A matter of grave import

Gravestones are starting to disturb me.

Not real gravestones mind you, but those of the fictional variety. I'm not certain whether that makes the situation better or worse. A few tombstones have cropped on some shows I've watched lately, and what's troubling me about them is the date of birth of the expired characters. Programmes like Buffy and Smallville feature likable characters with whom I still find it relatively easy to identify. Of course they feature people who are invariably cooler, smarter, hipper, stronger and wittier than me (and probably you too), but then isn't that the basis of escapist entertainment? Anyway, because of that identification I naturally expect the date of birth on the tombstone to be around the time of my own birth. Which makes it all the more disturbing when the date is in fact in the mid to late eighties. Children are born in the mid to late eighties. Or at least they should be. Instead it's now young adults who hail from such a time. Adults! When did that happen, from whence did this vast chasm of an age gap appear?

It seems that some part of my brain hasn't yet cottoned on to the fact that I've reached my thirties, and that my teenage years are some way distant. I do feel my responses are mitigated somewhat by the fact that many of the young adults featured in such programmes are considerably older than the characters they play. Sarah Michelle Geller and Tom Welling for example, are both 27, scarcely a stones throw away from my age. I'm not wholly certain that makes things better, but hopefully it makes my tv viewing habits seem a bit less creepy...