august 10 rrn

A few days ago I wrote a post about teenaged me within the larger context of it being my oldest brother's birthday and, moreover, how that brother hired me and another of our brothers (there are four of us) to work at the CN Tower during our summers away from school. That trip down memory lane was pleasant, and I spent the weekend thinking about old times because it was exciting to be young when I was young. When I talk to younger people now —— friends and family members in their 20s; 20-something service and retail workers at places I frequent; and friends' kids who are in their teens —— they don't seem as excited. They seem more burdened, more tentative, and less sure of themselves, and because I'm not stupid I know why and am not particularly surprised because the youths got a raw deal. They grew up online when online turned from bad to worse to performing reality for the algorithmic panopticon, and then they got a pandemic dropped on their heads. A close friend of mine is in his…