Growing up as part of Generation X often meant learning independence the hard way. Kids were expected to figure things out on their own, entertain themselves without constant stimulation, and push through awkward or boring moments that adults treated as normal. Compared with Generation Z, who generally grew up with more supervision and more open conversations about safety and emotions, many Gen X experiences can look harsh in hindsight. A recent rundown highlighted six everyday realities that once felt ordinary but now seem almost unreal.
One of the biggest shocks for younger people is how much communication depended on public payphones. If you needed to reach someone while you were out, you found a phone booth, dug for coins, and hoped the line worked well enough to be understood. If no one answered, you waited and tried again, and sometimes the call was placed as a collect call that the other person had to accept. Phone booths were often grimy, the audio could be terrible, and conversations were usually short because money ran out quickly. The piece notes that this kind of friction was simply part of daily life, and it even points to YourTango when describing how common it was.
Entertainment came with its own built in obstacles, especially when it came to movies. Instead of scrolling through streaming options, Gen X viewers physically rented videocassettes from video stores. Popular titles could be unavailable because the store only had a limited number of copies, and returning a tape late could lead to fees that made a weekend movie feel more expensive than planned. Many tapes had to be rewound before returning, and the tape itself could snag or tangle if it was worn out. For Gen Z, the idea that watching one film required a car ride, a line at the counter, and a fragile piece of plastic sounds like a lot of effort for a simple night in.
Music was another area where patience mattered, because building a personal library took time and timing. Gen X kids often recorded songs from the radio onto cassette tapes, waiting for a favorite track to appear in the broadcast. Hitting record at the right moment was a small skill, and the challenge got bigger when a DJ talked over the intro or the station cut to an ad at the worst possible second. The sound quality was rarely perfect, and the process could stretch on for weeks if you were trying to capture a specific set of songs. What is now a two minute playlist creation was once an ongoing project that rewarded persistence.
Schoolwork also looked very different without instant search results and digital archives. For many Gen X students, research meant flipping through printed encyclopedias, using library books, and copying information by hand. Finding a single fact could involve checking multiple volumes, scanning indexes, and rewriting notes carefully enough to use later. It was slower, but it also trained kids to navigate sources, organize details, and work with what was available rather than what was convenient. When you compare that to the immediate access Gen Z has to information, it is easy to see why the earlier method feels demanding.
Even something as simple as changing what was on television required physical effort. Many Gen X households did not have a remote control for years, so changing channels meant getting up and turning a dial or pressing buttons on the set itself. Channel options were limited, which meant fewer choices and more willingness to watch whatever happened to be on. Today’s content habits are built around instant control, recommendations, and the ability to switch between platforms in seconds. Back then, television asked for patience and made convenience feel like a luxury.
Photography may be the clearest example of how the pace of life has changed. Taking pictures on film meant you did not know how they turned out until the roll was developed, which could take days or even weeks. There was no quick delete, no editing, and no immediate redo if someone blinked or the lighting was off. The article also notes a striking contrast in attitudes, mentioning that nearly half of Gen Z would prefer that social media did not exist, even though they grew up in a digital environment that reshaped how people relate to photos. For Gen X, photos were precious because you could not instantly manufacture the perfect moment.
Looking back, it is tempting to frame these differences as one generation being tougher or another being softer, but the reality is more nuanced. Each generation adapts to the tools and expectations it inherits, and the tools available during childhood shape habits that can last a lifetime. Gen X learned to plan ahead because communication and entertainment took effort, while Gen Z learned to move quickly because information and options are abundant. What feels normal to one group can feel wildly inconvenient to another.
To place all of this in context, it helps to understand how these labels are typically defined in everyday discussions. Generation X usually refers to people born roughly in the mid 1960s through about 1980, while Generation Z commonly refers to those born from the late 1990s into the early 2010s. Gen X childhood overlapped with a largely analog world, with mass market VHS tapes, cassette players, landlines, and print reference books. Gen Z, by contrast, grew up as smartphones, social platforms, and always on internet access became routine. Those different starting points influence not just nostalgia, but also how people approach privacy, attention, patience, and even what they consider basic convenience.
A good way to think about it is that Gen X often had to create access, while Gen Z usually has access by default. When access is scarce, you learn to wait, improvise, and accept imperfect outcomes like fuzzy recordings and bad phone connections. When access is constant, you learn to curate, optimize, and question whether the constant feed is worth the cost to focus and well being. Both sets of skills have value, and both come with tradeoffs that show up in everyday life. Share your thoughts on which of these old school experiences you find most surprising in the comments.
