Dear Teenager

I’m not going to give out to you.I know your life is a living misery, nobody understands you.Everybody hates you, and let’s be honest, you hate everyone.
No, I’m not going to attack you.I’m just going to make a couple of little suggestions that should help make your world a little easier.

For example, please stop thinking you invented music.  Your parents used to think the same thing. So did your grandparents.  None of them were right.At least in our day we just complained that old people’s music was awful.  (Now look what you’ve done.You’ve reduced me to saying “in our day”.  For feck’s sake).

But half of you seem to walk around wearing Beatles or Jimi Hendrix tee shirts and spouting on about ever more obscure bands, presumably in an effort to intimidate the rest of us with your encyclopaedic knowledge of all things musical.Nobody is impressed by your ramblings about an “eclectic, post punk band made up of indigenous people of Guatemala.”

Just belt up.
And if you do choose to play strange music, for pity’s sake do it quietly when you’re on public transport.
Please try to use proper words.LOL is not a word.And, like, there’s no need to like, say like all the time.
The other big thing, no offence, is your clothes.Now, I know what you’re probably thinking.What the hell would an old fogey know about what we’re wearing.  And God knows, you’re right.I have absolutely no idea about what you’re wearing.

There is no excuse in the world for walking around town in pyjamas.  And I don’t care if “everyone is doing it” or if you’ll “look like a right eejit” if you don’t do it.  Get dressed before you leave the house in the morning.  The only time it’s ok for people to go out in their pyjamas in a medical emergency.

I know, you’re forced to go to school, and to visit elderly relatives, and what have you.  But you don’t have to worry about the mortgage, or whether the children are eating right, or if your spouse is having an affair. You’re fine.  Get dressed.  I recently saw a girl in Centra in not only her pyjamas, but a fecking fleece dressing gown as well.  Words fail me.

Teenage boys, there’s only one thing I need to say to you.  Pull your bloody pants up.  Nobody wants to see your underpants. There is absolutely no advantage to you, or to the rest of us.  Pull them up, I’m serious.  This has to be the worst trend ever, in the history of the world.   And your arses must be numb.Have some sense, please.

I know that you think the world revolves around you.  But it really doesn’t.  We’re not relying on you to change the world, or to change the future of music.  Relax.  If you feel angry, do it quietly. There’s no need to share with all of us.

Just chill out. And pull your pants up.  Or I’ll start sneaking up behind you and giving you all the wedgies of your lives.

Yours with elderly affection