How to survive the 35-year-old curse
Equal distance between 20 and 50, it is a time when the promise of youth is fading in the rearview mirror, yet the comfort of old age remains out-of-reach. At 35, some of your friends act 25, and some of your friends act 45, but no one really has their act together.
Census data from 2021 showed that homeownership for those aged 30 to 39 has decreased in each successive generation.Credit: Andrew Dyson
Now I know there have been countless articles about The Millennial Malaise™, and the last thing I want to do is send the Boomers rushing to the comments section to remind everyone – in caps lock – that things were harder, BACK IN THE DAY.
It’s more of an acknowledgment that a specific set of factors, like the real wage decline, the ever-rising retirement age, and homeownership at historic lows for people aged 35-39, has contributed to a world flush with options for those at each end of the spectrum but failing to cater to the forgotten middle.
Too old for TikTok and too young for a property portfolio, 35-year-olds must do the only thing left available: run from their problems by participating in half-marathons.
Depressingly, not only is TikTok fame out-of-reach, but I probably can’t even work there. According to a New York Times article, ByteDance, the company that owns the video app TikTok, is part of a widespread problem in the tech industry called “the curse of 35”.
Basically, tech companies are ditching workers en masse the minute they turn 35, believing they are simultaneously too expensive and too out-of-touch. One worker observed, “At 35, he feels young but also like a plague”.
*Provided you are 35 or under.Credit: AP
Thankfully, my young friend Jack seems oblivious to the curse of 35, given that he happily accepted my invitation to another midweek activity. This time, we played pickleball, one of the fastest-growing sports in the world and, encouragingly, a hobby popular with people mostly in their 50s and 60s.
It turns out the older crowd is incredibly ruthless on the pickleball court. After several one-sided games, the organiser shuffled over to Jack and me for a quiet word. He suggested we might have more luck joining a group of beginners.
