The monotony of milestones.
Celebrate everything, instead.
We ask parents if their babies have walked their first steps yet. Cameras waiting to capture it. We anxiously await the first words to escape from babies’ lips. Smile heartily at first day of school photos. Celebrate the first haircut. Make a memory book with the cinema ticket that became the scene of the longed for first kiss. Passing your driving test. The university acceptance letter quickly replaced in your parents’ homes by a graduation photo. Moving out. Getting the job. Moving in with your partner. Buying a home with the signature photo of a pair of polished keys with blurry door numbers in the background. The questions begin to surface with “when do you think you’ll get married?”, before the first date ends. Then, the wedding. The children. Retirement. All of the milestones.
They may shift and adjust depending on culture, beliefs and undoubtedly individuality. Yet, there’s something so tightly ingrained in our society at large that has determined the significant events in our lives that are deemed worthy of celebrating. The life moments that are designed for Instagram posts, photo albums and kidnap the entirety of conversations. It’s the ones we ask about, wait for and believe in. The stuff that we’ve been told forms the key steps in our journeys here, that lets us know if we’re on the right path or not. When in actuality, who gets to decide what is right? Who gets to decide at which age rather than stage of our lives should certain things happen.
I get it. Milestones create an inner bubblewrap of safety reminding us that we’re part of humanity and doing life “properly” with each milestone we reach. I don’t believe in the institution of marriage, but I’ll always cry at a “how we met” story at a wedding. I don’t really understand the mass hysteria of needing to save up for a property before your first pay-check lands in your current account, but I’ll bring a vase to your housewarming party and admire the accomplishment.
I find milestones monotonous, not for the stories of precious moments swathed up in them, but the permeating ideals, pressure, and comparison attached to them. Especially, when those milestones feel like they belong to certain ages. Where fear creeps in if you haven’t had your first kiss around the same age as your peers. Thinking there’s something wrong with you if you don’t have a house renovation story to share at a dinner party because you’ve chosen to travel or study instead. When the same things in society are revered and celebrated, then there must be things that go unnoticed. That’s what I’m interested in. I’m curious about why these events have become milestones, why we follow them and do they even have any emotional meaning or resonance, or is it just what we think we should do and celebrate.
I’m also interested in the cultural appeal of these milestones despite the exponential changes that society has moved through. Research suggests that we’re not even engaging in the milestones that we still seem to find appealing. The Office for National Statistics stated that in 2021, in the UK, 72% of people aged 25 to 29 years who lived in a couple were not married or in a civil partnership. This has increased from 56% of couples in 2011.
Similarly, research from University of Southampton’s UK Generations and Gender survey showed, “Less than half of 25 to 34 years old said they definitely or probably intend to have a child. Among 35 to 41 years old, around a third say they will definitely not have a child, with a further 20% saying they probably will not.”
We are constantly evolving and responding not only to changes in self but to all that’s around us. When we’re navigating more fertility struggles, rising childcare costs, the difficulties of nuclear families in systems that don’t promote a care economy, seeing the impact of overpopulation on deforestation and loss of biodiversity, have more awareness of intergenerational trauma and exposed to different ways of living, then of course the choice on having children is not as simple as, “I guess I should”.
When job titles become obsolete at a moment’s notice and job titles are created within seconds, it feels impossible to keep up with the world of work. You can make a milestone out of getting the job you’ve always wanted, to then be made redundant a few months later. It doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t celebrate it, but in this economy we’ve got to look at all the micro moments in and around it that are equally as worthy. We have to be practiced in celebrating the multiplicity of ways to work, especially the ones that aren’t culturally celebrated or given milestone status. We praise the shiny covetable job titles, with coos of “you’ve made it”. We rarely do the same for someone who’s working in a coffee shop a few times a week while they write their newsletter that is a source of unparalleled joy. That right there, is worthy of making a big deal out of. I want to hear about that.
The milestones that we stay tethered to and loudly celebrate despite the changing world, inevitably lead to comparison, envy and societal pressure. This grand old desire to fit in. To do what is expected. Smile for the photos of what we think we “should do” and by the age we think we should do it. We’re simultaneously told that we should be unique, quirky and different, but that’s not represented in a culture that has a path set out for us and rewards us for staying on it. Where choices outside of the norm are labelled as alternative and need to be defended or reasoned. We don’t ask people why they want to get married or why they bought a house. We sure as hell ask them in astonishment why they wouldn’t want to.
Milestones are milestones and even while I find them monotonous, if you love it, then I love it for you, but do you actually love it? Was your first kiss a burger sauce scented hurricane of tongue and teeth clashing, but you saved the scarf you wore, because you thought you had to? Did you pretend your baby’s first word was “mama” when they actually said “poo” because that’s the one we think should be memorialised? Did you actually want your hungover graduation photo from a degree you randomly chose, to be the one above the family fireplace? What about all of the life that happened in-between those milestones? Are we savouring and praising those?
The moments that went without ceremony or photo dumps. The tea party you held for your cat but didn’t invite anyone else to because you thought they wouldn’t get it. The email from a client saying thank you that you re-read every single day but didn’t feel was a significant milestone in your business. The random kiss on a Tuesday night with your partner of 12 years that left you speechless, but only your wedding where your Spanx cut into your waist and you were too exhausted to enjoy it, is what’s celebrated the most.
I want to celebrate and dance for everything. I want to celebrate the diversity of our choices. I want to scroll down my feed and not only praise the “I said yes” ring shots, baby scan photos, job updates, new house keys in manicured hands and 1 year anniversary dinners. I want to read love letters to the mundane. The milestones that might look like booking your first ever therapy session, wearing shorts for the first time without hating your thighs, the random-bits-you-found-in-the-fridge dinner you made for your best friend because they listened to you complain for 3.5 hours. I want to celebrate the days where we chose ourselves. The ones where we got out of bed after crying into damp pillows. I want to make milestones that are significant to us even when others say they’re not.
The milestones that come to mind from my relationship thus far wasn’t meeting each other’s families and friends, or when we first kissed, even though they meant the universe to us both. I have a list on my phone of things he does and says every single day that I want to celebrate. A list of moments not milestones, that deserve a pause of recognition. I have never thought about the milestones to come, because we both don’t believe in them. The world might want to know what’s next for us, but when the present is so completely delicious, why would we care about ticking off things from a list of expectations?
There’s so many ways to exist and we are existing in all of them. We are free to choose our choices. We are able to explore the aspects of our identities that were once forced to be hidden. All of our bold individuality, curiosity and choices can’t boil down to how many milestones we’ve completed. It’s all kinds of annoying to be sharing vivid details about how joyful life feels, describing the miso caramel fudge cookie from Sainsbury’s in detail and the birds you saw that day, to then be asked when you might buy a house or get married. Bruh, did you not hear what I said? I am living. I am alive. I am choosing to live in my most authentic expression, don’t diminish that because there’s no socially expected milestones in sight for me. Those milestones aren’t my milestones.
We all deserve to have a life that isn’t burdened by norms that don’t belong to us. A life well lived is one that celebrates the moments we incorrectly label as small, when in fact, they are life itself. Existing in the minutiae. Thriving in the mundane.
6 Random Things That Made Me Think and Feel Things
A weekly edit for paid subscribers of the articles, videos, food, beauty and other things from life, with what they made me think and feel about the human experience.
1. “Can’t you just love me quietly?”, via KAOS, Episode 1 on Netflix
I’m very into this show, add it to your watch list. This line said by the character Eurydice to Orpheus really took me out. My brain leapt into thoughts of lovebombing and that very loud version of not-actually-love that looks like grand gestures after two dates. The TikTok videos of “will you be my girlfriend?” outlined in scarlet petals on hotel beds with too many balloons to manage. Rom-coms with declarations of love so dramatic that they bring on early onset nausea. Quiet love is desperately beautiful, I wish that was what we showed more of on-screen. The quiet touches. Silent looks across full rooms. The morning smiles and forehead kisses.
2. The Joys and Fails of Getting Mail, via the Bertha Cake from Get Baked