A sign?

I was shopping for birthday cards and such today and noticed something that seemed more than a little odd. I generally shop for cards about once a month at various stores. Having a large family means sending a lot of cards. I enjoy sending the cards out and enjoy shopping for them. I know that when that card gets there someone I care about will have a smile.

So there I was looking for birthday and anniversary cards and that is when it hit me. I was looking for the perfect anniversary card for my sister and was having trouble finding one that fit. There seemed to be so few to choose from. In fact, there were very few and most were just old cliches. How many "leaving the seat up" jokes can fit into one store? Too many.

There were, however, a literal flood of wedding cards. Funny wedding cards, insulting wedding cards, serious wedding cards and so on. But there were only about 15 choices for anniversaries. Those were all not even close to good.

Is this a sign of the times? Lots of weddings and not so many anniversaries? Do they not count anymore? What's the deal?

Maybe it is just me, but it seems that celebrating getting married is a big deal, while celebrating staying married is apparently not. Perhaps our elected officials' inability to remain monogamous is part of it, or at least representative of it.

In keeping with the overall theme of this blog, the tendency towards cheating is apparently the only thing politicians are truly bi-partisan about. Both Republicans and Democrats appear to equally have straying eyes and hands. So it is not a liberal-conservative thing. And it is not a party thing. It seems to be an "I don't want to grow up" thing.

All I can figure out is that the baby boomers are reaching the ephemeral mid-life crisis stage. It used to be that when a man reached that point, he got himself a sports car and a sad little hairpiece. Women used to kind of skip right over it and go directly to gracefully aging. Not so much anymore.

Now it seems that both men and women in ever increasing numbers are reaching the whole goofy mid-life crisis thing and going more than a little off the rails. Perhaps that explains the dearth of anniversary cards. After all, if a couple is still together it would force them to acknowledge their age. And heaven knows, we wouldn't want that.

An entire generation seems dedicated to never really growing up. And that means they clutch desperately to the things of youth, including partying and messing around. This does not come without a price. The price is they will wake up one morning and realize they are no longer kids. At that point, I want to be the one selling those sad little hairpieces.

To be fair, there are literally millions of happy couples out there. Sadly, there are not a lot of great anniversary cards for them. I guess they know how good they have it and don't need to be told, but I bet they appreciate it when someone remembers.

So I ask again - is this a sign or just an accident of inventory?