I turned 40 and waited to feel old but felt free instead.

Read this at your "big" age.

I turned 40 this month. In the days, months, and years approaching this milestone, I prepared myself to take on something heavier, something that would weigh me down. I’m so used to the increase in age coming hand in hand with larger, wider, and more costly expectations. What part of my life isn’t successful enough? What part of me should look better? Every decade’s transition was an invitation to step up, do more, be bigger, and make something of myself. 

Surprisingly, as I watched the digital display turn from 11:59 pm to 12:00 am I checked the mirror like I do every year to see if something was visibly different, and it was. 

Something lifted from my shoulders, something I didn’t realize had been weighing them down this whole time. Maybe it was that thing my mom laughs about when she tells me she can’t find any of the fucks she used to cling to so tightly. Maybe it’s the wisdom of understanding the cyclical nature of life. Maybe it was gratitude. 

Later that morning, Tiff arrived from Austin. Her plane was diverted to Miami and we had been up all night sorting through her debacle. At one point we asked each other if it was even worth it for her to come, our time would be cut short by an evening because of the delays and she would have to take an unexpected detour, an additional plane and several hours wait in the airport. When she finally arrived at my door, all of it made sense. Good things take time. Good things take effort. Good things take determination. 

That night, a group of some of my closest friends gathered to toast my big new age. I wore a Bronx and Banco iridescent sequin dress that my friend Bria helped me source for way less than it retailed. We had champagne and dirty martinis and took photos in the mirror and then went out dancing.

Ashley 4.0

It was a Friday night, and life was lifing for a lot of my friends, so a few couldn’t make it. Normally I would take cancellations as a sign that I wasn’t worthy or good enough or that somehow my milestone didn’t matter. But I was wrapped up in the joy of having people I love at arm's length, who knew instead of a cake I preferred lemon bars, that Tiff, who had been an image on a screen for the past decade was here in real life, and that I knew for sure I was loved. 

The night was a shared folder of photos we can look back on and recall and laugh about later to remember what we looked like once. But the life is the point. The life is the celebration.

The next morning I logged onto my Zocdoc account to schedule a dentist appointment and saw my name and age:

Ashley Simpo
Age: 40

There it was. Evidence that time does indeed pass. That no matter what, you will be 40 one day if you don’t die young. The age you could once only relate to aunts and uncles and moms and dads is upon you. 

I waited for that feeling I keep reading about to hit me — the one where 40 becomes a lump in my throat and I long for younger days. Nothing came then, but it came later.

When I posted a few photos of the night to my Instagram a couple of people commented things like,  “Omg 40?? I had no idea!” Someone even said they thought I was a “sage twenty-something.” 

I realized that my inherent reaction to aging, which feels most real and relevant is not what the world sees. From now on I will be measured by how close to twenty I still look. Because when women are over 40, and don’t look like what they’ve been through, we become mystic phenoms. Rouge unicorns spotted in the wild. I felt it, the thing society hands you when you turn 40, and I vehemently reject it. 

I’ve become captivated by following 50+ influencers on Instagram. It feels aspirational to see women who are unjaded, who play with style and color, or who pursue lives that counter norms. It tells me that I do not actually have to change or conform to an expectation about age. I don’t have to wear muted tones and sensible shoes and have uncomplicated hair. I don’t have to marry a “safe bet” and talk about pleasure like it was something I grew out of. I could just keep on being me, but older. 

Looking back on my thirties, I think a lot about what society gives you versus what you might feel. It’s a busy decade full of loss, letdowns, and realizations about what’s real and true. It’s also a decade that will ask you to conform to capitalism in a way that feels very intense. 

The act of “settling down,” is closely tied to marrying a person, embarking on home ownership, having children, and taking them to Disney. And if you should choose a different path, or if your path should change unexpectedly, you will be reminded over and over again that you live an alternative life. Wow, you’re so brave. I could never do that.

One of the 50+ influencers I follow and love is a woman named Heidi Clements. She’s a storyteller and recounts tales from her life while she gets dressed. I love her whimsy. Sneakers and slouchy cargo pants, cardigans, and dad hats. She seems to take samples from every generation she’s experienced as if she’s wearing her life on her body. Her stories almost always end up being a reminder that life is different than age. That we don’t actually have to do anything that doesn’t feel molecularly vital to our truth. 

She posted a video recently that was a letter to the beauty industry and called out the term “anti-aging.” I love writers who give us the language we don’t have:

“How can I love myself unconditionally, if you continue to remind me that you are against what I am doing? Simply aging.

Do you understand the damage that you are doing to young women? Telling them not to grow old. Telling them that the gift and privilege of aging is actually awful? Would you rather we all just die young?

Please take the words “anti-aging” off of your products. It feels like a hate crime and it’s breaking my heart.”

There it was. The feeling I had been trying to nail down for weeks. The thing that lifted from my shoulders and then was abruptly handed back to me was the idea that aging is wrong. That I had fucked around and done the thing you’re not supposed to do. That aging is a failure. 

But my body was telling me something different. My body was celebrating a great accomplishment, a beautiful life, and all the healed wounds I had learned to nurture. Look what we’re surviving. Look what we get to remember. Look what I get to know confidently and in my bones. How could this ever be anything bad?

I planned to share this long list of all the things I’ve learned as some kind of resource for women embarking on their thirties. But when I sat down to write them I realized that advice about being in your thirties is pointless. Do what feels right and detach from the idea that your choices are permanent. You get to change your mind about anything. You get to reinvent yourself over and over. There is nothing urgent about being in your thirties. 

You can choose to be as free or deeply committed as you want. We will never age out of making mistakes any more than we will age out of resilience. If you’re happy, don’t change a thing. If you are unhappy, change everything. But age is not a compass, it’s just a gorgeous side effect.