On Saturday I woke up much later than anticipated and immediately felt a churning of my nerves as I realized the new and improved, casual me had slipped out during the night. Dang it! On the docket for the day was a birthday tea with my bestie (scheduled at noon) but also a few tasks that I’d allowed to linger a little longer than old and not-improved me would be comfortable with. Among those few tasks were finding a birthday card for said friend, wrapping a totally unwrappable gift, writing this blog, and hitting “go” on bills that I typically would have had done 24 hours earlier.
Instead of strolling casually into this Saturday morning, I was reaching panic level quickly as my long slumber left me with just thirty minutes to…what?!?!? Which of the above was I going to get done before I was needed in the car?
I quickly ran to the bow-maker and handed both my creation and the gift over to my husband before dashing upstairs, coffee in hand, to slap on some eyeliner and a cute outfit. As I was making the drive to pick up the birthday girl, all I kept thinking was, “How do those dang Millenials pull this off time and time again??”
I’ve learned a lot about Millennials and their approach to life over the last six months. So much that I’ve made a valiant attempt to lean into their gameplan but, clearly, that gameplan vexed me on this fine day.
Millennials? I’d like to formally request a moniker change to this age group. Millennials? Might we call them Generation W…as in the generation that just…Wings It?
Today, Monday, I am visiting James Madison University as we attend our youngest’s college orientation. It is, in fact, the first time we’ve set foot on this campus (yes, all of us, including our son). We are here today winging it as a group as we pray that our son’s laissez-faire approach to choosing a college is on target.
Winging It has long been the preferred mode among my children. I just didn’t know that this approach wasn’t limited to those living under my roof. I didn’t know that this approach was quite the norm among their peers and, really, why wouldn’t it be? A more structured, schedule approach would just cause stress, after all, and what fun is that? Because we now have two baby adults in our home, we have taken a few steps back as parents knowing that natural consequences would offer real-time life lessons while the safety net was still within arm’s reach.
I have been surprised both at how few natural consequences ever bubbled and how infrequently that safety net was actually needed. Maybe Generation W was onto something?
We started the summer by sending both kids thousands of miles away in different directions. One was off to a five-week seminar in Greece while the other was off for a post-graduation jaunt to California. Neither had tracked down a usable suitcase until their respective flight check-in (yes, the flight check-in that occurs just 24 hours before wheels up). If I had been joining them, I’d have started packing back in April which is also when I’d have started nagging them to get organized. Instead, this time, I stood by and waited for those natural consequences to reveal themselves.
Turns out, there was none, and off they went with nary a worry.
Going back a little further, to graduation season, well…you can read more about that here, but the summary is that I’d delegated quite a few things to our Class of 2024 participant, none of which ever got done.
The most important natural consequence to bubble up during those weeks was a new and improved attitude (mine) of “Welp, if it’s not important to the kid, it’s not important to me.”
Okay, that new attitude didn’t appear immediately. First, we did a round of me delegating to my child and then delegating follow-up to my husband, and then we did a round of me nagging my husband to nag my child and then we did a round of me nagging my husband because he wasn’t nagging our child the same way I would and, well, are you with me, ladies?
New and improved me discovered the joy of having parked the parental helicopter. Maybe Generation W was onto something. Could it be that, instead of bristling each time one of my children told me they’d “Get to it…,” I should have been taking notes?
Sure, I learned, on Saturday, that my Winging It skills weren’t nearly ready to be launched full-time as I sprinted to the birthday finish line flustered and well into a third hot flash. And, of course, I’ll never admit to my children that I’m testing these Winging It Waters. I most certainly will never let them see the beads of sweat forming on my worried brow as my Type-A side signals those nerves to start churning. And, I will likely keep that safety net tucked in a closet for the foreseeable future.
Will it all work out in the end?
I certainly hope so…I’m just winging it until I find out.
On Whine & Wine this month, we brought back our favorite Millennial Generation W as a follow-up to our previous Ask a Gen Z episode. For this podcast, our guest was to bring a list of questions for us…the Gen X’ers she’d be asking them. In what should have been not a surprise at all, the podcast started with an “Oh, no, I didn’t bring any questions…I thought I’d just wing it.”
Of course, you did.
Still, it did work out in the end.
Haven’t listened?