Mentalechoes

So I turn 37 in a less than 2 weeks! It’s a bit of a dilemma actually because I don’t really know what I am supposed by like at this age. I know that I probably am not your typical mainstream 37 year old. Anyone mainstream at this age has kids. Not having kids and being 37 is almost rebellious, like when you were a kid and you went out and drank in a bar before you were legally allowed.

37 actually sounds ‘middle aged’. The thing is I am essentially the same person now as when I was 28. And living the same kind of life style too; not married, don’t have any kids, still got all my hair, listening to cool music, still trying to do interesting things. Pretty much the only way I can tell I am not 28 anymore is that it takes a lot longer to recover from a hangover. But 37 is different from 28. It’s a friggin lot older, is what it is! You know I was always someone that never wanted to settle for a life where I just got a job and then got married and then faded away into obscurity in the Bris-vegas suburbs like everyone else. I’ve never wanted that! To me, being 37 and living in the burbs would be death! Life becomes this non-existance where you just fade away. At least living in Amsterdam means that I am doing something extraordinary that gives my life special meaning.

But what now? Should I get married and have kids? Because lets face it, I aint getting any younger. I mean, maybe if I don’t get married now, maybe I won’t be able to when I turn 40 because maybe my hair starts to go. Jezuz, 40 and no hair! Fucking hell! Then I’ll be doomed to never get married, because if you don’t have hair, nobody wants you. It’s true, otherwise hair replacement wouldn’t be a business sector! And that’s what all the advertisements say in mens magazines as well.

No hair and nobody wants you? Well that’s cause you’re massively fuckin ugly and not virile without hair. But don’t panic, sex can be yours again. For a ton of money we’ll stitch genuine imitation hair onto your head in any kind of part that you want. It may not look real; it may even look really stupid, but you’ll have hair where until now you’ve only dreamed about! And won’t the chicks love it. You’ll get laid morning, noon and night. You’ll get laid so much your dick will probably fall off, so call us now and have your creditcard standing by!

Yeah okay, enough melodrama. I’m not going to run out and get married just yet while I still have hair. If I’m not married when I turn 40 I can always buy a Russian bride for like 100 euro. True love only a click away (or so the tagline on the site goes).

I keep hoping that if I practice saying 37 enough times that it will start to feel more comfortable. So far it’s not working.

37… 37… 37… err… 37… still not working.

But seriously I can’t be the only one turning 37 and feeling like this. There has to be loads of us Generation X kids all growing up and hitting the same age. Our generation wasn’t known for conforming and following in their parents footsteps (the baby boomers). Perhaps there is even a club, or a support group out there in yahoo groups or google groups somewhere for ‘my kind’. Hmmm… tomorrow when I am supposed to be working I will run a few searches through the regular search engines and see if I can turn one up. If they formed a club for lepers on an island in the tropics, they surely have a ‘Generation X Growing Up’ support group somewhere.

But seriously, seriously! I do wonder if maybe I should start conforming a bit more to societies standard for my age group. Maybe settling down and not trying to hold on to a lifestyle that should have passed by now is a good way to go. Perhaps the obscurity of the burbs isn’t such a bad place to be. Many fine people live there, and do good things with their daily lives. Most of them are boring as shit, but is that important? Yet even the thought becoming one of them rubs a part of mind up the wrong way with sandpaper! Hunter S Thompson never settled down in the burbs, he lived as an original and defined an age with his lifestyle. Mind you he also blew his head off with a shotgun, so perhaps he’s not the ideal person to use as a role model.

I guess in the end, the closer I get to my birthday the more worried I get that I should be doing something differently. But then after it passes I shall settle back into my normal self. I hope so, because otherwise I’ll start worrying that I am neurotic. And worrying about being neurotic will sure as hell make you neurotic if you weren’t already!

Padwanna!