anywhereisbetter

Since injuring my foot a couple of weeks ago, I’ve seen more TV than a cabbie sees middle fingers. Stuck on the couch with my leg propped up and draped in ice packs, there’s not much else to do but turn on the ol’ idiot box and hope someone is showing a good rerun of Quincy. During these hours of mind-tenderizing forced complacency, a commercial for the Volkswagon Jetta has managed to burrow its way into my brain. In it, an attractive young couple disturb their downstairs neighbor by listening to loud music while jumping up and down like a couple of monkeys in front of a giant black monolith. When said grumpy neighbor demands that they stop, the attractive couple hop into their Jetta and, with a look of self-satisfied disdain on their faces, head to the store to buy a huge new speaker system. In the next scene, we see them again listening to loud music and jumping around–but what’s this? Zoom out to a “sold” sign in front of the new house that they’ve bought, Jetta in driveway. The tagline reads, “The new Jetta. All grown up. Sort of.”

Perhaps this commercial resonates with me because, as my reentry into the “adult” world draws near, I find myself spending a lot of time thinking about what it means to be “all grown up.” There are so many ways to approach such a question that I don’t even know where to start. What to adults do with their time? Where do they live? How do they live? Do they really eat old people medicine for fuel?

Scratch that last one. That’s robots.

I’ve written before about how certain changes in my life over the past year or so have left me feeling old. On the other hand, being 28 and still in college doesn’t exactly make one feel like a certified grown up either, and the fact that my apartment is primarily decorated with items purchased on a dare doesn’t help. In such an environment, it often feels like being an adult just means having the money to afford more and more extravagant jokes. Sixty dollars for a gag might seem like a lot for the average 18-year-old, but my 29-year-old friend didn’t hesitate to throw down that amount for two cookie cakes reading “Class of 2005 RULEZ!” for our prom party. Irony don’t grow on trees, you know.

That seems to be exactly the point that this Volkswagon ad is trying to make: you don’t need to act like a grown up, as long as you can afford grown up things. More specifically, you don’t need to sacrifice your youthful enthusiasm to own a Jetta. In fact, the Jetta will help you preserve that enthusiasm. Feel young again, buy a Volkswagon!

I’m all for balancing the stability of adulthood with youthful vigor (just look at my apartment), but I’m not sure that buying a Jetta is the way to do it. Has this lifestyle met our ebullient young couple’s ambitions? Maybe; such questions aren’t often raised in 30 seconds designed to sell a car. Nevertheless, I want to know more. Have they given up on their youthful dreams and ideals in exchange for the comfort of a spacious car with heated seats and an all-leather interior? Or have they simply shed their naivety and compromised in a way that allows them to balance these two ways of life? I suppose it’s possible that they haven’t had to make any concessions along the way, but I don’t know many people like that. Most of us seem to be faced with this predicament at one point or another in our lives. Those who escape it are the lucky few.

As I sat on my stoop last night, I saw something that helped me put all of this in perspective. An SUV pulled up in front of the Park Slope Food Coop (a neighborhood institution that practices progressive politics through community ownership while supporting local producers). The door flipped open, and a young, hip looking couple diligently moved their groceries into the back, all while Rage Against the Machine screamed “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me!” over and over through the enormous vehicle’s 9-point surround sound system. When all their organic produce and brown rice had been loaded up, the couple hopped into the car, readjusted the baby seat, and sped off, probably in hopes of catching the tail end of “American Idol.”

Does this seem strange to anyone else? I don’t care if you are 90′s alt-rock listening members of the Coop, you still look like a couple of assholes conquering the rugged terrain of New York City in your Cadillac Escalade. Whatever will you do when you can’t get more of those salmon steaks you love so much because that organic, sustainable salmon farm in Alaska has been shut down in order to drill for more oil to feed your car? Progressive politics don’t stop at the grocery store, you know. Just ask Zach De La Roche.

Maybe I’m just being unrealistic. Maybe a few more years of being back in the “real world” will break me of my ambitions and values, and I’ll decide that buying sweatshop clothing isn’t so bad as long as I’m still voting for Democrats. Maybe after a little taste of financial stability, I’ll more willingly accept my position in the rank-and-file. Maybe a nice apartment and two weeks of paid vacation will help me forget what I used to want out of life.

Maybe. But as Bernstein said in Citizen Kane, it’s no trick to make a lot of money, if all you want to do is make a lot of money. I’ve been there before, and while the financial stability, health insurance, and retirement funds are all very nice, I know that they alone are not enough to make me happy. In fact, the thought of conference calls and team building retreats makes me want to eat broken glass from a garbage strewn alleyway. I know I’m being more than a touch idealistic, but I’m hardly the only one that dreads this kind of existence.

Of course, I could always change my mind. It’s possible. Maybe buying a Jetta would help.