When I'm 64... I'll be cooler than my children

The Quizzo crew and I were pondering this today: how did our parents become cooler than us? How did these people whose mere presence used to send us shuddering and whose every comments were just another thing we were going to have to tell our therapists about, start leading cooler lives than us?

We all thought that our parents lives' rose and fell with our own, but guess what? They never did. They have hit the peak of the mountain. They're empty nesters, and empty nesters are like two silly kids in love but with one big difference. THEY HAVE MEANS.

Stick with me on this: you go through your teenage years, all angsty and acne-filled, but you have a lot of freaking freedom and very few real world responsibilities. Then you have your quarter-life crisis, where you try to find a job/career you like and meet someone you don't hate. You two get married, have kids, raise them, and then one day you realize you haven't bought a new shirt in five years because your kids have sucked you dry. That's okay though, because one kid is driving and the other one just got Bar Mitzvah-ed, and you slowly are able to start to focus on yourself for the first time in 15 years.

Then, one kid goes off to college. Sure, tuition payments are siphoning money off and the kid keeps telling you she needs "books" and "food," but hey, education means the possibility that she could one day be employable. The other kid's at home, but he's in high school and so the exchange of car keys becomes the only daily interaction you and your spouse have with him. That's fine, though, because you haven't had a this many nights to yourself since Carter was in office.

Then, something magical happens. One kid graduates and gets a job! And the other one is in school but the tuition payments aren't that bad because now you're only supporting three people instead of four, and even that is temporary. You realize you're married to a person you still don't hate and you have real world responsibilities, but you also have a fair amount of money because your empty nest years tend to coincide with your super-gainfully employed years.

So you decide you can travel more, you buy hybrid cars on a whim, you go to U2 concerts, all the while your own children, who are now employed but are suffering through their own quarter-life crises, wonder why their parents (now in their 50s or 60s) appear to have a much more satisfying and exciting social life than they do (in their 20s).

55 is the new 25, you heard it here first.