I presume.
Mercifully I haven't got to that stage yet.
I am very happy to be in my 30s. I think the 20s are extremely overrated. It's all a mess and blur of "who am I?" and "who wants to pash me?" and "it's a reasonable and responsible idea to spend my last $20 on a bottle of wine".
Well, some elements of the decades bleed into the next.
If I was to review my 30s: The absolute best decade so far. Financial stability, comfort in your identity. Bad back. 4.5 stars out of 5.
However, it's come to my attention Generation Z is roasting my generation - Millennials - for always wearing skinny-legged jeans.
The audacity of these young upstarts.
Look, here Gen Z. I'll have you know I have no choice but to wear skinny jeans.
I'd look short standing next to Danny DeVito. If I wore straight-legged jeans, I'd look like a Dalek. You probably don't even know what that is, you never even heard the cry of the dial-up internet tone, let alone Doctor Who.
At least if I wear black skinny jeans, perhaps pairing it with a red shirt, I can pass for a postbox.
I'd just finished this internal rant when I saw my Dad, a Boomer, in a trilby hat.
Perhaps it's that he's retired. Perhaps it's that he plays the guitar now. But he's got himself a trilby and he's not afraid to use it.
I want to burn it. The hiking boots with blue jeans he pairs it with will only add fuel to the fire.
Don't get me wrong, I love Boomers. I'm half Boomer on my Dad's side. OK, Boomers, to me.
I believe I was once, briefly, hip. Perhaps even cool. Now, these young ones have the finger on the pulse, but they don't even realise how easily it comes to them. I once taught my parents how to use Facebook. How to change their Instagram handle. What Spotify was. Easy.
The other day I downloaded TikTok and was immediately overwhelmed by it. Stabbing at buttons, panicking, noises blaring at me - I couldn't work out how to use it and deleted it. I felt like a doddery old man. It was a milestone - the first time technology got the better of me. I had the terrifying revelation it won't be the last.
So now, I have accepted it. I'm not hip, young, or cool. I say all the things old people say, like "when I was your age" and "oh gosh you won't know that, you're too young" and, "I was talking to Norma the other day - oh you know Norma, her son's Frank who you went to school with. Oh, I thought you'd remember Frank. Well, anyway, Norma was saying Gerry - oh come on you know Gerry…".
But before I sink completely into existential oblivion, I am comforted by the fact that it happens to everyone. There's a saying "youth is wasted on the young", and while I do lament taking things like fleeting hangovers (one beer now and I'll feel it the next day) or how I could trust all of my joints for granted, I think if young people knew how good they have it, it wouldn't be as fun.
But that's just it, isn't it? Their day will come when they bend over and groan accidentally. Where someone younger, from Gen Alpha, roast their fashion sense. And like all of us before, they'll take it personally, before they realise it's the circle of life (Gen Z: that's a film reference to The Lion King).
It's the natural order of things. In the end, we're all actually just the same, slouching, in skinny jeans, straight-legged jeans or trilby hats - towards the sweet relief of, well, bestowing inheritances, all going well.
So, Gen Z - you'll get your own back. A bad back. And then you'll understand.
- >Felix Desmarais is a journalist and mostly-former stand-up comedian who sold out very cheaply. He's old before his time.
