107. Teenage kicks, or is the half better than the whole?

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Have you ever listened to a teenage boy while he is playing in an online console party? If you have not, you should. It is an experience. If you don’t have one, borrow him from a friend who does. It’s hard to know whether the one sided chat you are privy to is better or worse than the complete dialogue. Incompleteness does deprive it of context, which may well be a blessing. Although it’s hard to imagine how the whole could be worse than the part. When listening to it, you marvel at how humans can have changed so much so quickly. What’s happened since you were their age, and eminently normal? And then you remember the Ramones, the punk movement, those steel toed Doc Martens, techno and the oversized shoulder pads… You remember your parents, regarding you with a mix of marvel and aversion, sometimes even helpless bewilderment. Wondering how humans could have possibly changed so quickly since they were teenagers, and eminently normal. Is this the price of maturity? Is it indeed maturity?

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Location: Hereford, UK

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