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It is with great regret that I announce the passing of my youth. Those who wish to join with me in mourning this sad loss may send money, gifts, or messages of sympathy. Floral tributes will be much appreciated. Yes, folks, today I am thirty. What a horrible thought! I have crossed The Great Divide. It's the big one. I can no longer refer to myself as a 'youth', or a 'young adult'. I now have to think of myself as a grown-up. The signs have been apparent for several years. The odd gray hair amongst the brown has multiplied like some virulent bacteria, until now great swatches of silver shine in the sunlight like a neon sign which proclaims my age in huge flashing numbers. |
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The wrinkles around my eyes have been growing more pronounced - I can no longer put them down to too many late nights. My skin has lost its youthful smoothness and is starting to look as if I need a good going over with a steam iron. My body is slowing down and seizing up. I creak when I get up in the morning, my eyesight is getting worse, I suffer more from minor ailments like colds and upset stomachs. Mind you, I haven't exactly treated my body well in the past, so I don't blame it for wanting to get its own back, but it is just one more indication that I am no longer a spring chicken - more like an old broiler. Nurse - pass me my walking frame! Thirty is a very symbolic age to reach. It is not that yesterday I was any different from the way I am today (apart from the deep depression that swept over me as I opened my birthday cards this morning) but the fact that society's expectations are geared so much to age. The whole of life is filled with landmarks. Under UK law, at 16 you can walk into a pub for the first time (but only buy soft drinks or low alcohol beers which are considered safe for children), get married, with your parents consent (except in Scotland where parental approval is not required, which is why it used to be fashionable to elope to Gretna Green. Now, of course, couples just move in together which is much less hassle and acts as a try-before-you-buy period), buy cigarettes and have (heterosexual) sex. At 17 you can learn to drive. 18 is the really big one - you can vote, you can buy alcohol, you can get married against your parents wishes, and you are finally let into a cinema to watch people doing all the things you have been doing since you were 16. It's an even bigger landmark for gay men, because it marks the time you can stop fearing arrest every time you screw. (Well, so long as you don't do it in the wrong way, or the wrong place, or with anyone else watching.) 21 used to be very important but now it only marks being able to stand for Parliament, and being able to drive a heavy goods vehicle. Of course for our American friends it is tremendously important, being the age at which they can finally buy alcohol and get completely legless. When I was a teenager, thirty was the age that symbolised everything we didn't want to be. It was the age our teachers were, our parents, all other figures of authority that we resented. It seemed so far in the distance that we couldn't envisage ever reaching it ourselves. "Hope I die before I get old" sang The Who, and we all fervently agreed with this sentiment. We declared that we would commit suicide before we got to the horrendous age of thirty. I've lost track of this group of friends, but I can imagine what they are doing now. They are married, with 2.2 children and 0.4 of a dog, and their supreme achievement is buying a new washing machine. So much for adolescent rebellion! At thirty I am supposed to have sorted out my life. I should be settled down in a steady relationship, I should own my own home, I should have a career with a fixed promotion path. I should be able to map out the rest of my life and know that I am secure. I shouldn't be dressing in outrageous clothes. I shouldn't consider dyeing my hair strange colours. I shouldn't wear five earrings in each ear. I certainly shouldn't indulge in one-night-stands, or have several casual lovers at once. I shouldn't live in a council flat. And I shouldn't leave jobs when I get bored, spend my money as soon as I receive it (or even before!), and not give a damn what the neighbours think. In short, I should be respectable. The trouble is, although I've now been alive for thirty years I don't feel ready to settle down. I look back on my life and in moments of depression I know that I haven't really achieved anything, I haven't made much of a mark on the world. But when I look at the people I work with, or that I meet in the street, I am so grateful I am not like them. Their lifestyles just seem so boring. Today's society is geared so much to young people. Yuppies make their fortune in their early twenties, and are burnt out by the time they reach 26. Old people are ignored, resented and derided. How many famous people can you think of who are old? The Queen Mother... yes, thank you, I don't really want to be like her, and besides, she's not famous for having done anything except married the King. Barbara Cartland? Give me a break! Film stars and pop stars become famous in their youth. If they are really successful, they manage to keep going despite their wrinkles, but only by trying to hide their age with multiple face-lifts. So should I try to hide my age? Should I reach for the Grecian 2000 and the wrinkle cream in an effort to deny the passing of the years? Or should I conform to the standard behaviour for an adult and settle down, fade out of view, grow old gracefully and relax quietly into middle-age? Actually, neither of those options appeals to me. I think I'd rather miss out on middle-age altogether and go straight to senility and my second childhood (although I don't really feel as if I've finished my first!). I'll just carry on doing whatever I feel like doing, and not care whether I am respectable or normal. If that makes me eccentric - great!
Ten years after writing this article, I am forty, which even I have to admit is middle-aged. But I still don't feel like a grown up. I now own my own home but I live alone rather than as half of a couple, and I've gone into business with some friends which is infinitely preferable to working for someone else. But I still have no intention of settling down or behaving myself. One more thing has changed in the intervening seven years. When I wrote the article, the gay male age of consent in the UK was 21. Since then, it has been lowered to 18. Lucky them. There's now only 2 years during which a gay man is unable to explore his sexuality while his straight colleagues can go out bonking all they wish.
Parliament eventually voted overwhelmingly to lower the gay male age of consent to 16, but it was defeated in the House of Lords by the old buffers and religious right. Some years later, the amendment to the law was debated again, and finally it passed - presumably some of the opposition had died in the meantime! |
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