Recently, Agenda 360 made headlines through a grant they were awarded. Agenda 360 has a mission to “transform Cincinnati USA, by the year 2020, into a leading metropolitan region for talent, jobs and economic opportunity for all who call our region home.” I can’t believe they have given themselves ten years, by then, I may have moved elsewhere. Anyhow, their recent grant was won for the purpose of, amongst other job and living creations and additions, to “add 150,000 20-34 yr olds to the workforce.”
Next, I am researching a few volunteer opportunities, for myself and family and stumble across Give Back Cincinnati, whose mission is to enhance our communities through engaging young volunteers and developing leaders by providing unique community engagement opportunities. Give Back Cincinnati is designed to attract members ages 18-35 that live and/or work in the Cincinnati and surrounding communities.
My point here is that while I live in the suburbs, in a few years time, I want to live and work downtown. But somehow we don’t figure into too many plans to do so. My husband and I are part of the U Generation. We have resigned from our membership in the Me Generation, Generation X and Gen Y. Based on the year I was born, I lost out on the opportunity to be a part of the baby boomer generation, for which I am grateful to my parents for holding off on sex for a while. That I would be considered a “baby boomer” when I am fifty is really abhorrent. And I never felt like a part of the Generation X either, as they were considered the “slackers.” Ask my kids. Our household motto is “no slacking.” This may have originated from my Army father, or my willingness to work at McDonald’s in my youth where I was taught, you got time to lean, you got time to clean.” Finally, we are not Generation Y or Next or Echo Boomers or Millennium babies. Just know that we are not.
Generation U encompasses three major points: The first was brought to my attention by a Ralph Smith, when quoting Psychology Today, wrote about federal employees who took retirement and then were hired back. He was not supportive of this policy, but made a point in calling them Generation U for unretired. In this current economic climate, we find that not so startling. But unretired is also part of our plan by the time we hit 50. To be considered unretired would be the utmost complement. My father was forced into retirement from the family business, but he went on to work in real estate and for 20 years has been the chairman for the local housing authority. We did that generation (the greatest) a disservice by calling their post-children lives “retirement”. They, and others in our grandparenting family trees, did anything but.
The second point is that Generation U is an about face from the Me Generation. We find fulfillment in serving others, alongside of serving ourselves. We intend to rise above racism, class warfare and the age gap to reach out into other areas in need. That reaching out to helps prop up ourselves as well. We do this with a clear conscience of having raised conscientious children (we hope) and no longer having to be home for when the boyfriend comes to visit or the kid needs a ride to basketball.
And finally, we are the U because we will be in position to want more from our communities demanding they take on a more urban nature. Sidewalks, locally owned businesses, a mixed-income level neighborhoods. Such surroundings our parents founded or grew up with, such environments we eschewed. We wanted new, shiny, bright, big backyards. Some wanted to buy toilet paper in bulk. According to Bill McKibben, “Parasociologists followed shoppers first through the supermarket, then through the farmers' market…When they followed people around the farmers' market, they were having, on average, 10 times as many conversations per visit.” I have always adhered to my civic duty by not shopping at Sam’s. Those settings never created for me a feeling of home and connection. We had to host Euchre parties to do that, and even then, we still would not have known our neighbors anymore than we would have known the cards in their hand.
Moving downtown after living in the suburbs will, for both of us, be a lot like our second marriage. We are older, wiser and bring to the atmosphere a new set of experiences. We will risk more, and share more. Our love is deeper, stronger and our connection to whatever will call home will be passionate because we understand how fleeting life is. We will be looking to downsize, downtown, where neighbors are shopkeepers, and business owners are friends.
Perhaps the number of Generation U hoping/choosing to relocate to the urban core is relatively small. But recently, after a night of drinking and dancing with our close friends, we had them nearly convinced. What if there were more parties and organizations that hosted events designed to attract Generation U (us)? Softening up the hardliners that hold fast to their fences with a little booze just might get Generation U to see that life does not end at the turnaround of the "U", there is a whole upside to explore.
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