Today, I went to my son’s soccer game while the boys congregated and kicked the ball around.  I overheard one of their exchanges. Okay, I was eavesdropping.

“Did you see McCain give that speech?”

“Yeah, I did”.

The first boy shook his head somberly, “Well, he gave a bad speech.”

The other agreed, “Totally a bad speecher.”

“Plus, did you notice,” the boy continued, “that his group is 92% Caucasian?”

I didn’t hear the rest, but I know that these kids are emblematic of their generation.  They feel a great weight on their shoulders.  War, environment, economy and a deep sense of inequality color their view.  At 10 years old, they know these are already their problems.  Unlike my generation or the ones before them, it’s normal for these boys to talk politics before soccer.  So I got a peek into the thinking of the emerging generation and I’m both sad and inspired by my view.  I know that in their lifetimes, they will see our abundant, consumerist way of life end.  Change to something else.

I haven’t figured out what they’ll call these kids as a group.  I’m Gen X; I know Gen Y.

These are Generation P - for Peak.

Peak oil.  A couple days ago, I interviewed a leading expert on peak oil.  Our conversation changed my understanding of what it will mean for these kids and all of us.  Link TV asked me to come in and interview Richard Heinberg, author of “Peak Everything” along with the director of the 2003 film, “End of Suburbia“.  It was like a one-two punch on my brain.     You see, I thought that peak oil was mostly about running out of oil to drive cars and trucks.  So, I held a fuzzy idea that hybrids and solar would fill the gap. Here’ the must watch film:

Oh, how wrong I was.  I thought Americans could invent our way out of this mess, but we can’t.  A combinaton of nuclear, wind, solar, natural gas and coal won’t be enough.  Because fundamentally Americans consume too much.  So, Heinberg helped me to understand that peak oil will be the virtual end of globalization based on oil guzzling ships and trucks.  That the consumer-based economy won’t be sustainable when energy is no longer affordable and available like before.  McMansions in the outlying areas will be abandoned to the poor.  Food prices will rise and cause more hunger and desparation.  Crazy politicians a la Sara Palin will rise to assure suburbanites desparately trying to hang on to their lifestyle that they can still have it all, if they drill, baby, drill. It won’t be enough.

The 10 year-olds get that on a gut level.  And here’s the scary part.  It’s just getting through to me.  It’s too late to avoid some disasters based on the peak because those who could sat on their hands.  But it’s not too late to determine how communities are going to recast the American Dream.  People will go back to growing their own food and biking around and talking to their neighbors. And millions of other changes. And it will be Generation Peak that must arise to lead us forward.