So I bet you never thought that teens and senior citizens could have anything in common. Guess again friend. Just put them in a position of authority over others, and you will see the two groups bear striking similarities.
Now don't misunderstand me. Teens in general crack me up, and I have mad respect for my elders. My own dad is a senior citizen, and if she can work the discount to her advantage, Moms will admit to being one as well. Those over the age of sixty-five are truly old school and from the days where your toys were made of metal, as were your constitution and your character. Bottom line, old people rock, and I hope to be one myself one day. Because that's when you can truly get away with saying and doing anything, and everyone just thinks you're charming.
But back to the subject at hand. I'm talking about two specific groups of teens and seniors with authority. Teen lifeguards and senior citizen polling place workers. Give teens a whistle and a tall white chair or seniors an "Official Poll Worker" badge and a few crowd control stanchions, and the power trippin' is ON!
Let's start with the lifeguards and a caveat to please spare yourself some torment by never, I mean NEVER, bringing up the subject of teen lifeguards with my Handsome Husband. This would be akin to asking most Americans to give you their opinion on the Westboro Baptist Church, and you are probably going to be left wishing you'd never brought the subject up to the HH at all. (You and I can have a sidebar instead regarding HH's idea of appropriate behavior in the pool vs. that of the majority of the western world.)
Suffice it to say that it is HH's opinion that all lifeguards are put in place to ensure that they get the patrons to comply with the #1 Pool Rule & Regulation, which is "NO FUN ALLOWED". Granted, this rule is not posted anywhere, but it does not stop his fervent belief that it, in fact, exists. While I don't share his opinion about the No Fun rule or even his definition of what constitutes "fun" at the pool, I do think that if given a smidgen of authority, the teenage lifeguards do tend to take it over the top.
It's really not the teens' fault, as the Stanford Prison Experiment in the 1970s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment) effectively demonstrated that when given authority, most people tend to run with it. Teens are on the cusp of new discoveries such as driving, gainful employment, and other things that as the parent of a tween, I don't even want to contemplate yet. Throw a whistle and some hormones into the mix, and all bets are off!
When we are at the pool, I try and be respectful of these pups' authority as they sit in their big white chairs. I even overlook the fact that when I was (yet ten years older than) their current age, they were still sitting in chairs, albeit the kind their parents fed them strained peas from. I remind myself that I am leading my kids by example. While they may turn deaf and dumb most of the time when I am, say, giving them a "procrastination intervention", the second I do or say anything that strays from a positive "WWJD?" outcome, you know my little darlings are going to be all eyes and ears.
But really, teens, when you are whistling at my kids for hot-footing it across the 350 degree pool deck concrete, whistling at them for putting their feet in the gutter during Safety Check, whistling at them for hooping and hollering in the pool and denying my vertically-challenged seven-year-old (who can swim the length of the pool and has been going off the high dive since he was five) admission down the slide because he is 47.8" tall and not 48", you're pushing it Missy/Young Man.
Still, with the aid of some deep Ujjayi breaths, I will let it all go. Except the slide thing. Which really, really makes me want to freak the freak out. But never fear, I will not bawl out a teenager. I will ask for the inevitably college-aged "manager" and speak my piece to him/her instead. I will then get fourteen "ma'ams" and "I'm sorry"s from them and not actually any resolution. Please, my dear sweet Jesus, get the Boy Child AT LAST to 48" so I can be a better Christian. Amen.
Moving along to the seniors. I can see why Official Poll Worker is a great gig for the over seventy crowd. You're up at 4:30am anyway, so the 6:00am opening at the polls isn't an issue. You can always DVR The Price is Right and all four networks' broadcasts of the noon news, so why not make a hundred bucks being a poll worker? Given the average age demographic of the people who actually show up to vote, most of your friends are going to be there anyway, so you can socialize and supplement your income as well. BRILLIANT!
When I turned up for advance voting for the November elections this year, I started pit sweating with my first encounter with one of the OPWs. They immediately started barking at me after I came through the door. I was momentarily confused as to whether I was joining the queue at the advance polling place or the line to go through security at the airport. I'm telling you, the TSA has nothing on the OPWs when it comes to instilling fear in people.
I felt like if I turned in the wrong direction or said the wrong thing, Secret Service agents were going to swarm me and take me in the back for an audit with a contingent of IRS accountants followed by an interrogation by a platoon of Army Rangers. (I may have dated an Army Ranger or two back in the day, so maybe that wouldn't be so intimidating, but I is flat out skeered of the IRS. Not because we cheat on our taxes, but because I have reached the point where I am sometimes now referring our fifth grader to her dad for math homework help.)
I kept my head down, my mouth shut and my arms at my sides (to minimize the display of pit sweating that no Rx roll-on was going to slow down) as I moved through the line and past the posts of the Geriatric Gestapo. In all fairness, I did think that I encountered a smile or two, but I was concentrating hard on minding my Ps and Qs, so it could have just been someone reworking their dentures.
Having said all of that, I will not be dissuaded from patronizing the pool or exercising my right to vote. Because despite my having a little fun at the lifeguards' and the OPWs' expense, I really do love teens and seniors. I've been a teen, and I lost my head (way) more than once when taking on all of the new experiences those incredible and overwhelming years can throw at you.
And with God's grace, I will be a senior some day and have earned my right into being exactly who I am, and I'm sure I will not apologize for it either. So if you see me in thirty years clearing tables in the Hy-Vee cafeteria (not because I work there, but because I have nothing better to do) and barking at people while wearing my bra on the outside of my shirt, don't be afraid to come over and say hi. I would be crushed and tell anyone and everyone who would listen if you didn't.
Sparkly Kisses,
D
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