If you haven't see the video for this new Taylor Swift song, it's at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4xmxb9K8RI on YouTube. I didn't know who Taylor Swift was a short time ago, now I see her in the gossip and entertainment news with increasing frequency.
She broke out on the country music scene two years ago when she was 16. I thought it was Clair Dane when I first saw the Love Story video. Her story is pretty interesting, and I was pleased to find that she writes her own songs.
As I grow older, I keep in mind the infuriating comments of older people I have heard. The comments fall under the category of how stupid young people are, derision about the choices made and the mystifying behavior they display. I had the sense at the time that those comments were being directed at myself and my contemporaries to know that they were wrongheaded, petty in spirit, and lacked insight and understanding. In particular, when whithered old crones with their tiny pursed lips spat distaste and condescension about the music my generation loved, I knew that they had closed their mind to the truth and rejected the best things we loved without opening their heart to knowing and cherishing them with us. I vowed never to fall into their trap, to try to keep my mind and heart open as I aged and try to be one that still remembered and understood the passions of youth.
Listening to Tayor Swift's Love Story reminds me of that vow and makes me realize something else about the age divide. There are things that young people know better than their elders. Passion is a product of youth, something you can forget as you get older. Now that's not absolute, it's not fair to say that you lose all passion as you age, but your passions shift from music and romance to politics, your job, your church, keeping your house nice, and raising your children, among other things.
When you are young, you are really good at romance. I say this even though I remember my own and other's awkwardness, whether by shyness on one extreme or embarrassing yourself on the other extreme. It's true, you may not be as smooth and polished when you are young, the words you come up with may not be worthy of publishing to inspire others, but you are an expert at one thing. When you're young, you open yourself to your loves and throw yourself into them with abandon.
I can rationalize this and say that young people have never been hurt or humiliated yet, and that allows them to leap without reservations. That's true in many circumstances, but not always. Not to get too technical, but scientist have also found that your brain does not easily produce some of the chemicals that it did in youth. I can't find the reference, but it talked about how children love gifts, but older people rarely get as excited about receiving presents when they get older. I've noticed this in myself.
So I think it's fair to say that you lose something as you get older, something besides just innocence. You lose some of the capacity to appreciate the sweeter things in life.
When I see how someone young is finding their passions in life, whether they are creative or romantic, I can't help but get a little wistful. I don't think it's over when you get older, I think this is what the young have to teach the older people, to remember the excitement of discovering the things in life that thrill you. One thrill I know is just seeing that love catch fire for the first time in someone young.
Inexperience is a great thing.
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