Wait a minute; this sounds like rock and/or roll.

I've always looked young, and so many other Scout leaders I know are a bit older than me, so I generally feel pretty young. I've had some experiences recently that have made me feel old, though. It doesn't have anything to do with the guy who called me Sir last week, but that didn't help either. It has to do with music, which has the power to amplify or cancel out emotions, depending on the situation.

Rewind back 3 or 4 years, and I was running a couple of my Scouts to their houses to grab their books or something that they needed. On our way there in my truck, they were looking at some of my CDs, one of which was a Van Halen album, probably Balance. I asked them if they like Van Halen, and they replied that they had never heard of them. I was floored.

Fast forward a couple years, and I was relating the above experience to my ASM. He likes the same kind of music that I do, and neither of us like the crap that kids listen to these days. He just pointed out it's always like that. Every generation has different music that they like. It just made me stop and think that I was getting old. I'm out of touch with the current generation. I seriously hate the music, if you can call it that. But everything I can think of that's bad about it is pretty much the same thing you hear of any parent complaining about the music their kids listen to.

I really think that hip hop music is worse than what I listen to. Of course, really thinking about it, some of the songs I like are not entirely appropriate, but for some reason it seems different and not as bad. Maybe music is getting worse. Maybe it's not, but I can't judge, because I'm out of touch.

Anyway, fast forward to just recently on the way home from a campout. I had a kind of weird mix CD in my truck that someone had made, so one of the boys popped it in the CD player. It doesn't much matter the purpose of the CD, except that it had a song by The Manhattan Transfer on it. I'm not necessarily a big fan of them, but I appreciate their music and understand the style of it. During a part of the song, where they hold a note and slowly drop the pitch, one of the boys complained that 'those guys are really bad singers'. I assume it was because they couldn't hold the pitch steady, not realizing that they do it on purpose just because they can. I'm not totally sure. It was just another reminder of how old I am. While I'm not a big fan of The Manhattan Transfer, like I said, I appreciate their music much more than I do Jay-Z or Soulja Boy. The boys now either dislike or have never heard of the music I like or even marginally appreciate. And I don't think there's anything that anyone can do about it, except hope that whatever replaces hip-hop is something better. I'm not holding my breath.