Not That Zelda

 When I opened my email this morning, the title on my New York Times Newsletter read, "The Mysteries of Zelda." 

The original Zelda

I was intrigued. Years ago, I read a biography of Zelda Fitzgerald, a trouble, tragic flapper and wife of F. Scott. Perhaps there was a new book out about her?

Opening the email, I read further. It was about The Legend of Zelda. A video game.

Why is it these days that I feel like Rip Van Winkle? When did I lose touch with modern references?

All this would be a little depressing, except this week I understood a somewhat obscure reference on Facebook. The meme showed a cardboard coffee cup with the number "867" written on it. The gag was, "They called my number, and I called back '5309'." 

One reader apparently had no idea what the meme meant and requested an explanation. I said, "Ask Jenny." 

Hey, if you're too lazy to spend five seconds asking the Google, I have no respect for you. (Hopefully, my readers are savvy enough to get it. If you didn't get it, please don't tell me. Tommy Tutone and I will be too disappointed.)

Anyhow, the point is, while I'm the master of the old and obscure, somewhere along the line, I lost track of modern references. I'm not familiar with much of the music recorded after the 1980s, I haven't seen a new movie release in forever and I never got into video games.

But throw an oddball, antiquated reference at me, and I'm there, baby.

I try, I really do. In my chat group at work, when they talk about different bands, I will occasionally go on YouTube and give them a listen, just to get an idea of what's trending. And I listen to the soundtracks under the shows I watch. It's not that I don't like what I hear. It's more like I've been listening to classic rock radio stations for so long, I simply don't know what's going on in the music world. 

Of course, now that the weather is warming up (finally), people oh so generously share their music at full volume, so I get exposed to some music that way. Alas, I don't believe I'll ever get into rap or hip hop. No surprises there.

So, like I said, Rip Van Winkle.

Just to prove I'm not a total Luddite, I googled The Legend of Zelda (the video game) and discovered it was named for Zelda Fitzgerald.

Maybe there's hope for me yet.

Photo attribution: public domain