It does.
Maybe, as a generation, we know that true sophistication isn't something you can buy. So why spend your money on it? I've never ordered a round of gimlets but, at a Hollywood bar, I've ordered s'mores for everyone at my table. It came like the fondu of yesteryear, with a Sterno flame surrounded by bits of chocolate, M&Ms, and graham crackers. Wooden sticks like long chopsticks were provided to roast the marshmallows on.
At a restaurant in West Hollywood, my meal of linguini and muscles ended with a complimentary bowl of penny gum balls being brought to the table. As an adult, I know I can go to a store and buy my own gum balls. But I still got a thrill when my childhood wish of being able to just reach into a gum ball machine and grab all I wanted was finally realized. I picked out the red ones first, until I had enough to blow a bubble.
Since moving to LA, I've been to two all-adult parties at Chuck E. Cheese (they serve beer and we couldn't be bothered to drive all the way to Dave & Busters) and two birthdays with a Spider-Man bounce house. My own birthdays have been celebrated by going roller skating at a rink in Glendale. I've been in Los Angeles too long to be sure if juvenile adults are nationwide or just here; in a town where women get braces and, in August, men start discussing what they're going to be for Halloween.
Maybe this is just proportional to our growing life-expectancy. If I'm going to live a century it's okay to still read comic books and go out to dinner in a t-shirt. Perhaps this just happens to every generation as they get their youth repackaged and sold back to them. That's why diners emulate the nineteen-fifties and ice cream shops got stuck in the teens.
Or, it's that we've put off having kids and our culture wasn't designed to continue advancing. At this age, we're supposed to be surrounded by snack food and action figures but with no kids around we just keep them for ourselves. In the mid-1990s I read an article in my hometown paper, "How To Recognize A Child Predator in Your Neighborhood." The signs it said to look for was a male, still single in his adult years, who keeps, in his home, kid's movies and video games.
I hope that's not the profile they still go by, or almost every guy I know will be under suspicion.
