Guest Post from Boomer Lit Author Stephen B. Satterwhite

Why a Baby Boomer Writes

I suppose everyone has a book inside of them. I am certain that all authors hear a similar response from their readers, that they were thinking of writing a book as well. The difference between thinking about it and actually doing it is testament to a burning desire inside of writers to share their life experience and their inner soul.

It is so much better than watching television, because we get to use our imagination, to visualize what we are reading. As a member of the baby boomer generation I believe we are just as significant as what has been referred to as the "greatest generation" before us. We stood for human rights for all people, regardless of the color of their skin, their gender, their faith, their ethnicity or their sexual preference.

We marched for peace throughout the world. We invented the incredible electronic pad that I am now writing on. We have developed microscopic surgery. We can keep a one pound premature baby alive. We have been to the bottom of the oceans and to the faraway planet of Mars. We have proudly witnessed the color of the past slave become the President of the United States.

My journey has been a journey of love, a journey to discover the beauty of my fellow man and to find God. This is what has compelled me to write, not that a final act of my life was like switching on a light, but it was the eventual culmination of living through many true stories, both heart breaking and hilarious, that many of us experienced.

It was being born after our fathers and mothers survived a world at war. It was the wholesomeness of the fifties when Superman, The Lone Ranger, and Elvis brought us warmth in the blue fire of our black and white TV's. It was the insane trip to see the USA in our Chevrolet that created our lifelong medical condition of claustrophobia.

Then it became our turn to define ourselves as "The Beatles" gave birth to our generation on "The Ed Sullivan Show". It was the night when we rejected everything, our government, business suits, being clones of our parents, as we tried everything in search of our own lives, a world of experimentation with sex, drugs and rock 'n roll.

Then it was our wake up call to tragedy, the outrage of the those left behind, the burning of our cities, the assassination of the Kennedys, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King and the young men and women we sent to die or to be forever wounded in Vietnam. It was the disgrace and the dishonor of an impeached president and the tearing down of our many institutions we were taught to respect and admire. The United States was imploding.

But it wasn't just us. It was a billion baby boomers around the world who would experience the lunacy of a ridiculous educational system that has yet to adapt, the absurdity of losing our minds to self destructive drugs, losing our grandparents, mothers and fathers to the ravages of lung cancer, heart disease and the sad world of cocktail parties.

It was our own discovery of the time honored traditions of graduations, marriage, having babies and getting jobs, and not one lifetime profession like our fathers, but to adjust to the new world order, of a new career every couple of years, for the rest of our lives. It was the discovery that mom could no longer stay at home and raise the kids. In order to survive we all had to work. Some us didn't survive, as we turned to suicide.

It was the shrinking of the world with the evolution of the Communication Age, where instead of finding out that Hitler gassed the Jews years later, we would now know if a little girl fell off her tricycle in China, ten minutes later. This has been the most profound change in our generation. It has made us all next door neighbors.

Future generations will reap these benefits. No longer will it be acceptable for a madman to run free. We are entering an age of peace that the world has never known, a world of body replacement parts, a world of instant communication and ultimate knowledge at our fingertips, a world where the heavens will be our future frontier, full of drones and flying cars.

I am honored to be part of a group of remarkable people, of heartfelt authors and readers who were part up one of the most incredible generations in the history of the world, our baby boomer generation. We should stand tall and we should stand proud, as each of us prepares to walk into the loving arms of God in our final, most dignified act of all. I will be with you...

About the Author

Stephen B. Satterwhite was one of millions of baby boomers born after World War II. He was raised in upstate New York by his father, who was a successful businessman, and by his mother, who was a clinical psychologist. His book is True Stories from a Baby Boomer.

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