2024 has been an intense year for a few reasons I am not going to talk about here. I want to talk about the fact that it’s the year I turned forty. It still feels weird to see it written, the 3 lines of the 4 and the circle of the 0. Although they say it’s the best age, especially for women. I didn’t want to celebrate it at first, my birthday is in January, which is not the happiest month, but I was reminded that the next important birthday will be my 50th, so I immediately sent a message to my friends to organise a little get together.
I am part of the generation of eternal Peter Pans, at 40 I feel I’ve finally crossed the threshold of adulthood. Sometimes I’m still surprised to be financially independent. I don’t know if you see what I mean? I no longer depend on my parents’ money, I can buy whatever I want, whenever I want, even an apartment, without having to answer to anyone. My husband says that I hide the clothes I buy on Vinted from him, but that’s another story. Does it happen to you too, for instance when you order a cappuccino and a slice of cheesecake at a bar, to think that your mother would have said no? And to feel happy because you decide and not her? It happens to me.
I think my daughter has already understood that we will rarely say no to her. She used to eat a croissant and 3 speculoos every time we went out for a coffee and we even bought her one of those stuffed dogs with batteries that move at two millimeters an hour and make noise. Every weekend we go to the local market, and she stops in front of the man who sells cheese, who gives her a piece, then at the stand where we buy fruits and vegetables, where they offer her grapes or a clementine.
I have a 2-year-old daughter. When I was 14, I thought that by 28 I would be married, with a career already well underway, pregnant with my first child. Oh yes, because I was planning on having 3-4. In my mind, I obviously wasn’t going to have any financial problems. I’m also sometimes even surprised to be a mother, even though it’s been over two years. There is someone who depends on me, to whom I can say no if I want to, without having to explain myself, who will ask me for pocket money, because I’m financially independent. That’s not a bad accomplishment. In terms of accomplishments, I can’t complain, I’m happy with my life. At 40, I finally know myself. In reality, it’s been a long time, but not that long. In any case, that’s it, at 40 I no longer have FOMO when I have to stay home because my daughter has to go to sleep. Tomorrow is new year’s eve and I will go to bed before midnight and I am more than ok with it. If that’s not an accomplishment to be proud of.
Happy new year folks, let’s hope 2025 will be better than 2024.
Blabbering of a millennial 