Midlife Crisis

Great song! the end.
Well maybe not.
I have stated before that I did far too many stupid things in my youth to bother having one, but it's still fun to look at the things many do in their middle age and evaluate them.

First and foremost move the goalposts of where middle aged is. I am middle aged, there is a very slim likelihood of me surviving much more than the number of years I have already lived, so I am around the middle of my life. Many try pushing this further away to avoid classing themselves as middle aged, this simply tells everyone else you are definitely there.

Finding yourself. Voyages of self-discovery are a big thing and often used as an excuse to buy an unnecessary vehicle, go on a road trip, and pretend you are in your late teens when in truth you have children of that age, or could legally have. Harley Davidson would go bankrupt if this trend stopped along with many others who make profit from people trying to rough it in five star comfort without exceeding their credit limit. I did the running away part and did many stupid things en route. Couldn't afford a Harley or often even a roof, and was genuinely in my late teens when doing so. Finding myself didn't happen until I stopped running and looked inward and forward rather than outward, that part was not fun in any way and I am glad I did it before middle age.

The big bike. Harley was mentioned, there are many others bought to reclaim a sense of youthful exuberance. I have owned a bike with an engine made by Harley, it was great fun, totally unnecessary and I got rid of it when I realised that going out on the bike meant not being with my infant son. Born again bikers are a menace on the roads and insurance companies are so aware of this that they have released figures showing them as being almost as high risk as new riders. There is a certain bizarre pleasure watching someone who doesn't realise how much more power is being produced by a 600cc engine now than a 1000cc could 20 years ago, holding on for dear life when they wind back the throttle and try to avoid disaster.
The above is also true for sports cars, except I have never had one.

The affair. Unfortunately too many don't spend enough time and effort ensuring their life partner is the right one, this has given rise to a number of myths about how old married couples are and how unhappy it makes them. The all too common result of this is the affair. Today this takes many forms sometimes just taking place in virtual games, via text message etc. much as these can seem silly and harmless it is still a sign that they are thinking outside of the relationship they swore to for life, likely either financially too tied in or similar to escape.
I said I would never marry, largely because I saw divorce was so easy and later because the person in a number of those affairs was me. Fair to say I had a poor opinion of marriage in many ways. Ironically the core issue was that I never thought I would find someone that I could promise to stay with for the rest of my life, knowing that we all change over time, I always thought of this as a set of promises before witnesses, and refused to break such serious promises. Obviously I was wrong, but because I spent so much time with various Miss Wrongs I was able to identify the real Miss Right, eventually. I got better than I deserved, and this is one part of a midlife crisis that would never happen.

Getting the body back. Many people spend decades, driving, drinking, eating junk and generally abusing their bodies in the name of good living. All of a sudden they look at the mirror and the teenage photo and realise they aren't easily identified as the same person. This one is easy for me to take the mick out of as I am fitter than most half my age and have told people in that age group wondering how I could be like me at my age that it was by starting before I was their age. However I am not what one would call pretty, and my satisfaction with my ability doesn't come with the image of magazine perfection. The 8 to 10% body fat I had when caring about my image has blown to 15 to 17% meaning there is a six pack if I pose but just a fur lined variation between one and four most of the time. I do cite that one big advantage of being married is only having to impress one woman, she's happy, so am I.
For those who haven't lived like me i.e. normal people, the crisis method usually involves buying expensive equipment and clothing, club memberships and trying all of the latest crazes expecting their body to perform as if they had done this their whole lives. The resulting sight of someone shoehorned into lycra, or sweatsuits pedalling like crazy on the latest high tech bike, or trying to figure out how to get tea out of their new kettlebells is great, and the sight of them trying to move the next day is even more so. There are many who do this sensibly but they aren't the topic.
The next step of course is to declare that the exercise they did is bad for you or that they used to be able to do this so should be able to again, then buy diet plans they don't stick to electric stimulation devices, truly hilarious, or push themselves until they end up in hospital.

The big cover up. Hair dye, toupees, thick make up, age defying creams and every other product that is designed to hide the fact you are getting older. Physically I am fit, but there is no escaping the fact my face could use a darned good iron what hair I have left on my head is going grey along with the rest of it. I don't look like I'm in my teens or early twenties anymore, in fact I didn't when I was so I wasn't going to look younger in later years.
There is the expression that women spend more time on makeup than education because most men see better than they think, definitely truth there and it works as well both directions, trust me. As such this could be deemed more than a little unfair after all why shouldn't people make the most of what they have, or at least pretend to have what they don't. Well there is likely to be a time when the person you are acting for gets to see the real you, if you using a stack of makeup, both genders are now buying the stuff, wearing a girdle, inflatable wonderbra etc. there will be the time when you are standing before your new found partner without all of this and worried sick of what they will think, although in reality they will likely be doing the same.

Trying to be hip. For a start, I doubt very much that the latest term for being part of the youth scene is hip, secondly get real. You may well find yourself using the right words, if you are lucky maybe 75% of them in the right places, but any thoughts that the kids are seeing you as one of their own will soon disappear when they ask you what it was like when the latest retro tunes were new. Even if you have kept in shape and can move better than professional dancers in the videos, you will still be less hip than the 18 year old doing the funky chicken half a beat out of time. Youth scenes are exactly what they say, it's no longer a case of too much, too young more what's that looking over the hill is it a monster (forgive the slight name change). In the hip and happening scene age is crucial, teens are good young twenties are acceptable, older twenties are a bit, haven't they moved on yet, but if the first number in your age is above a 2 they will be expecting a zimmer frame at the very least, and the younger you act the older they will see you as.