I figured something out this weekend. Age isn’t about getting old. It’s more about the past getting farther away. It’s about the gap between how old you are, and how old the people around you are. If you are 16 but your friends are 12, then you are old.

This weekend, I was old.

I had volunteered to work a booth promoting a pop culture / science fiction convention I attend later in the summer. Essentially I stood around and tried to notify people at one convention to attend another one.

Conceptually, the two conventions are similar, but demographically the one I was standing at, is much younger a crowd than the one I was promoting.

I am told a generation gap is 7 years. This crowd was 30 years younger, and full of fans of Anime and other cartoon characters I’ve never heard of. It was a whole new universe.

It quickly occurred to me that Star Trek next generation went off the air before some of them were born. They knew who Will Wheaton was because of his role on The Big Bang Theory, and knew nothing of Wesley Chrusher her at all. He’ll be a guest at the Polaris convention.

When I was watching Star Trek, my folks were telling me how much better the original series was. Today, people talk of the new movie with that guy from Heroes that plays Spock.

I don’t feel old, until some kid tells me they’ve never seen star trek.

Today, on my way to lunch, my radio station was playing classic oldies, from the 90s.