Keeping up with the teens

I think parents are those types of creatures who have the slowest evolutionary rate. We don’t learn from experience. At all. In fact, if we continue like this, we may soon be extinct like the dodo, and the children will celebrate by throwing a party with Yo Yo Honey Singh, unless he himself is a parent and he joins us in extinct-land with his CDs.

Let me illustrate with the help of my friend and the best example, Rajeev, who, in children-terms, is a 100 years old. 

“I need a hair-cut before the vacation. Do you think bangs will suit me?”
Rajeev is puzzled.

He pips, “What are banks?” “It’s bangs, uncle.”

“Ok, but what are those?”

She rolls her eyes and waves her hand in a dismissive manner. This means that Rajeev should realise he is not welcome in the conversation and should graciously retreat. But, as I mentioned above, parents are clueless. He persists, “Like colourful beads?”

She now laughs hysterically. Rajeev joins in, laughing loudly, since has no idea how else to respond. “No!”

Rajeev stops laughing, and repeats his query. She is wondering why he does not just give up and relocate to Kashi where all old people are supposed to be. She responds, “You know — when the front part of your hair is trimmed shorter, it’s called bangs.”

Rajeev is satisfied. He gets it. He has to prove how quick he is on the uptake (this is another mistake parents make: not knowing when to stop.)

“Ya, ya I know — like Laloo Yadav has, right?” Her eyes have taken a tour to the back of her head and do not return for a while.

Rajeev is hurt. He was looking forward to a mutually-rewarding conversation. He often gets disappointed with how Aisha reacts to him. That is when, smarting from the hurt, he brings out his trump card, “I have seen you as a newborn baby.”

She does not realise that she has to feel grateful about the fact that he has seen her as a baby, and retreats to her room which is behind a door labelled ‘ENTER IF YOU WANT TO DIE’.

Then there are teenage boys who exist to redefine humanity. That is, to pull the category lower, closer to crustaceans and parasites. With their sparse facial hair and their sparser bathing schedules, they inhabit your houses to add to the air and noise pollution. They come with devices attached to their palms that command video games which kill 10 living beings per second.  You can send them on errands. Such as buying food. That is, if you are on a diet. Because they will do it eventually — after they have collected one thousand gold coins after slaying King Korol with a goomerang. That could take some time, you see.

The collective goal of all teens is to eliminate younger and older people. They walk around in armies, with wires hanging out of their ears, oversized clothes and pants falling off their butts, with a mission to exterminate. Be careful — their music can drill holes in your skull, their jargons can sear your eyeballs, their texting can cause you to tear your hair.

And, god forbid, if you are connected to any kind of life-support machine, they’ll remove the plug to charge their phones.