Like my own mother Betty, Mad Men’s Betty  Draper woke one morning in the late 1960s to the realization she was a square. In a world firmly divided into the “under 30s” and “over 30s” she was no longer part of the “ in” crowd . Isolated at home, the age of Aquarius was dawning but not for her.

Sometimes, she felt as old and out of step as her Victorian House in Rye, N.Y. left behind in a changing world.

Despite her being an anthropology major at Bryn Mawr, this crazy new-counter culture was as confusing to Betty as if they were natives of Samoa.

Things were moving way too fast for this suburban housewife. The much ballyhooed “Generation Gap” had landed firmly in her own home in Westchester.

Generation Gap

Everything was now a battle with her teenage daughter Sally.

Even the simple act of packing her daughters school lunch turned into a battle royale. Wrapping Sally’s sandwich in Saran Wrap, something Betty had done for years ever since this miracle product replaced old-fashioned wax paper, elicited the evil eye from Sally with the same disgust as if Betty were personally napalming a village in Vietnam.

Betty merely rolled her eyes. Sally’s dad Don would drool to land Dow ( the makers of saran wrap and Napalm) as an account, Betty thought to herself, napalm or no napalm!

Tuning in to The Now Generation

One morning as Betty finished her third cup of coffee and nibbled on her second piece of Sara Lee Coffee Crumb Cake, she  picked up a copy of the March 1968 issue of McCall’s hoping to find a hurry-up-recipe for Henry’s favorite dish, Turkey Diva. It wasn’t long before her eye caught the “Under 21 Column” which offered up a Quiz “for parents who want to be modern” to find out how “tuned in” you were to the Now Generation?

 “Do You know the Lovin’ Spoonful from a heapin’ spoonful?”  the headline asked “How ‘in’ are you?”

“It’s a long, long way from the campus to Main Street, from Greenwich Village to Greenwich Connecticut and from  junior to senior.” the article by Sylvie Reice began. “As one sardonic Jr put it”: ‘Like father, like son-like hell.’”

“But time, in its way rushes to fill any gap. Though the generations are still light years apart, the culture of the young is daily making its way into the lives of every one of us. “

“Many of its mores and idols, its language and activities have been taken up by the elders. And properly so. For if we expect the young to learn from us, whats wrong with learning something from them every now and again?”

“In that spirit then, here are 40 multiple choice questions ranging from the obvious to the obscure.”

“Take the quiz,”  the copy teased, “and find out just how swinging you are. If you score over 30 congratulations you talk under 30 language! If you range from 20 to 30 you’re making noble efforts to stay in touch: 10 to 20, you’re obviously only half interested in the other half.”

“And 10 and under- well maybe its time to get tuned in to the now generation.”

Betty buckled down to take the quiz and find out just how swinging she was.

And please feel free to take the quiz along with Betty.

1. SDS Is…

a) a new drug teens are using

b) a leftish student organization

c)a government anti poverty program

2. RAVI SHANKAR IS….

a) a new Israeli starlet

b) an “in” Indian musician

c)  a teen baseball idol

3. TWIGGIES ARE…

a) pipe-thin legs

b) painted on bottom eye lashes

c) girls who look like twiggy

4. ELECTRIC ROCK IS…

a) a famous landmark in San Francisco

b) amplified rock n roll

c) a teen night club in Greenwich village

5. QUANT IS…

a) a short bang hairdo

b) an English fashion designer

c) a cinchy college course

6. MOD MEANS….

a) modern in teen slanguage

b) an English Hoodlum

c) a style of British fashion

7. SLICKER IS…

a) a marine-type raincoat

b) a paste cover up to keep surfers warm

c) a shiny, natural color lipstick

8. DYLAN IS…

a) a famous Welsh poet

b) an English hairstylist

c) a folk-singing idol

9. THE NEW LEFT IS…

a) an unorganized coalition of student activists

b) Red China

c) a rock n roll group

10. CARNABY STREET IS…

a) a comic strip character

b) an English Folk singer

c) a London Street Famed for Fashion

11. SHRIMP IS…

a) the nickname of a famous model

b) another name for LSD

c) a character in “Peanuts”

12. A MICRO SKIRT IS…

a) a special lens for microscopes

b) a very abbreviated skirt

c) a skirt made of fiber glass

13. A SITAR IS….

a) a new type of motorbike

b) a Cuban Guitar

c) an Indian lute the Beatles play

14. A LIGHT SHOW IS….

a) a new media mix of photo and light images

b) an exhibit of art employing moving lights

c) an entertainment featuring “light” music

15. HAIGHT ASHBURY IS…

a) an avante garde English photographer

b) a hippie community

a) college protest slogan

16. DuBOIS CLUBS ARE…

a) a chain of teen nightclubs

b) Communist oriented campus clubs

c) a weight watchers club for young people

17. ACID MEANS….

a) Associated Campus Independent Democrats

b) lysergic acid diethylamide

c) folk music with a sardonic message

18.  FRODO IS…

a) a hero in The Hobbits

b) a mystic leader of teens

c) John Lennon’s adorable puppy

19. EAST VILLAGE IS…

a) the Hindu town the Beatles visit

b) the East Coast hippie habitat

c) a home for runaway teens

20. JAMS ARE…

a) sessions where musicians really swing

b) Hawaiian flowered knee-length surfer shorts

c) parties jammed with crashers

21. FREAK OUT MEANS…

a) to have a bad drug experience

b) to fall off a motorcycle

c) to take an individual stance

22.VISTA IS…

a) an anti[poverty project for college students

b) a mind expanding drug

c) a new program for drop-outs

23. THE FREE SPEECH MOVEMENT WAS…

a) a campus revolution at Berkley

b) an anti war college demonstration

c) a demonstration favoring Army Recruiters on Campus

24. LORD OF THE RINGS IS…

a) Ringo Beatle

b) A trilogy by Tolkien

c) A Harvard spoof of Wagner

25. HERMAN HESSE IS…

a) a leader of Herman s Hermits

b) an adorable ski idol

c) the current campus author

26. TRIP IS…

a) a frog like dance

b) a hallucinatory drug experience

c) Teen Representatives International Platform

27. ALLEN GINSBERG IS…

a) a sick comic

b) author of Fiddler on the Roof

c) a poet leader of the hippies

39. COURREGES IS…

a) an expression meaning courage among surfers

b) bouquets given to girls at prom time

c) a French futuristic fashion designer

29. PSYCHEDELIC MEANS…

a) a doctor specializing in addicts

b) a mental state produced by drugs

c) a person who’s lost their mind

30. NSA STANDS FOR…

a) Negro Student Aid

b) National Student Association

c) Nonviolent Student Alumni

31. SURFS UP MEANS….

a) the surfing season is over

b) the tide is in

c) the swells are right for surfing

32. MR SPOCK IS..

a) an antiwar leader

b) a well-known pediatrician

c) the star of TV show Star Treck

33. MARIO SAVIO IS…

a) UCLA quarter back

b) winner of the Metropolitan Opera Auditions

c) a leader of Berkley campus ruckus

34. A GURU IS…

a) a Hindu teacher and mystic

b) a cape young swingers wear

c) a small tambourine

35. SOUL IS…

a) an anti-materialistic campus grouping

b) a kind of rhythm and blues music

c) a style of pop art

36. TURNED ON MEANS….

a) an intensified state of consciousness

b) lost in a musical frenzy

c) really dressed up

37.JOAN BAEZ  IS…

a) a figure skater

b) head of a school for non violence

c) guitar playing folk singer

38. POORBOYS ARE…

a) ribbed, tight-fitting sweaters

b) a hip hugging type of pants

c) a San Francisco rock group

39. TIJUANA BRASS IS…

a) a high-placed official from Tijuana

b) a big band style of music

c) a kind of hardware on belts, shoes etc.

40. GRANNY IS…

a) a nickname for Timothy Leary

b) a floor length informal dress

c) an award for best record of the year

The correct answers:

1. (b: Students for a Democratic Party. 2. (b: Sitar player with whom the Beatles studied ) 3. (b) 4. (b) 5. (b: Mary Quant). 6. (c) 7(c) 8. (c: Bob Dylan 9(a) 10. (c: Carnaby Street).

11. (a: Jean Shrimpton) 12. (b) 13. (c) 14. (a) 15 (b: West Coast home of the hippies) 16. (b) 17. ( Commonly referred to as LSD) 18. (a) 19. (b: Off-shoot of Greenwich Village). 20. (b)

21. (a) 22. (a: Volunteers in Service to America). 23. (a) 24. (b). 25. (c: Author of beloved “Siddhartha”). 26. (b) 27 (c). 28. (c) 29. (b) 30. (b)

31. (c). 32. (c: Real name: Leonard Nimroy.) 33. © 34.(a) 35. (b). 36. (a). 37. (b and c). 38. (a). 39. (b) Made famous by Herb Albert) 40. (b).

How did you do on the test?

Copyright (©) 2013 Sally Edelstein All Rights Reserved

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