Affordable Midlife Crisis Options for Millennials

Instead of buying a sleek convertible, you head to Dick’s Sporting Goods and take a test-spin on every model of high-performance scooter. You settle on an electric one, which isn’t practical enough for your seven-mile commute to work, so you mainly use it to compete in the local teenage drag races on your cul-de-sac. It’s no Porsche, but it still gives you the thrill of the air rushing through your thinning, graying hair.

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Rather than leaving your spouse for a younger version, you find an older, more financially stable one with excellent health insurance. At the dinner parties you attend now, you’re constantly referred to as “the kid,” which gives you that feeling of youth that you were chasing.

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You dream about quitting your job to follow your passion, but your boss beats you to the punch. He offers you the choice of resigning or being fired. Jokes on him because both options give you the rush of not having a stable paycheck.

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When your tween asks if your eyebrows are supposed to be that close to your eyes, you decide against an expensive facelift and start using a photo filter instead. There’s no physical recovery time needed, just the emotional time it takes to get over the shock on people’s faces when they see you in real life and say something like, “You look… okay?”

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Rather than take a yearlong sabbatical in Tuscany to write the next great American novel, you call in sick two days in a row, hoping that’s enough time to get a few thousand words written. Instead, you end up writing a lengthy Instagram post on millennial malaise. It gets four likes.

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Instead of buying the most expensive guitar on the market and getting the old band back together, you imagine what it would have been like if your parents hadn’t let you quit the guitar after two lessons. You download an app, pay for a yearlong subscription, think about texting a friend to get together to “jam,” and then promptly forget about it until you get charged for the second full, nonrefundable year.

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Instead of skydiving, you go to the mall and pay a hundred dollars to get blasted up a plastic tube while families eating Cinnabon stare at you through the glass. On the plus side, you’re not worried about dying because of a faulty chute, but you think you might die from embarrassment.

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You dream about buying a second home, but that would require owning a first. Instead, you spend three weeks designing and building a “luxury” treehouse in the park across from your apartment. The city declares it a threat to public safety, tears it down, and fines you.

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You read a book about a couple who sold all their possessions and sailed around the world. You borrow your Gen X brother’s kayak. While you aren’t afraid of drowning in the middle of the vast ocean (you’re in a body of water that barely qualifies as a lake), you are afraid of capsizing in front of the group of teens who keep beating you in scooter races.

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After your hour of touch-and-go kayaking, you think about writing a bestselling memoir to inspire readers with your hard-earned wisdom about life. But you settle for writing on Substack. You publish one heartfelt post and wait for readers to be moved by your vulnerability. Instead, someone comments that you’re a “millennial snowflake” and you get the intoxicating jolt of fighting with a stranger online about your own life.

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You’re staring down the tunnel of mortality, and you say, “Screw it.” You decide to finally take the safari you’ve dreamed of since childhood. You go to empty your 401(k), but the market beat you to it. Instead, you go to the zoo and climb over the fence into the lion enclosure. The lions don’t notice you, but you get the exhilaration of running away from the zoo staff.

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You ask to borrow your dad’s Porsche. Backing out of the garage, you accidentally run over your scooter, which somehow feels more shameful than totaling a sports car. You realize you’ll never again get to drag race against the kids down the street.