Wonderfully Unavailable

On FOMO, time, and the very specific desire to dance at six and be home by ten

Mabel has FOMO.

Not a quiet, private, reflective version. She announces it.

“I have FOMO.”

This can mean many things. There may be a parade somewhere. A concert she could have gotten tickets to. A nightclub that exists in theory, if not in our actual evening plans. A festival, a second line, a party, or some event within a fifty-mile radius that appears to contain music, people, and the vague promise that something memorable might happen.

For a while I took it personally and wondered if she was bored.

Our life is not exactly dull, but it is not the rock-star version of New Orleans either. We like happy hour. We like brunch. We like sitting on the beach. We like music, festivals, parades, and all the beautiful chaos this city offers. We also like coming home at a reasonable hour with our dignity, our sandals, and our nervous systems intact. At the beach, our version of glamour is a good chair, a cold drink, and no one asking us to move.

Still, I understood what she meant. There is a certain kind of longing that shows up now, and it is hard to name without sounding as if you are trying to be twenty-five again.

I am not trying to be twenty-five again. There are parts of being younger I remember fondly, but nostalgia is a very talented editor. It leaves in the music, the clothes, the feeling that anything might happen, and the people you loved before you understood how complicated love could be. It quietly removes the exhaustion, the bad decisions, the financial anxiety, the emotional confusion, and the many years spent pretending to enjoy things I did not enjoy.

I do not want to go back, but I do want the door to stay open. That is the difference I keep coming back to. I want the fun, the music, the romance, the travel, the beautiful clothes, the late-blooming ambition, the sense that something interesting could still happen. I just want all of it in a way that fits the life I actually love now.

If I want to dance my heart out and be home by ten, I want that to be possible without it being treated as a compromise, a punchline, or evidence that I have aged out of fun. I want the good music and the good lighting. I want beer and wine and people who know the words. I want a dance floor where no one is filming themselves for content and no one looks confused when the DJ plays Prince.

About six months ago I decided someone should create theme dance nights for people over forty. They would start at 6 p.m. and end at 10 p.m. This is, frankly, a brilliant idea.

Not “oldies night,” which sounds like a punishment served with a sad buffet. Not a novelty event. A real night out. Disco. Madonna. Motown. Miami Sound Machine, which Mabel would attend with the seriousness of a pilgrim reaching a holy site. New Wave. Eighties dance. Mardi Gras music. Whatever makes people remember they still have a body and it still knows what to do when the right song comes on.

It would be packed. I know this because I know too many people who still want the thing and no longer want all the nonsense around the thing.

This is where I think the cultural story gets lazy. It assumes that wanting a calmer life means wanting a smaller one, that if you do not want to be out until two in the morning you are no longer interested in the party. Maybe you are very interested in the party. Maybe you just have better ideas about when it should begin, what should be served, and how easily one should be able to get an Uber home. That is not boredom setting in. It is the slow and rather satisfying development of standards.

At twenty-five I might have stayed out late because I was afraid of missing something. Now I am more selective, which is a tremendous relief. I love getting up early. I love writing before the world starts making requests. I love the strange, quiet hour when an idea is still close enough to catch, and I am not trading it for a mediocre party and a two-day recovery. But give me the right party at the right hour and I am absolutely available.

That is the part people seem to miss. We are not done. We are editing, which is a different project altogether and a more interesting one. We are not trying to recreate our twenties. We are trying to claim the parts of life we did not have the time, money, confidence, or freedom to enjoy properly the first time.

When I was forty I had children to raise, work to do, money to earn, people to manage, things to prove, and a calendar that did not leave much room for asking what I actually wanted. I was capable but stretched thin. I was productive but not always free. I had a life, but much of it was spoken for.

So yes, in some ways sixty is the new forty. I know the phrase gets used too often, usually on a magazine cover next to a woman who has never met a carb she did not have professionally negotiated on her behalf. But I understand the impulse behind it. I am not trying to be younger. I am saying I have more access to myself now than I did then. I am smarter and more curious, I get more done, and I know what I will no longer sit through unless there is excellent wine and a clear exit strategy. I also look better than I did at forty, which still surprises me, and I am not going to pretend otherwise for the sake of modesty.

The problem is not the number. It is the story that gets attached to the number.

There is still a strange discomfort around women wanting a lot at this stage of life. We are allowed to be wise, helpful, charming, stylish, generous, and supportive. We are allowed to age gracefully, as long as gracefully does not make anyone uncomfortable. Desire is trickier. A woman over fifty wanting more can make people nervous. More love. More money. More beauty. More business. More travel. More attention. More fun. More room.

Not everyone disapproves, of course. Most people are far too busy thinking about themselves, which is one of the great comforts of adulthood. But there is still a tone that appears now and then. A small joke. A raised eyebrow. A “good for you” with a little question mark hiding inside it. Good for me, yes. The question mark they can keep.

This is where FOMO becomes more serious than missing a concert or a parade, because the real FOMO now is about time.

There is still time. I am not saying this from a fainting couch, and there is plenty I still intend to do. But the runway feels different than it did twenty years ago. Not tragic, just visible, and that visibility changes things. It makes me less patient with postponement. I do not want to wait until the business is perfect, the body is perfect, the bank account is perfect, the house is finished, the timing is better, or someone else has blessed the plan. Perfect timing has not proven itself to be a reliable friend.

I want to travel while I still want to travel. I want to build the thing while I have the energy and the obsession to build it. I want beauty, work, friendship, good food, quiet mornings, and excellent hotel bars. I want serenity and possibility at the same time, which sounds contradictory unless you have ever deeply loved both a beach chair and a passport stamp.

I want the life I have now, only expanded. Not blown up, not abandoned, not traded in for a fantasy version of myself who stays out all night and regrets nothing. Just larger than it has been allowed to be.

That is what I finally understand about Mabel’s FOMO. It used to make me nervous because I thought it meant our life was not enough. Now I think it means she still expects life to offer invitations, and I love that, because I want that too. Not every invitation, God, no. I have become wonderfully unavailable for a great many things. But I still want the door open. I still want to feel that life is not narrowing without my consent, that fun has not been handed over to the young, that romance is not embarrassing, that ambition is not unbecoming, and that wanting more does not make me ungrateful for what I already have. I am deeply grateful. I also want more, and I have decided that is allowed.

The nostalgia is real. Sometimes a song comes on and I remember exactly who I was, what I was wearing, who I loved, what I believed might happen. There is sweetness in that, and there is also relief that I do not have to be that woman again. I do not want the old version of fun. I want the current one, with better judgment, better taste, better boundaries, better coffee, better travel plans, and a much clearer understanding of what a good night is worth. A good night does not have to end at 2 a.m. to count, and a life does not have to shrink just because it has gotten more specific about what it wants.

And yes, if someone could please organize a very chic dance night that starts at six, I would like to be on the list.

Mabel too, obviously.

She has FOMO.

Of course, now I need to know if anyone else out there has FOMO in their 50’s and beyond? What triggers your FOMO?