where did the despair go?

I'm 29 years old

I was 19 to 23 from 1999 to 2003.

When I was that age.

Everyone around that age seemed pretty consumed with a nice existential despair.

Everyone dwelled on the misery of human existence and had a lot of fun with it.

We grew up listening to Kurt Cobain and Tupac complain endlessly, watching the The State and the biggest problem our president had was his blowjob situation.

We had 9-11, Bush got a little crazy, then we had two wars in a short time.

It was a pretty demoralizing time.

But there were still jobs.

There was still money.

Gas prices were still around a dollar and cigarettes were around 2 dollars.

It was still pretty cheap to live for a young adult.

Considering gas and cigarettes are two of the main things young adults buy.

There were also little cell phone use.

So if you are 19 through 22 right now reading this

subtract like 20 dollars for cigarettes and like 15 to 20 for gas per week and 40 for your cell phone and see how much money you have.

Also we were convinced there would be jobs and the federal government had money, now the government has no money.

Now kids talk about jobs constantly.

They are sitting around dwelling on the existential meaningless of society anymore.

Now it is all about employment, future shelters and food.

It seems when I sit with my girlfriend and her friends that they are having a very different life experience than what my friends and I had.

I don't know what that means exactly.

I don't know if it is good or bad, it just shows that life has changed.