Over the Hill.

Reflections on turning 40

When I was 10, my mom died from breast cancer. A few years before that, my dad turned 40. We threw a party for him at our ranch-style suburban house. It’s one of the strongest memories I have of us as a nuclear family.

I remember the sunny day at our beige and brick home in Bayside, Wisconsin, 15 minutes north of Milwaukee. I remember the plates and cups. They read “Over the Hill.”

I remember my mom in a wheelchair. I remember my brother in his Umbros. I remember Sasha, our black lab, hoping people would drop food in the freshly mowed grass. I remember my dad looking good as he mingled, sporting a full head of dark hair. He could have been an extra in a mafia movie — a muscular 5 foot 7 with a thick dark mane combed backward. My mom had no hair left after many rounds of chemo, but her head was wrapped beautifully in a blue silk scarf that had swans on it.

I’m 40 now.

It’s hard to believe. Especially when I think of that boy watching my dad celebrate his 40th. I remember eating cake from those “Over the Hill” plates with their wacky, celebratory font. If I close my eyes, I’m there.

Now I’m Over the Hill? Okay.

I’ve often reminded him over the past decade that I’m almost 40 as an explanation of why I don’t want his advice. His love language is advice, so I try to keep our conversations to things that have happened, not what might happen, because I don’t want his generation’s worries put on me. If what might happen comes up, there will be advice. There will be worry. There will be a moment where I’ll want to say “Dad, I know, I’m almost 40!”

At 40, my dad is still here. He’s just getting closer to 80 now. He’s getting old, and I worry about when he won’t be here. I love him deeply, but our relationship, like many father-son relationships, is two different sides of the same coin.

I’m deeply grateful to my Pops. Often, I see myself in him in the best possible way. I know he sees himself in me. Also, I see myself wanting to prove to him that all of his fears are wrong.

That the world is open, that you only fail if you don’t try, and that the American blueprint they hand out in the suburbs for adult life is not the only—or even best way—to create a meaningful, interesting, and joyful life.

It’s just safer. It’s less worry. It’s more predictable. That I’ll agree with, but that, however, is not what I want. It’s the classic parent-child conundrum of the child taking a very different path into adulthood from the ones that were hoped for or even imagined by the parent—our version of every story about a kid not wanting to take over the family business.

I believe he oscillates between genuine pride and deep worry. There is real support and there is palpable doubt. It’s always the same dad-shaped coin, and I love him.

I’m 40 now and I live in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, where my life savings are invested in a hotel project. If you could have told that 7-year-old cake eater in his Umbros—When you’re 40, you’ll be living on the beach and chasing your dreams in Mexico—I wonder what he would have said.

He’d probably think it was cool. He’d wonder why I don’t have a wife. He’d think it was smart that I stayed in shape. He’d wonder if I at least have a dog. (I do, kid. I have the best dog. She’s a lot like Sasha.)

What's the point?

When I think about my age now, I think of my Dad. I think of how old and mature he seemed at that suburban party. I think of myself when I was 10 and the time warp that brought me to the present. I eventually wonder, What is the point of it all? What did I manage to achieve in the past 30 years? Did I use my time well? Am I making my mom proud?

I studied. I traveled the world. I wrote a book. I worked at an NGO. I started an NGO. I started a business. I’m starting a hotel. I did a lot of pushups. I read a lot of books. I hosted a lot of open mic nights.

I saw whale sharks in the Phillippines and nudibranchs in Indonesia. I jumped off a bridge in Bulgaria. I jumped off a bridge in South Africa. I got my Divemaster in Honduras. I licked the salt flats of Bolivia—twice. I’ve walked across a frozen Pickerel Lake in northern Wisconsin with my best childhood mates eleven times. I ate the still-beating heart of a king cobra outside of Hanoi. I lived, laughed, and loved a whole lot.

I’m trying. I’m motivated. We have one shot at this. I remind myself as often as possible that we only have One Life to Live. Only so many laps around the sun. Eat all the snake hearts, I say!

I’ve made exactly 40 laps around the sun now. On one of them, I lived in Australia. On one, I quarantined in Mexico City. During others, I visited over 10 countries. During many, I fell in love. During some, I fell out. During one, I published a book. During this one, I put new music into the world. Sometime during the next lap, I plan to open a hotel.

We only get one shot at this.

Call me “40.”

My very first thought when I started writing this was to avoid the tropes about middle-age milestones. You know—40s are the new 30s, you’re as old as you feel, age is just a number—and such. I honestly don’t agree with those tropes, so it wasn’t a temptation when I started putting words to my thoughts on turning 40.

Saying “age is a number” is like saying “I don’t see color” in a conversation about race. It’s for sure a thing. Pretending it’s not a thing, does not make it not a thing. Most people would rather just be identified correctly than have you ignore their unique personhood, regardless of the descriptor in question. I have earned these years, these victories, these lessons, these scars, and these memories, because I am 40.

So please, call me “40.”

I’ve earned a boatload of memories. Heaps, even, as my Aussie mates would reckon. Since the start of my world travels, and even earlier—before graduate school, before moving to New Orleans—I’ve used a simple question about making memories to help me make choices. If I think saying “yes” will create a memory that will last for years, I’ll almost certainly do it. Whatever it is.

In many ways, collecting colorful memories and new characters feels like the point of life. To make it to my father’s age with the thought of What a fucking story this all is.

When it comes to memories and trying new things, I feel closer to 60 than 40. When it comes to my lifestyle, my health, my new music, and my often insatiable extrovert need for social energy, I feel closer to 20. In certain ways, I feel both 20 and 60, but I’m somewhere exactly in the middle. I’m 40 now, and I’ve earned it.

Half done.

Over the hill essentially means you’re half done. The expression is predicting that you’re going over the crest, starting the march toward the end. The celebration is to signify the one exact day you spend at the top of the hill, reflecting on the 40 years that it took to reach the summit, and what the hopefully next 40 years on the walk down will bring.

Sly Stallone elaborates on his view of 40 in a recent Netflix doc by saying that up until 40 you’re adding things, starting and creating things, and after 40, life is subtraction. You lose friends, the kids move out, and the lights of fame begin to fade.

I don’t have kids (yet) or fame, so I don’t imagine my journey down the backside of the mountain to be about subtraction like it has been for Sly. I’m going to continue to create new things and build a treasure chest of memories and artifacts for that 80-year-old man at the bottom of the mountain to hold close to his heart. For that tired old guy to be able to share.

I hope there are still great friends and family when I reach the bottom. I imagine my brother will still be there, hopefully wearing Umbros again after they come back into style. Maybe I’ll even have adult kids of my own. Who knows?

What I do know, is that I want to have made myself proud. I want to feel like an athlete who left it all on the field. I want to look at my bingo card and see every box ticked. I want to know that the tread is bald and the soles are worn thin. I want to have made my Dad proud, despite his doubts, with everything I’m destined to accomplish.

Exhausted, with a smile on my wrinkled face, I want to be able to think — that 40-year-old kid didn’t even know, he had so much more living to do.

If you liked this, you’ll love my 5-star travel memoir, Not That Anyone Asked.

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Find out more about Travis — his travel memoir, podcast appearances, blogs, music, and more at his website, www.traviswking.com

All uncredited photos belong to the author.