Excerpts from a conversation with a 16-year-old.

Me: see, i didn’t have to worry about my teachers on facebook. facebook wasn’t around when i was in high school.
Her: …what?! what did you guys do online?
Me: well…at first we didn’t have internet at all. It wasn’t until around 8th grade or so that internet was a thing. and then when i got to high school, well, back then there was a lot of myspace and livejournal.
Her: what’s livejournal? is that like tumblr?
Me: …yeah, sort of.
Her: …that sounds really boring.
Me: shut up.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Her: I’m so lost without my cell phone! Like, what if I need to CALL someone?! I can’t! I’m cut off from civilization!
Me: Quit your bitching. When I was your age, I didn’t have a cell phone. I didn’t get one until I was 17 and driving to Governor’s School every day.
Her: Well that’s just because your parents didn’t buy you one, right?
Me: You have to remember, when I was younger, we didn’t have cell phones. Seriously. They did not exist. My mom got one of the first ones readily available to the public, and that wasn’t until i was in 8th grade.
Her: …what if you needed to call someone? could you use someone else’s cell phone?
Me: not many of us had them, really.
Her: I don’t understand. what did you do?
Me: we used pay phones. or you had to ask someone if you could use their land line.
Her: what if there wasn’t one?
Me: then you were up shit creek.
Her: OMG you grew up when it was SOOOO DANGEROUS!
Me: *facepalm*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Her: …did you have an ipod growing up?
Me: no, they didn’t exist either. Good god, are you trying to make me feel old tonight?!
Her: well what if you wanted to make a playlist?
Me: we made mixtapes. that involved sitting by the radio for hours on end, finger ready over the pause button so you could unpause it and record the song you wanted, and then half the time they cut off the end anyway and you’d get all angry.
Her: that sounds like it fucking sucked.
Me: …well at least the expletives have stayed the same.