Columns

Summer has come and gone, and so has Woodstock's 40th anniversary. Even the music festival that defined a generation now is over-the-hill, although the Ang Lee film "Taking Woodstock" continues to play in theaters.

If Woodstock was the defining moment of the boomer generation, ours is perhaps the moment each of us logged onto the Internet.

Woodstock and rock 'n' roll galvanized a generation, but the Internet allows us to express ourselves independently, each in our own way. It has improved communication but fragmented our generation into a million movements of peace and war, liberal and conservative, up and down. Everyone has a megaphone, and no longer do we get our information from mainstream news sources -- or even counter-culture activists. So many different sources of information exist online. We read sites and watch cable news shows that reflect our own ideals, and when we have something to say we blog it, tweet it, Facebook it or turn to an online forum where everyone else will agree with us.

Technology in general belongs to 20- and 30-somethings. Space. Cell phones. I remember the year my dad gave my mother a microwave for Christmas. Crouched on the floor in her pajamas, wrapping paper and toys strewn around her, my mother relished how luxurious it would be to cook food so quickly. We plugged it in and turned it on.

"Careful," my mother warned my sister and me. "Not too close. The radiation."

It was the early '80s, during the Cold War when Americans feared radiation as an unseen, ever-present threat, like global warming today. Growing up in Florida I could watch a shuttle launch from my backyard. In a blue sky the shuttle resembles a power boat in its dogged pursuit against gravity, a white trail churning behind it. Back then the shuttle seemed to carry with it American invincibility right into space. I was 9 when Challenger exploded. It was as though some small measure of this invincibility was lost, too.

Video games are ours. My first introduction was at my orthodontist's office, where a giant "Pac-Man" machine the size of a foosball table entertained us while we waited to have our braces tightened. Atari came next and then, wonderfully, Nintendo and "Super Mario Brothers" and "The Legend of Zelda." My good friend Michelle developed such blisters on her thumbs playing "Super Mario Bros. 2" that she wrapped them in toilet paper so she could continue playing the game.

We also can claim Cabbage Patch Kids and Care Bears. He-Man, She-Ra, Smirfs, Snorks and Muppet Babies. We had My Little Pony and Gummy Bears. There was "U Can't Touch This" and "Strike a pose." We all agreed "Saved by the Bell" was a terrible show, and we all watched it. Later we had Pearl Jam, Nirvana, flannel shirts and mix tapes. We watched "90210," "My So Called Life" and after "Reality Bites" loved "My Sharona."

We had big hair, big clothes, "Material Girl" and "Where's the beef?" There was Max Headroom, (whatever that was). We can claim Michael Jackson as our Elvis. I learned to moonwalk during PE class. MTV and music videos are ours. Back then new Jackson and Madonna videos were big TV events, premiering on primetime network television.

The environment, the recession and sustainability all belong to us. We can claim 9-11 and Islamic terrorism as things that will shape our generation. We've been called "The Obama Generation." We used to have Barbie. "We girls can do anything, like Barbie." Now we have Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin.

I'm still trying to figure out what that means.