John Crace
First Person
Madonna, Michael Jackson and Lenny Henry did it last month. Caroline Quentin, Jennifer Saunders, Michelle Pfeiffer, Sean Bean, Gary Oldman, Sharon Stone and Rik Mayall did it earlier in the year. And come November, Jamie Lee Curtis will be doing it, too.
Not so long ago, 40 was old. It was the age when you donned cardies, cords and sensible skirts. These days, though, 40 is very young, very cool and very happening. Forty is the age when you can have it all. Wannabe a pop singer, screen goddess, alternative comedian and get taken seriously? No problem. Where once you just had youth on your side, you now have youth and experience.
And if you believe any of this, then you’ll fall for almost anything. Forty is just as old as it always was. It’s half-dead, to be precise. This is not depressing negativity; it is, in fact, profound optimism. I am 41 years old; the average life expectancy for a man is somewhere in the mid-70s. So even if I get lucky, I’m more than halfway through my life.
Offer me the chance of dropping down dead the day after my 80th birthday, in exchange for the certainty of getting there, and I’d take it like a shot. I would willingly pass up the possibility of making it through to 100 for 39 inglorious more years. As it is, I may well be three-quarters dead. Or seven-eighths dead. You just never know.
In your twenties or thirties, death doesn’t tend to impinge too much. Those that do are generally the result of accidents, overdoses, congenital diseases or extreme old age. As such they can be explained, sanitised and compartmentalised. They are something separate to you. But in your forties, people you know, people your own age, start dropping down dead – of old age.
But even if you manage to stay alive, 40 is the age when things start to fall apart big time. Celebs might be able to remain sexy, glamorous and young, because they’ve got a whole army of make-up artists, plastic surgeons, personal trainers and fashion designers to help them stay that way. Not to mention the battery of PRs who are employed to extend their careers beyond their normal shelf life. Oh, I almost forgot. Stacks of cash help, too.
The rest of us just have to sit back and watch our bodies fall apart in front of our eyes. Especially, if you’ve bought into the myth that it’s just as easy to be a parent in your late thirties, as it is in your twenties.
And even if you don’t have kids, there’s almost nothing you can do about your body. No matter how much respect you show it, it treats you with contempt. So waistlines refuse to respond to exercise, your skin starts to sag and men have to face the added ignominy of their hair dropping out.
If this all sounds vain and superficial, then I make no apologies, because you’d have to be a pathological liar or be in a permanent state of denial to accept all these changes without a murmur. Or good grace, even. Because what’s going on on the outside is often a fair reflection of what’s happening internally.
One of the reasons the rich and famous are so keen to witter on about how much more fulfilled they are at 40 than they were umpteen years earlier, is because there’s often an element of truth. They are more successful now than they used to be, and fuelled with the knowledge – albeit illusory – of their own immortality, there’s nothing much to stop them enjoying it.
But that doesn’t apply to the likes of you and me. Because although you might have a decent job, devoted partner, lovely kids, great home and life might appear to be tickety-boo, there’s almost certainly a level at which you know you’ve failed. You’re not the person you once imagined or hoped you might be. And while you could tell yourself that there was time for you to become that person when you were younger, at 40 the game is up. You are what you are. Which in my case happens to disappointingly mediocre.
To see how washed up at 40 you really are, you only have to look at the world of sport. In 1957, Stanley Matthews played his last soccer international at the age of 42; these days most players are finished in their early thirties.And the same applies to cricket, rugby, athletics, tennis and so forth. You probably haven’t noticed sports luminaries such as Daley Thompson, Malcolm Marshall, Tony Sibson, Garth Crooks, Serge Blanco and Kriss Akabusi queuing up to tell you how wonderful their 40th birthdays have been this year.
Even in less active professions, 40 is a watershed. Not to mention a death knell. Get made redundant in your forties and your only option is self- employment. Unless you’ve got specialist skills, most companies only want the younger, thrusting types. And most people won’t even have the security of a decent pension to look forward to, either.
But those of you who aren’t yet 30 or who are and are fantastically successful should not relax too smugly. Achieving more at a younger age only means you’ve got a longer time to suffer the anti-climax.
Which neatly brings us to that old adage: life begins a 40. Mmm. Of course it does. Silly me. My life so far has been nothing but a waste of time.
It would obviously have been better to have been cryogenically frozen at birth, and then unleashed on to the world in pristine form on my 40th birthday.
God, what a drag it was to be young. To be able to stay up all night and still feel great the next day. To be able to bend over without getting backache.
Right. It was all really hard work. Like hell. The only thing to be said for being 40 it that life doesn’t end. Necessarily.
John Crace is the author The Second Half, to be released later this year