I'm an Adult and I Blame the Jonas Brothers

So, last night as I'm watching TV, getting ready for Grey's Anatomy, it occurred to me that I'm getting old. It was one of those horrible, sudden realizations that stops you cold for just a second. Ok, so I am approaching my mid-thirties and it's not that old but you have to understand, until recently, I still sort of counted myself on the side of the young 'uns and not of the grown-ups.

I think it's time to admit I'm a grown-up, an adult. Eek. Don't get me wrong, it's not like I've been living like a kid. My bed is a grown up bed, not some princessy, curtain-draped wonder. I cook. I clean. I even occasionally do my own laundry. I act like an adult, I've just never really felt like one.

You might wonder what spurned this revelation. Well, in all honesty, it was those blasted Jonas Brothers. You have to be somewhat familiar with them. They're the hot teen band; you cannot go into Walmart without seeing their stuff displayed by the Hannah Montana merchandise. I think there are three of them, they're Disneyfied boys, prettied up to get the girls screaming and they play that bubblegum rock that makes your teeth feel like it's going to fall out of your head with the sweet teen-ness of it all.

Last night I saw a preview for their movie or whatever it is they're promoting and I thought to myself, "what funny looking little boys" and then it hit me, I called them little boys. My mind flickered to the audience for whom they exist and I realized that I had no connection to this generation, that it had moved on and so had I.

I think this is the first generation with which this has happened. I try to stay pretty current in my music tastes. I'm a die-hard Green Day fan, I love Linkin Park, I love My Chemical Romance, I like some of the songs they used in the Twilight movie. (I'm sad to admit that Stephanie Meyer and I do have similar taste in music and when she lists the songs that on her writing playlist, they're usually very similar to mine). I'm always worried that I'll seem like an old person trying to be young but, in truth, I really don't care. I've always loved music and that will most likely never change.

I will say that even when I was a teen, it's doubtful I would have liked the Jonas Brothers. With my generation, it was New Kids on the Block or, as they're so fondly known, NKOTB. I despised them in high school. I was annoyed at their popiness, their irritating sickly ballads, their clean-cut looks and their horrible choreographed dancing. I was into the hard rock stuff, Bon Jovi, Skid Row, Def Leppard, Cinderella. Well, that was until I suddenly started listening to showtunes and I became a complete an utter nerd but I've already told you about that.

Yet even though I didn't care for NKOTB, I cared enough to tease my friends who did and, deep down, understood why they liked them...yet it still wasn't for me.

With the Jonas Brothers, I realized I didn't even care enough to mock them. They exist but they have nothing to do with me. I wouldn't know if I heard them on the radio, all I'd know is that I was on the wrong station and scan for another one. Even with the craze before that, High School Musical (HSM), I had seen the first stupid movie. It was when I lived alone in L.A. and I had a free preview weekend of the Disney Channel (I only ever had basic, basic, BASIC cable- local channels only with a few odd extras). I thought it looked interesting when they previewed the first HSM. I still like a good musical and I thought "That looked cute."

Bad idea. I thought it was awful. It was a shiny-happy version of high school and not one that I remembered. I knew it was Disney but wow, was it Disney, the dimples, the shiny hair, the happy ending...give me that in a cartoon form, change the characters into monkeys or something and I might like it but not with those insipid kids with their flat-ironed hair and trained-from-birth singing voices.

Yet, you'll notice, I still cared enough to pick on it, to make fun of it. I would never mock the fans of it unless they were over the age of 16 but you get the point, right?

Those Jonas Brothers are just a sign of the times. They're a safe transition from pre-teen to teenagerness. Yet, to me, they're just there. I don't even groan when I see their posters the way I do with the two leads from Twilight because the kids like The Jonas Brothers and let 'em have their music.

(Of course, the Twilight thing might be because every picture I see of Rob Pattinson and Kristen Stewart looks like they've been smoking something they shouldn't have. Seriously, want a visual picture of 'stoned', look at the latest cover of Entertainment Weekly.)

I digress. Again. Anyway, back to the Jonas Brothers. They make me feel old. I do still remember the butterflies that a pre-teen crush can bring.*

(*side note: I already confessed I used to love George Michael. Today, a remake of "Careless Whisper" was on the radio and I still know every word without thinking. Bizarre.)

Yet I don't get the fuss about the Jonas Brothers and I don't care. The kids like 'em. That's all that matters. And by saying 'the kids' I'm separating myself off as an adult.

I suppose it had to happen sometime, I had to come out of the closet and admit I was a grown-up, no matter how many times I watch or read Harry Potter but I just didn't expect it to happen so suddenly and without my knowing it was going to happen.

I suppose it had to happen sometime, right?

Have a great weekend.