Gods of Advertising

You don’t envy your daughters or any young person. Their world seems vapid and idiotic – an endless slew of You Tubes and disappearing dick pics. You must explain almost every reference to the 20^th century. They do not read for pleasure and barely for school. If it isn’t on their social media feeds they aren’t consuming it. Yet, you do envy their paradoxically thick skins. Their ability to “shake it off” was remarkable.

Moving through life’s minefield with ease you find breathtaking. Does a glib term like triggered render brutalities benign? For all the very real talk of bullying and its fatal consequences, maladjusted loners shooting up high schools, your children seem blissfully immune. If they are on the receiving or giving end of any such terrors you are unaware of it. Are they living sheltered lives? Undoubtedly. Will the real world punch them in their pretty faces soon enough? Probably. But that they are oblivious or even impervious is one hundred percent a fucking miracle.