On Being 35 with Teenage Feelings
I have questions.
I’m turning 35 next month and I’m feeling a certain way about it.
I’ve always enjoyed celebrating birthdays. The marking of a new year is a gift, it’s fun. I’m a Gemini Leo so Celebrate Me Energy is true and correct.
Yet this upcoming mid-30s milestone is really bringing up some stuff. I haven’t been able to fully parse it out yet. The only clear definitive action I’ve taken for stepping into this transitional time is that I’ve booked a hair appointment to chop all my hair off. I’m not getting bangs, don’t worry.
Getting older isn’t the thing that’s coming up here. It feels like I’m getting further away from something (carefree innocence and a simpler time?), and I’m getting closer to something else that is unknown (crossing the threshold into full-blown adulthood and no longer being relevant?). I’ve gained wisdom but have I also gained pessimism? This world hasn’t shown itself to be the sweet, safe bubble that my youth danced around in.
Forever young?
I know that for us Millennials our “remember the good old days” is trending really hard on the internet right now. No matter how cringe1 or delulu2 the Gen Zers say we are.
My teenage experience was one I mostly look back on with love and gratitude. I had my first real boyfriend who was sweet and kind. I had a group of girlfriends to laugh and cry with. I wrote furiously in a journal. And Taylor Swift was the same age as me, writing songs that literally paralleled my small-town existence.
I was able to explore, have fun, feel love, break hearts, have my heart broken, and grow through the messiness of being a teenager in a relatively safe and cozy existence.3 My heart aches for teens today who, because of the world we’ve created, do not have this same experience and their grief is, rightfully, demanding something better.
writes about this beautifully in her article from last month.This leads me to my love of Teenage/Young Adult content. Maybe it’s how, in today’s world, I let my story-telling imagination dance around in a safe bubble. Or maybe it’s because it’s part of my human condition that I crave a trip back in time to access feelings that felt impossible at the time but are understandable now. Regardless, I love today’s television and cinematic entertainment that centers on this theme.
The Summer I Turned Pretty spoke directly to my 17-year-old self who literally dreamt of situations the main character Belly finds herself in. I read the books, watched the show, and bought the t-shirt. I recently just watched Bottoms and LOLd at every ounce of absurdity and truth in it.
Now I’m on the heels of 35, wondering if teenage stories are serving me in the heartwarming way that they have in the past. I feel further away from it and it’s not always relatable. But I also don’t want to abandon my youth because let’s be clear, 35 is not old. And there is still a hopeless romantic teenage girl alive and well inside my mid-thirties heart.
Nostalgia is wonderful. It can also be quite sad.
nos·tal·gia
/nəˈstaljə/a
nouna sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.
Where I am certainly feels like a sentimental, transitional space with a lot of longing. There is grief and discomfort here. It feels like I’m where I’m supposed to be, so perhaps the realization of being in a hard place is what has me deep in my feelings as my birthday approaches.
Is it that I’m entering into unknown territory and that’s ok, just part of getting another trip around the sun? Growth is uncomfortable and perhaps I’m just in the sticky, gross phase of emerging into something new and beautiful.
I keep coming back to my intention for 2024: The best is yet to come (with manageable expectations). And my astrological indicators4 for this year read that 2024 is the “year of growth and renewal.” This has been unfolding like the emotional whiplash that comes with being a teenager while also having a grounded, adult understanding of how to handle and process it with a bit more grace.
I guess I’ve officially entered my Tortured Poet Era.
A global pop superstar who is 7 months out from turning 35 wrote 31 songs about emotional wounds and deep feelings. Taylor Swift stated that the chapters of her Big Feels have closed and she feels at peace giving the stories to us as our own. I’m taking them. I can’t stop scream-singing But Daddy I Love Him alone in my car because it makes my teenage heart soar. And I can’t stop gleefully skipping while also normalizing depression with I Can Do It With a Broken Heart.
So do we ever really move on? Do we ever really let go of our younger selves in the name of getting older? Or is it more of an acceptance? Acceptance of the fact that inner turmoil is a thread that’s stitched into each year of the tapestry of our life’s story. And the complementary colors that weave alongside it are nostalgia, memories, love, and inner knowing. All coming together to strengthen a beautiful masterpiece that we wrap ourselves in and that gets better with age.
Seriously I’m asking for me, not even a friend.
I don’t want to let my YA content go because I don’t want to deny the parts of myself that still adore a good coming-of-age love story. And also, I do crave some more relatable yet entertaining stories of my actual age and current season of life.
Is there a This Is 40 of today? Some that I’ve been into over the last year have been:
What are you watching or reading that lets your Lover Of Love flag fly while also meeting you where you’re at in life? Tell me in the comments, I’d love to chat!
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Pretty sure using this term is now in and of itself cringe.
This is what the kids say when calling someone delusional.
This also has a lot to do with the various privileges that make up my identity of being a white, middle-class, educated kid with two working parents and local generational support.
This is also very Millennial of me.
writes about how we of a certain generation lean really hard into the stars and zodiacs. I’m here for it.
Thanks for sharing your vulnerability, as always <3