Retroactive A music-loving techno-straddler breaks yet another sound varrier

I am a straddler. I fall between the generation that is entirely fatootsed by technology and the one that can’t imagine leaving home without something plugged in an ear. With my elders, I am a techno heavy. With kids – ages 5 to 35 – I step back, shut up and do a lot of pretending. Either way, I stumble well through the world of electronics.

Never is this personal schism more apparent than when I exercise. In recent years, I’ve evolved into thinking winter workouts are so utterly boring that, unless I multitask – a word my generation added to our vocabulary, by the way – then I’m not likely to engage in an activity more taxing than ironing, which at least has immediate results.

That’s not to say that I’m high maintenance when it comes to working out. Some people might need an Intertrainer Exercise Motivator, a belt that is wirelessly connected to a TV and turns down the volume if you don’t keep pace, or an MP3 Clip Stix, which looks like something a nurse would use on your finger to monitor heart rate. (The Clip Stix works best on the front pocket of a pair of jeans.) I’ve heard strange, but good, things about something called a hula chair. And if you’re really ambitious in an equestrian way, there’s the iGallop, which simulates riding a horse.

I’m not likely to buy any of these or, for that matter, even a flat-screen TV to watch while sweating. Music is what motivates me. Probably like a lot of people who exercise, I started out years ago with a boombox, then a portable cassette tape player, then a CD player and eventually joined the 65 million others who, in the last five years, bought iPods, which dominate the MP3 player market. I may still be listening to music from 20 years ago – who doesn’t want to feel the way she felt 20 years ago? – but the iPod itself changed my life. Not only did it provide lightweight machinery to distract my struggling muscles from pain, but it allowed me to be a member of the iPod generation – even as I was afraid to talk to the iPod generation about how an MP3 player works.

More or less, I was slogging along pretty happily with my iPod – after I figured out the volume button – when one day online I found the Sony S2 Sports Walkman. Years ago, I stopped using Sony products because I resented their gender specific names for portable players. I wanted a Walkwoman or a Walkperson or a Musicwalker. Let’s just say I boycotted the Walkman back then.

Forget the branding for a minute. This new machine had instant appeal and not just because it holds a lot of music, counts calories, calculates mileage and automatically matches workout tunes to your pace. It even has an FM tuner.

But it was the tubular shape that got me. It looks like a mini-microphone, or a Maglite, or like something Bones would carry on “Star Trek.” Very cool. This was so retro and so futuristic at the same time, it reminded me of me. I had to have it. So I ignored the boy name and did what any iPod-generation shopper would do. I clicked the “proceed to check out” box.

A week or so later, the Sony arrived. I loved it instantly. Of course, I didn’t understand one syllable of the accompanying instructions. But if being a straddler has taught me anything, it has taught me to be patient with mistakes. One of them will inevitably download a song. Three hours later, I downloaded my first song. In fact, I downloaded it twice. I downloaded every song twice. And no, I haven’t figured out how to correct that error yet. To be honest, I’m still figuring out the earphones.

But I love my new Walkman. Whether I’m listening to Franz Biebl’s “Ave Maria” or Dilana’s version of “Roxanne,” I feel as if I belong to my generation and the next generation, too.

Now I’m looking at Hasbro’s Tooth Tunes, a toothbrush with downloads to inspire teeth cleaning. And the other day, I saw a guy wearing a Bluetooth Headset. “Hey, can you jog with that thing?” I asked. He looked at me blankly. Then he perked up, “Yes,” he said. “If you wear a tight hat.”