Core memory unlocked

Gen X is built different.

20-year-olds feel like they're invincible. Free of the shackles of their parent's rules and setting off into the world on their own, it's tough to fight the god complex that comes with your 20s. You're young, you're healthy, and you've got your whole life ahead of you! But guess what, your mid-life crisis is just around the corner…

Having kids changes everything in your life. The gravity of raising a tiny human from birth alters a parent's brain chemistry, changes their priorities, and enriches their life in every way–but what if you're not ready for all of that until you're older?

Nostalgia can strike at any moment, but for a Gen X dude who hasn't seen kiddos playing outside in decades, the feels hit strongest when he sees a pile of bicycles on a neighborhood lawn.

"When I started sympathizing with the parents in teen movies"

People are strange as it is, and when we grow up and get our own homes and have our own kids in what is effectively our own world in which we can set our own rules things can get very strange indeed. Of course, this “strangeness” ranges from delightully weird takes on common household rules to things that are downright mistreatment of the people who are being forced to follow them.

Shoulda, coulda, woulda…

We all have that one childhood memory that was so funny it turned into a legend. Being a kid is one of the most fun times in life. You wake up in the morning and get to play all day long. It's a time of endless creativity as kids learn how to interact with the world around them and the people in their lives. And, if you've ever interacted with a toddler for more than five minutes, you know that kids get into trouble like it's their job. They're like little whirlwinds of chaos . They find an ope…

Simpler times

Kids are so funny , it's no wonder they're keeping their parents in stitches. Kids just do and say lots of wild things. They're new here, they're still learning, and they don't often have a filter. Therefore, they're often hilarious, just saying and doing things that adults wouldn't dare to utter. These people shared their funniest stories from the children around them, from their own kids, to siblings, to grandkids . Other shared stories from their own childhoods. I think stories involving tod…

Birthday obsessives are the bane of everyone's existence and we all have that one friend who can't stand it when people don't worship them once a year. Some random childhood trauma created the birthday-obsessed adults that we see today and, even though it's just a regular day marked on the regular calendar, folks get a little crazy about the anniversary of their birth. Like Disney adults, birthday obsessives tend to be emotionally immature...

What do you miss most from the days before the internet's glowing screens took up all our time? It turns out that lots of people have things they're nostalgic for! As numerous Twitter users shared , starting with @ThatEricAlper's prompt tweet, people miss everything from getting catalogues in the mail to being harder to get in contact with. I still recall the days of having to travel to a library if I wanted to use a computer. We just didn't have a computer at our house at the time, and cell ph…

The “latchkey generation” will understand these memes all too well.

Some folks are plagued by their childhood trauma for the rest of their lives, while others seek a different approach to the healing process: Revenge. One man on Reddit did what we all wish we had the strength to do and faced his childhood demons head on; in his case, that meant having a long, dragged out conversation with his narcissistic mother.

The best part about being a child is playing imaginary games with your friends, parents, or siblings. One day you're a riotous pirate, the next day you're a princess in a tower, and the day after that, you can be a mermaid on a beach. With your imagination, you can go anywhere and be anything.