Y oh Y

Oh, how old I am about to sound, but I don't care, here I go...
And as not to offend, this doesn't apply to all...just to some...

Store 1: Hobby Lobby
So I was perusing darn near every aisle at Hobby Lobby looking for some various this-n-thats to place in my spare bedroom and I was on the phone with Theresa.  During my conversation I found myself getting very irritated b/c 2 workers, probably around the ages of 16-20 were talking so loudly I couldn't hear myself on the phone!  I had to go to another aisle.  So that was fine...had their yelling been work related.  It was not.  Loud talking about a party, talking about a co-worker, talking about the "junk" they were burdened with having to mark down for a sale.  I growled under my breath, told Theresa what jerks they were and went on about my business.  I saw them throwing resin figurines into a cart as I walked off, with absolutely NO care whatsoever, one of them broke something and just chuckled.  I get to the register to encounter another young person, that was ridiculously unfriendly, no smile, no greeting, just doing her miserable time, punching the clock, miffed that I had items that she was actually going to need to wrap in packing paper.  Nice.

Store 2: Target
 I too, was all over Target yesterday looking for bath towels, a new iPhone case, blah blah blah....and 2 girls, same age group as the Hobby Lobby boys were wheeling around a cart of misplaced items to put away.  I heard them talking, and one of them was in training and learning what to do from the other one.  I heard them saying "we are never going to get outta here, so who cares anyway". Then the new girl went to put away a misplaced rug, asking for direction, the other girl said just throw it wherever, noone ever really checks anyway.  Then they went on about their business of talking about a Spanish teacher that was a total "douche", without even trying to be quiet about it in my presence, ya know, me; the customer??  Not sure if they were in college or High School, don't really care, just seeing a pattern here.  The most striking thing was the apathetic way in which they spoke, like they had come straight off The Hills (vomit-gag), every word was drawn out, and every eye roll was pronounced.  Missouri wanna-be valley girls, trying to sound cool, overtexted, over electronicized, and completely unenthused and lackadaisical, dying to get off work and doing a crappy job while they are there.  Super.

Store 3: Sam's Club
I am nuts about Sam's Sweet Golden Pineapples, they are HUGE, so off I go to the produce section to grab some fruit and veggies, a few other asundry grocery items and get outta there!  I pull up to the pineapples, and there is a worker there that greets me, he's restocking my favorite yummies, great!  I start sniffing their bottoms to see which ones are ripe, and a friend walks up to pineapple boy.  Apparently this friend works there too, but is off work and has come to Sam's to bother the friend stocking.  They get into a conversation about going somewhere later that evening, who was going to be there, and why both their last paychecks sucked.  I thought yes, I bet their checks did suck, perhaps no incentive to work any harder, to show a more grand work ethic, naaaahhhh, screw it, let's just hang on the pineapples, shoot the breeze and do my time. 

All of these young kids (oh man, I can't believe I am saying this, I feel old) had one thing in common; apathy.  Welcome to Generation Y.  I suppose, it's great that they have jobs at all.  I think the worst part is when you are seeking one on one customer service and the person waiting on you acts as if you have interrupted their conversation.  I needed a new photo id at Sam's a few weeks back, and you would have thought I was a leper the way these young girls looked at me for interrupting their NON-work related conversation.  I found it interesting as they were typing in my info and clicking my picture, they were still carrying on their conversation, as if I wasn't even there.  I just stood there incredulous, the audacity, and the sheer rudeness, has noone ever taught them any better?  Obviously, the answer to that is no.  Or how about going to a restaurant and just honestly asking your waiter or waitress for a refill?  Is that too much to ask when you see them flirting with their co-worker two tables away from yours.  How dare you want more Diet Coke!  Or what about the checker that hasn't gotten to take her break yet or do a shift change, and makes you feel guilty for getting in her line.  That's always fun.
 I know I sound like a geriatric fuddy-duddy and I know I sound like I just hopped off the pissy train, but I get so tired of seeing first-hand the ridiculous sense of entitlement, lack of work ethic, respect, and acknowledgement, some kids/teens/young adults possess.  There are common courtesies, manners, greetings that you just assume are universal, but apparently those things are falling by the wayside to the real problem, self-absorbedness.  Sadly, these sassy young 'uns, usually have parents that have enabled their selfish behavior.  --It's all about the child's convenience, their agenda, their wants, needs and caudled feelings superceed anyone and anything else.  Some parents are raising insensitive kids because they are so overly-sensitive in child rearing, and the children cannot begin to understand anything that doesn't revolve around them, pertain to them, or benefit them in some way.  Some children in the formative years are allowed to treat their parents like butlers, maids, peers, piggy banks, servants, and mainly like dirt, and it's often times too much work for a parent (plain 'ol lazy parenting) to correct or instruct, so the kids turn into little narcissistic monsters...monsters that eventually make their spoiled little ways into the work force...  at Target, Hobby Lobby and Sam's.  I found this excerpt in an article I was reading about Generation Y:

"Generation Y is much less likely to respond to the traditional command-and-control type of management still popular in much of today's workforce," says Jordan Kaplan, an associate managerial science professor at Long Island University-Brooklyn in New York. "They've grown up questioning their parents, and now they're questioning their employers. They don't know how to shut up, that's aggravating to the 50-year-old manager who says, 'Do it and do it now.' "

"The millennium generation has been brought up in the most child-centered generation ever. They've been programmed and nurtured," says Cathy O'Neill, senior vice president at career management company Lee Hecht Harrison in Woodcliff Lake, N.J. "Their expectations are different. The millennial expects to be stroked and told how they're doing."


Matt Berkley, 24, a writer at St. Louis Small Business Monthly, says many of his generation have traveled and had many enriching experiences, so they may clash with older generations they see as competition or not as skilled. "We're surprised we have to work for our money. We want the corner office right away," he says. "It seems like our parents just groomed us. Anything is possible. We had karate class, soccer practice, everything. But they deprived us of social skills. They don't treat older employees as well as they should."

I also found it interesting that Generation Y is considered to be kids born between 1977-2002.  Technically, I am generation Y (just barely, I was born in January of '77)?  Ha - nope, not me.  I cannot relate.  I know most of my generation has seen our parents work, work, work, and lost the quality of family life that so many of us all craved, but there must be some sort of balance.  Things have so flipped.  Now we may have an upcoming generation that may not be able to make it into work at all because their mommy called in for them!  We live in such an amazing technologically advanced age, that you just pray we don't lose our humanity in the process.  I love my iPhone (and hopefully iPad soon-hehe), email and Facebook, but pray for our upcoming generation.  I have no answers, only a short list of complaints, and the desire to understand why things are they way they are.  It's really sort of fascinating from a sociological aspect, and then really can be aggravating at times.  I did find it ironic, that in going to just 3 stores in the same day, they all shared such a common thread of Generation Y workers.  Interesting and eye-opening for sure.