People seem to get uncomfortable when I say it: 40’s a weird one. It’s an age other people turn, not me. My parents are (were) 40. As the Fleet Foxes put it, “So now I am older / than my mother and father / when they had their daughter / what does that say about me?”
I share this at the same time I am fully owning it (40), taking my recognition and celebration of this milestone farther than I’ve ever taken a birthday (with LOTS of help and in amazing company, more on that below). A friend remarked that millennials are a “younger” 40 than our parents. I find that comforting even as I wonder if it’s true, or if every (modern, healthy, lucky) generation hits this age and reflects on how in some ways we are still so young; the confusing contrast between what’s in our brains and identities vs how our now-older bodies present to the world. Are these millenial bodies now younger-appearing than those of the Gen-Xers; boomers at 40? I don’t know.
What I do know is that every decade I’ve lived so far has been distinct, and cumulatively brought me here. I spent most of my kid-years (10 and younger) blissfully unaware; I only have blips of photo-informed memories from that time. I can tell you my favorite color was neon (wait – which color? The answer is all of them). As a teenager, I was indulgently brooding and moody as hell, even though – also a typical teenager – I considered my reactions to the world and myself to be the only natural and appropriate way to be. Everyone else, ie my parents and most of my peers, were – obviously – sheep. My 20s were a fun and freeing, shitshowy departure where I let go of most of my self-imposed rigidity in favor of flirting with hedonism. During my 20s I was deeply insecure about myself, many of my friendships, my supposed “love” life, and work, but I started to learn how to say yes to opportunities and enjoy the ride. And in my 30s, I found a muscle memory in exploring and owning who I am and how I best exist/thrive in the world, which had the enormous side benefit of strengthening (or sometimes, painfully, letting go of) relationships with both family and friends. I got about 100 times better in my job(s) as I saw and owned my own strengths, worrying and focusing less on my flaws.
I’ll tell you in ten years what the overarching themes of my 40s look like, but here at the threshold it feels like I’m taking all of the above and leveling up into a bone-deep level of “chill” when it comes to navigating life’s curveballs. I’m sure some of this is natural age and the other is the intensive life course of learning how to move through constant change intrinsic to full-time Airstream life: something is always breaking, nothing’s ever going quite as planned. We have credit cards that are usually paid down, but not always. I go through periods of sleeplessness, then rest. Ups, downs. Moments are blissful or brutal, and then they pass. I trust this now more than ever, having lived 40-ass years of it.
Sometimes I have the fleeting thought of whether what I want to do is quote unquote age appropriate. I love to go dancing, but…can I go “out”? And, where?! I don’t track fashion all that closely in favor of having my own, but still – can I wear that, whatever it is? I’ve never had the kind of pure physical attractiveness that turned heads and I’m so blunt/straightforward that I’m not a good (traditional) flirt so I don’t notice a difference in people checking me out or not, but I do know I have a kind of familiar-face-magnetism that many people are inherently drawn to – is that still there, or was it something about a youthful face all along? (The answer to that latter question is I’m pretty sure I’ve still and may always “got it”; it’s more to do with presence, posture, awareness, eye contact, and a ready smile – something I’m actually learning to turn off when I don’t feel like constantly making best friends at the grocery store, airport, or post office).
One thing I can definitively say I have finally learned is about people and connections. I used to think enjoying time with people was the exception and treat, rather than the rule of my life. For example, in my late 20s and 30s I worked my full time pretty normal job so I could cover all of my material needs, which then enabled me to create, inhabit, and enjoy evenings, weekends, and vacations. Yes, Wes and Reesa were the priority, but the foundation of work and producing an income were what supported this priority. I cared about doing well at work and having an impact, so I pushed myself to give it my all when I was there (and often when I wasn’t). So even though the goal was always family, and friends, my day-to-day experience provided these as exceptional moments with work dominating the majority of my time and energy.
During that time I remember attending this amazing leadership training in Montana, supported by my work but still requiring a week “off”/away from my normal meetings, emails, and responsibilities. The overall training was comprised of three separate trips to MT over the course of about a year. My cohort got along so well that we planned a final get together at a ski cabin. After the official training wrapped, we piled into various cars and went to our rental for the weekend, where we cooked and enjoyed meals, got drunk and measured our heads to see whose was the largest, and got up to go downhill skiing/snowboarding/cross country skiing the next day depending on our interests. I had an amazing time with these people I now knew very well through our intensive time together.
At the time, though, I had this feeling that the weekend and even the training were a nice “bonus”; an optional add-on to my real life. Real life, of course, was characterized by that 40-hour a week routine embedded with the necessary responsibilities that then enabled me to fulfill my monetary needs to provide a two bedroom home filled with good food and occasional annual family vacations, etc. The added on weekend, with people I now deeply cared about and connected with? I was getting away with something. It was a lovely, lucky, and entirely optional bonus. Afterward, I would roll up my sleeves and get back to the grind of “real life”.
Here’s what I am now finally getting: that weekend and experiences like it ARE the point. I am still connected to many of those people, and even more amazing is that those connections thrive both personally and through work. And that’s also the point: I’ve finally found work that yes, while it’s still work (I am presently on a laptop typing this out; the act of painting is 90% effort and 10% payoff; I check and respond to consulting email almost daily and comb my hair/stick earrings in to cosplay professional for Zoom like anyone else, and occasionally even show up in person in a nice dress and mascara) can be far more aligned with my own personal self. In fact, when I let a lot of myself show up, I feel more at ease at work AND more competent. Than ever. I’m not perfect; I still get stressed, anxious, fail, etc – but the overarching feeling is that work IS also personal IS also “the point”; vacation and quality time with people are mixed in and necessary, and absolutely not an exception.
I guess the short way to put this is 40 feels like greater alignment in the various former-quadrants of my life, paired with a smoothing sense of bludgeoned-in-by-circumstance trust that things will generally work out even if it’s unclear how at any given moment. This isn’t “Jesus take the wheel”. As you very well know, I am diligent about creating circumstances to optimize the likelihood of whatever outcome I’m after. But I also now deeply recognize the limits of my own control; including that what I can best control is my own presence and responses. So I’m learning how to be. How to be and enjoy. I don’t know when this jig of life is up, and I feel dizzyingly lucky to be here experiencing it at all, when I really stop to consider it.
On that note, I mentioned that ringing in 40 has been the most extra series of events of any bday ever. And while it’s not over – I have my whole bingo card to work through over the course of this year after all – these past weeks surrounding the actual day (5/27) have been life-level memorable. I flew to AK for an awesome facilitation and got to see green-up and good friends in real time, then (back in the Lower 48) caravanned out to the otherworldly Black Rock Desert with amazing friends and family, had a beautiful long-form dinner with Wes and Reesa, ran a 178-mile relay race with eleven of my new closest friends, and so many more moments large and small that are difficult to relay, and I don’t necessarily have to. Sharing some pics below.
Do you have aha’s on aging to share? I’m all ears. Reply in the comments!
