Hey Punks, It's Over!
Sam Sykes ~ 03/18/2025
Face tattoos are a bad idea if you plan on living a nice, long life. They are not for young men and women looking to settle down somewhere in the Midwest with a white picket fence and a chicken coop. Being young is mostly about damage control. Partying and waking up in parts unknown is (probably) a necessary part of growing up… The keywords are “growing up”. Huge fuck ups at 20 years old are recoverable, but as someone ages, bad behavior becomes a lot less cute and a lot more pathetic.
It’s weird seeing the cool people I grew up watching grow old and lame with time. They haven’t grown old in the traditional sense where they are a little grayer and tamer than their glory year, that’s perfectly acceptable. What is not, is when a 50-year-old dude is wearing a flat-brim cap and a Tapout T-shirt. Dressing like you have respect for yourself and society is at an all-time low. For the Gen Xers not stuck in the 90s, the faux pas reaches new levels of horrendous. Graphic Ts are not for middle-aged men with young children. Nobody cares what bands you like, what shirt you found funny on the boardwalk, and especially not what Marvel superhero you like. The only thing gayer than a Captain America shirt is a superhero tattoo. The lame ink is a great way to tell everyone that you’re a pussy.
I’ve written on the subject before, but the absolute takeover of flip-flops, slides, and sandals is depressing. In other Western societies, they do not suffer from the same epidemic that is killing us. I’ll make exemptions for the beach and anything around water, although I am a purist myself. The problem is that all year dudes at the grocery store, dmv, and bar are letting their dogs air out in public. Have you ever been in a fight? If you have, you know that they can break out at any time, anywhere, and for any reason. This is why men need to be laced up and ready to rock in case anything pops off. How about your neighbor unloading something heavy or an old man falling over in a parking lot? Are flip-flops the best footwear for being a helpful member of society?
Music fans always seem to be the weirdest young people of the bunch. I’m not sure when this came to be the norm, but I think it goes back over a century. Young people gathering, sometimes in secret or seclusion to jam out, it’s a cool part of modern culture. To the music scene's credit, I actually appreciate the rebellious and creative culture cultivated through music. That being said, college-aged partiers can only be party-aged for so long before it grows gray and gross.
There are few things sadder than a man clinging to his youth with a deathgrip as it slowly and painfully sifts through his hands like sand. So many self-described “punks” and “rebels” have blown straight past 30 into their 40s and beyond. As their friends grew up and moved on, our friend the punk kept slamming 40 ozs and smoking bowls. The issue is that these guys never stop trying to look cool and express their inner pain. Well here’s the wake-up call, old men aren’t cool and no one gives a shit about your trauma, sack up!
The saying is “Live Fast, Die Young”, not “Live Fast, Die Peacefully In Your Sleep At 88”. The real rebels made good on their vow to fight society and killed themselves via drugs, booze, a bullet, or all three before they got too old to be lame. The leftovers are just pathetic old men who don’t realize, IT’S OVER.
