TORONTO – A recent housing survey suggests that the uptick in melancholy exhibited by the millennial generation is the result of realizing that they will never be able to yell at children on the lawn of their own home.
“It’s disheartening that so many people’s aspirations are crushed by the reality of the situation,” said Sandra Wilks, an economist at the University of Toronto. “All their lives people look forward to walking by their living room window, looking out and becoming engulfed with uncontrollable rage at the sight of the neighbourhood children laughing and playing on their property.”
Joey Brown, a 36-year-old East Side Mario’s manager, had definite, turf-based plans for his future: “My wife and I used to lie awake talking about how great it would be to sit in rocking chairs on the front porch grumbling and waving our fists at the kids who would step foot on our lawn. I even thought about buying a rifle, but that dream is over.”
Some boomers, capitalizing on the generational despair, have started renting out the front lawns of their second homes so that millennials can experience what it’s like to yell at children for themselves. Angry apartment-renting millennials are calling this a cash grab, and lamenting that these boomers are so caught up in being lawnlords that they don’t even take the time to stop and threaten the children who are smelling the roses on their own personal front lawns.
Despite the bleak situation, many millennials are seeking solutions. “We had plans to protest in front of Parliament,” Brown said, “but in the end we decided not to give them the satisfaction of telling us to get off their lawn.”
At press time, Brown has recently taken up scolding squirrels in his community garden.
