USEFUL BOOMERS FOR MATERIAL CULTURE

Useful boomers should know things, the sort of things that show a certain level of awareness.

Awareness is useful, so is cleanliness.

Directing that awareness to history is even more useful.

But it can’t be funky history, so let’s start with the basic question:

What Happened? People need to know the right stuff.

But first let’s dispense with the baby boomer tropes.

You know the ones I’m talking about?

The hoarding boomers.

The rich hoarding boomers.

The rich hoarding boomers who won’t retire, die, and go away.

Am I missing anything?

Useful boomers ought to know things that pass from generation to generation, the sort of things that define aspects of the culture they came from.

I’m not using culture as a ‘weeder phrase,’ like ‘cultured boomers’ or ‘yogurt culture.’

Instead, in this case, it’s a time reference for material culture, the stuff used before we all got so smart and digital.

What are some of the benefits of identifying material culture?

Prove You’re Not Stupid

At some point younger people will challenge useful boomers with questions like:

“I’ll bet you don’t know what this is?”

Some smart aleck millennial all pumped up on a video game that uses old stuff as hiding places and obsolete farm equipment as weapons will ask the question.

The top picture is an old washing machine, the lower one a hay rake.

On closer inspection it’s a combo hay rake and bird nest.

You don’t get that in a static museum exhibit.

You don’t get some question asked as if you just fell off the hay wagon, either.

Useful Boomers Should Know Things

This is a picture of a McMinnamins’ urinal?

No, but this is:

The top shot shows a fountain created with old sinks, a fence gate, and in-ground pool pods above ground with a disconnected pump.

It’s created by some stoned hippie, or a farmer remodeling the old homestead.

What’s the bottom pic all about? Material culture run amok in creative plumbing.

If the goal of water flow is avoiding leaks, someone either didn’t get the memo or has supreme confidence in teflon tape.

Since water is essential to life, why not more celebrations of water.

Las Vegas doesn’t get all the fountains.

This one was built off of an old water pump.

See the handle on the top right?

If you’re thinking it hasn’t seen water in a while, you are correct.

How does that feel? Feeling right? It feels good.

The Transparently Useful Boomers

For the sake of true transparency I’ll confess to going off on tangents related to material culture.

It helps that I spent two decades managing museum collections along with regular updates on what things are made of.

Intriguing, right? If the answer is yes:

When you have something made from wood the first question is whether it’s hardwood or softwood.

Made from metal? The first question is ferrous, or non-ferrous. Or, does a magnet stick to it or not?

The best way of keeping track is writing it all down at your work station.

So break out the old Royal and White-Out, crack a cold Fresca, and start looking around.

Useful boomers like lists.

Start cataloguing the material culture surrounding you.

You may deny this, but the stuff in your life is the story you’re leaving behind.

Why not make it a better story starting today?

If you wait too long someone else will tell your story, beginning with the same words you said while sorting through your parents stuff:

“Why, just why? Wtf, why?”