure and success. What you end up learning is that the best relationships are never perfect. There is no need for perfection; just a desire for meaningful human interaction.
I am going to stop trying to approach technology at the end. I am going to embrace the unknown and learn the ingredients of a successful blog without agonizing over the mistakes along the way. But I really don’t have time to start at the beginning. This world is moving too fast for that. I am going to try beginning in the middle and asking my Millennial friends for help when I get stuck. We all need to call Support sometimes.
Hello folks. Thanks for your encouraging comments on my first post. In Millennial fashion, I googled ‘how people can follow my blog on Word Press’. It’s simple. Once I publish two posts, the Follow Blog Widget should appear on the bottom right corner of the screen, allowing you to follow me. Hope it works – we shall see.
Today at work, I thought about a difference in the office noise level, compared to a decade ago. I’m not talking about the heater fans, office equipment or white noise. I’m talking about the noise directly related to the people at work.
Now instead of hearing the office noises I have heard much of my career, I see the headphones and earbuds. Gone are the radios and CD players. Remember when we could play CDs in our desktops? No more team votes about which radio station to play in common areas. No spontaneous toe tapping when the greatest hit comes on, no group camaraderie when everyone knows the words to the song.
People are listening to podcasts, paid song download sites, books and other selections through laptops and mobile phones. There are still some dinosaurs like me who have an actual radio and a CD player, but the technology offered online is superior in selection and privacy.
Work is getting done, people are entertained and this is really a non-issue. Except that I can’t help but miss the old-timey noise in the office. I miss the chit chat between coworkers in cubes asking about processes and procedures. I miss the quiet laughter and exclamations as the day unfolds and things happen. I am missing the community and interaction of colleagues beyond the flat screen of the computer.
We still communicate often through computer messaging or email and we get the work done; often more efficiently than we used to. Though I am a big user of the smiley emoji, I long to see your smiling face as I tell you, “Good job”. I kind of want you to see my silly, googly eyes when I confess, “I goofed.” Those are the things that help me gauge relationships and how things are going. A careful observer could learn so much about the business and different personalities just by listening to the daily office noise.
If we want to talk to someone wearing earbuds, we have to get their attention first. This can be awkward because we don’t want to startle anyone. Do you tap them on the shoulder? Tap the desk? Invasive. Do we position ourselves in their line of vision and wait until they notice? Really hard for an extrovert to wait. Best Practice – send a message telling them you’re coming over to chat in person; rather. asking if they have a moment for an in-person visit. This works, it gets the job done. But it can leave you feeling like you’re invading someone’s privacy or that someone else is invading your privacy. Everyone knows that if you want to be left alone, you put in your earbuds.
I keep the earbuds out of my ears because I really like to hear the office noise and I like to be easily accessible. ENFJ. And what I’m hearing tells me about relationships and how things are going. Now I just have to listen more often with my eyes and plan ahead for those ‘impromptu’ face to face meetings.
Here’s the blog. I need a creative outlet and I am passionate about a situation I find myself in all the time: Baby Boomer aging in a workforce that is increasingly younger and more tech oriented. Please join me as I share my take on growing skills, managing stress, and enjoying the broad age dynamic in my workplace. Bear with me as I learn to navigate the blogger world of mysterious technology needed to broadcast my message.
As one of America’s youngest Boomers, (born in 1962) I was raised in a slower time without computers and the internet, where people were more connected to each other by daily, personal interactions. I am rapidly moving into a future that feels more personal and less personal at the same time.
I hope to entertain you as I document my experiences and explore the mindset dichotomy of the Millennial and the Boomer. And I hope you’re very patient as it may take a minute to get up to speed on this blog. If I wait until I’m ready, it may not ever happen.
