The New Yorker:

Adulthood might be less monolithic than it seems.

By Joshua Rothman

Late this past summer, I was at the convenience store with my son, buying ice cream, when a Tesla Cybertruck pulled into the lot. Peter is six, and fascinated by Cybertrucks; hushed with awe, he walked closer, peering out from beneath his bike helmet. Angular and metallic, the Cybertruck loomed in its parking space like a meteor fallen to earth, or a Transformer waiting to transform. Peter said, “Whoa,” and the truck’s middle-aged driver, wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap, rolled down his window and offered a thumbs-up in return. They grinned, like-minded across the decades.

Later that day, we biked to the marina near our house, to test our new remote-controlled boat. We’d burned out the motor on our old one, and I’d sprung for an upgraded model, which turned out to be two feet long, with a top speed of thirty miles an hour. As we installed the battery, configured the controller, and then descended the boat ramp, a small group of gray-haired men milled around on the dock. They stayed to watch as our boat zoomed to and fro. When Peter successfully raced it between two tightly spaced pilings, they applauded. “Sweet boat,” one of them said, as he walked to the berth where his big version was moored.

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