I recently put myself in a position I avoid like presidential politics: asking my 22-year-old son for help with technology.
This is not a healthy arrangement.
While I make do with the technology I need on a daily basis, he holds the golden key to obscure podcasts, Spotify gone awry and watching TV without paying for it.
And he knows it.
In this case, I not only determined to witness every sequin of the Academy Awards and the Red Carpet pre-show without benefit of cable, I also braved to invite a dozen movie-buff friends to come over and watch with me in our electricity-challenged basement.
This added hostess anxiety to the existing tech anxiety, which, to my credit, I tried to set up early in the day all by myself: I would simply stream off my friend’s cable like my other son taught me to do the last time I watched TV, when the New Orleans Saints were in the playoffs.
Only: “Not this time,” said the cable guy. “Can’t stream local channels.”
Awaken the self-satisfied millennial.
“I don’t know why this always has to make you so anxious,” he says in response to my plaintive cries from the dungeon, his jaw clenching before I even ask him to hold the antenna above his head for access.
“Look,” I say, borrowing a line from Barack Obama and now, Elizabeth Warren. “You grew up with this, and I didn’t.” I continue weakly, slipping into that sing-song voice parents use when they know all they’ve got are the same tired old metaphors.
“Consider how you’d feel if you suddenly had to give birth.”
“Uh, Mom, what?” he retorts, biting off the “t” like Hannibal Lecter.
“Ok then. What if you’d never driven a car before and suddenly there was some emergency and somebody gave you the keys to the car and said, ‘Figure it out. I gotta go.’ ”
“Actually, I do have to go,” he says, continuing to fiddle with the $29.99 antenna that might as well be a dinner plate for all it has to offer.
“See? That’s the other problem. You are going to half-help me get started with some useless piece of equipment I don’t understand, that could go out if too many people stand in front of the window. And then you’re going to leave.”
“All right, Mom, forget the antenna. You can just do a free trial with one of the online streaming services. What are your passwords?”
“Um.”
In the end, he ended up using his passwords since mine were challenged by poor memory recall and the PTSD of trying to find the right one in front of a gotta-go millennial.
In the end, he not only procured what appeared to be reliable access, I asked him to show me exactly what he did to get there, which turned out to be an especially forward-thinking move on my account.
Not only did the TV go out while Ryan was interviewing Charlize, but the whole basement went black, right about the time I plugged in the crock pot full of mulled wine and just as guests were arriving.
If ignoramus mom hadn’t asked for a play-by-play tutorial, if I hadn’t known to click on that little plus sign on the laptop screen attached to the TV and that the pre-show red carpet icon was different than the Oscar icon, we would have been snarfing up hummus next to a black screen instead of watching Brad Pitt poke fun at 2020 presidential impeachment proceedings.
As it was, I got everything back on before Ryan interviewed Charlize and while all my guests were busy filling out their Oscar ballots.
Nobody seemed to notice either my angst, or the herky-jerky start of the evening.
Nor did they note the determined bear hug Benjie gave me upon his return from his outing.
Which constituted the performance of the night.
There it was, never to be taken back.
I felt it.
He felt it.
Millennial-to-boomer empathy.
It must have been the birth metaphor. I think it finally got to him.
Journalist Debra-Lynn B. Hook of Kent, has been writing about family life since 1988 when she was pregnant with the first of her three children. E-mails are welcome at [email protected].
Commentary: The first Democratic debate, night two