Wanderlust, or whatever its opposite is.

A common guilt-tripping thing I hate hearing whenver I come home form a night out is this:

"bakit ang hilig mo lumabas? nung panahon namin, blah blah blah" [Why are you so keen on going out? don't you know that during our time, when I was your age, blah blah blah"]


My usual response to this is a "But you were my age some 30 years ago!", or when being compared to my brother, "that was 10 years ago!" Really, 30 years or 10 years, the level of wanderlust in the youth of today is in far excess of what it used to be. I will concede to the fact that, yes, ten years ago, I don't think it was acceptable for my brother to come home as late as 12mn. And, thirty years ago, I don't even think establishments were open that late! ha ha!

I don't think that the wanderlust of today's youth is indication of anything other than our increased desire to be with our friends. True, this is an anomale, especially considering other advancements in connectivity such as cellular technology, the internet, blah blah blah; but I think that we, more than ever, want to be with each other in person, face to face. I think of it this way: given a choice between phone communication and in-person communication, we are bound to choose the latter, right?


More than that, however, I don't buy this whole interpretation of our desire to go out as a turning-away from our notion of home. So many people today say they miss the days when friday or saturday nights were spent in the living room, watching television or eating a home-cooked dinner on a common dining table. Again, I don't think we've turned our backs on our homes. (of course, i speak from my perspective). In fact, I even question if our wanderlust really is wanderlust. You see, wanderlust means a desire to go away, a desire to travel. I don't think, however, that we want to go away. I just think that in today's age of connectivity and world-at-your-hands-ness, we've expanded our definition of home so much as to include public areas with friends. Gone are the ideas of family simply meaning the nuclear unit of father-mother-children. Family now, whether in a good way or not, includes friends, lovers, colleagues, etc. In going away, we are not really forgetting home and wandering; we are simply going home to a larger community.

Euch. I know, this is a VERY poorly written entry. However, allow me this opportunity to speak out anyway.