Is It Our Time Yet?
This essay was originally posted July 23, 2026 to Substack.
Listen, "Sloth love Chunk," and if you don't know what that means, then pull up a chair because this is for everybody.
Sean Astin is a national treasure and I will not be taking comments on this matter.
I once saw John Clayton Mayer deliver this very speech at a concert on a warm July evening in Dallas, Texas back in 2004, and I responded with, “ANDY! YOU GOOOOOONIIIEEE!!” in my very east Texas accent.
I’m pretty sure he didn’t hear me.
Anywho.
I was six years old when The Goonies was released. I was twenty-five when I saw John Mayer in concert for the first time. And, I think I was around twenty-seven when he crooned that we were “still waitin’ on the world to change.”
I’m forty-seven now and I just gotta ask... is it our time yet?
I mean, I think it is. I think it’s okay to start taking charge of things, but it feels like we’re all just sitting back waiting for either Sean, or John, or Atreyu or Somebody to grant permission.
I have faith that John Mayer will give us a counter-part to Continuum at some point. I believe that Sean Astin will some day deliver yet another unforgettable speech in the way only he can. Atreyu’s not coming, though.
But The Nothing might.
And, not to bum you out, but…
No, dear reader, I’m not proud of myself for doing this, but you—yes, you—need a reminder of what it feels like to not be numb. Because, I really am afraid that Artax is sinking again, into all this sadness.
And instead of Bastian reading along like a silent observer—I think it’s us. I think we are Bastian, and Moonchild is screaming at us to give her a name. Only, it isn’t a movie, it’s real life and we are missing it because we want to avoid all the sadness and collective grief our generation feels.
Do me a favor and look back at everything we have experienced and endured together.
Recessions, pandemics, opinion wars—I think it’s fair to say we have not been afforded the time or space we’ve needed to process the rapid changes we’ve lived through. Yet we continue holding the line—and our complaints—as we’ve cared for both our kids and our aging parents, all while carrying the economy on our backs.
And despite the concerted efforts of the Garbage Pail Kids to prepare us for all kinds of horrors, nothing could have prepared us for diarrhea lettuce.
We did what was asked of us. We worked hard. We’ve invested our money and a lot of us even have savings accounts—for goodness’ sake. We go to all the things for our kids. We show up. We say yes. We did what our grown-ups told us to do in order to be good contributing members of society…
And the world is still on fire, y’all.
For the love of Care Bear Stares, I’m so tired of trying to hold on just a little while longer. Like I might combust any damn minute. Is it just me or do we all feel like we’re holding our breath and waiting to exhale? What the hell are we all waiting for?
What if the thing we’re trying so hard to keep the lid on, simply wants to exist in the world?
Could that be the real us? The versions of ourselves that are tired of keeping the peace and staying quiet because we don’t want to upset our families, or neighbors, or our pastors, simply because we disagree.
Sometimes fundamentally.
Still, some days I just want to tell everybody, “Calm down—it’s not that serious!”
Except, it kinda is that serious. There are very real issues that need to be resolved in the world, and I believe they are our responsibility now. No, I don’t have all the answers, but what you and I do know is that it’s not that hard to find common ground with people. We’ve been doing this all our lives.
We know that “Sloth love Chunk!”
I’m not sure why we feel like our warmth, and our humor and joy aren’t enough, but I do think those attributes our generation inherently carries—warmth, slightly twisted senses of humor, and stubborn joy, are precisely what the world needs right now.
So, I guess, I’m just trying to say, in case you need permission to say the thing, or do the thing, or simply to exist out loud again—permission granted.
Maybe it’s because we’ve been so distracted managing all that is ours to manage, that we’ve been expecting someone more qualified to step in and intervene. I think somewhere along the way, we became the ones we’ve been waiting for.
It’s finally our time.
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Thank you for reading and supporting The Common Joy.
—Mack
