It will never be the same again.

^{https://pixabay.com/illustrations/father-and-son-father-family-son-8828819/}

Although I have been in this world for more than half a century, something in me has changed in recent years. Perhaps it is not only the result of a maturity forced upon me by age and the experiences that have shaped and taught me, but also by the work I do to make my passage short and insignificant, compared to everything else in this world.

I often remember the advice and conversations I had with my father. And at the time we had them, even though I didn't fully understand the message, I thought I did.

He always told me not to be in a hurry to want to be an adult. That I would have my whole life to live as an adult... Until I reached old age. Of course, the desire to do the things that adults do, and to have the responsibility of an adult life, was more appealing than what I thought at the time was less interesting.

After a few years, I realize that adult life is a set of obligations and rituals that bring us little or no freedom. Our salary is just compensation for “selling” our time. We are literally selling our time in exchange for money, which will then be used to pay for the things we need to be able to work... Interesting, don't you think?

Who remembers the summer holidays? More than two months without school, being able to play outside from sunrise to sunset, stopping only when our mother called us to the window to come in for lunch, a snack, or dinner.

At that time, television was not the attention grabber it is today, let alone computers or game consoles, which would only appear in the next generation with greater emphasis.

Looking back today, I wouldn't change anything I experienced at that time. Today, children are treated like royalty. There is a huge investment in them, of course. And the dangers of today's society are completely different from those that existed in the 1980s... But have we changed that much as a society? Or has technological evolution led us to create real monsters that hide under beds, but don't exist?

The fear of lack of control, of having something we are not aware of, is more than enough. There is a supreme need not to fail at anything. It would be unthinkable today, in the 21st century, and in the year 2025, for a child to be able to spend so many hours on the street playing with their friends, without adult supervision.

It will never be the same again.

I am certain of that. Each generation is marked by experiences that only it has lived through. Those that came before do not understand the magic, much less those that follow.

The true generational gap.

^{Free image from Pixabay.com
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)}