Am I now considered old?
Apparently there are some Gen Z kids tik toking their way around social media proclaiming that people who wear skinny jeans, that part their hair on the side, and use the face with tears of joy emoji, are officially old. WHAT?! Who are these people and what gives them the right to declare us old? I immediately consulted my friends, is this true? What do you think of this? Most think it is hilarious, but secretly we are all shoving our skinny jeans in the back of our closet and are now training our hair to part down the middle. I decided that I would dig a little deeper into this ridiculous declaration and find out what these young whipper snappers are wearing and how they are communicating these days.
The first person I consulted is my clever niece who is 21. Sara is going to college for engineering at Rensselaer in New York. She's got BIG brains and is going places. I asked her what she would wear going out with friends, and how she communicates with her peers. She sent me the below picture.
She said this is what she typically wears with friends, but tends not to be too picky amongst them. Cute, casual, with a tinge of sweet. Yes, I'm biased, but this is the vibe she is giving off. Although you can't quite see the bottoms of her jeans, she does NOT wear skinny jeans, but prefers bootcut. Also take note of the curly hair and how she parts it. TO THE SIDE people. How on earth can a girl with curly hair do a middle part? We will look like a lamp shade. Clearly the tik tokers who claim side parts are uncool do not have naturally curly hair! At this point, I am still feeling young. How does she communicate with friends? Discord, she uses discord. I had to look this up, as I was interpreting that smart and clever students communicated by sarcastic disagreement. Not the case, it's an app used by the gaming or fan culture. She uses spoiler bars which hide the message until the recipient decides to view it. When asked if she uses emojis, she noted that she does, but only with OLDER adults. Point taken, I am old....again.
The next person I consulted is one of our high school age babysitters, the lovely Georgia. Georgia's mom sent me the below cropped picture because we don't want to be posting children's faces without permission. The vibe that Georgia gives off is slightly skater, slightly hipster, slightly funky. I like it.
Notice in this picture there are three different styles of pants going on here, but there is a pair of SKINNY JEANS. That brings me back to not being old again, right? Good. I'm glad we are all in agreement here. Georgia's main way of communicating with friends is through Snapchat. Some of the emojis that she uses are these ones:
pretty standard and clear for the most part. No tears of joy emoji though, and what about that last one, what does that last one mean? I needed clarification on this one so I consulted urban dictionary. To my astonishment, there is no definition, but I was in luck as Georgia's mom somehow knew I would need clarification. She informed me that this one is used when you are impressed with someone or when you think someone is cute. Old, yup I'm old.
I know this is not scientifically proven data, but I'm drawing my own conclusions here. The young girls I know are damn smart. They seek friendship based off of their personality, life goals, common experiences, and morals. They wear what makes them feel confident and what makes them feel like themselves, skinny jeans or not. This is the same mantra that I live by and that I explain to my daughter. Although I differ in the emojis and apps that I use compared to these girls, they communicate with language that feels right to them, and what they think is appropriate for the situation.
Me and my skinny jeans, my side part, and my tears of joy emoji may be considered "old" to some, but I feel confident in what I am wearing and my friends don't have to guess what I mean when I add an emoji to the end of a text string, so ladies, put on your favorite jeans, do your hair how you want, and use whatever emoji you are feeling! In my book, you are NOT old.
