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At 61, I Didn’t Make It This Far To Make It This Far
We’ve become a demographic mirage
I turn 61 in a few days.
It’s a strange number. Not round enough to celebrate, not dramatic enough to fear. But so much has happened since my last birthday, that big hairy six oh, it sort of demands a pause.
Sixty-one — Not quite what I expected
When I was younger, I thought 61 was the age of uncles in bad cardigans, men who smelled like aftershave and regret. But now that I’m here, I feel more like a Jedi in exile. Or maybe Prospero, conjuring storms with one hand while quietly planning his exit strategy with the other. And yes, occasionally, Don Quixote, with less of the madness, and a healthy dose of refusal to stop imagining a better world.
That list might come later. I think I am writing this to mark something else: a moment when past experience and future curiosity have finally met on equal terms.
I’m not finished
At 61, I still believe in work that matters, questions that provoke, and ideas that move through culture like a pulse. I am not tired. I am a bit frustrated. And I am getting more precious about where I put my energy and who I spend my time with.
I am leading an event with the where we will be unpacking ageism, but more importantly, how to create intergenerational dialogues. I am lining up talks and meetings with agencies and brands to address the lack of representation of my generation in advertising, and in the talent that brings that to life.
I recognize that I have an opportunity to help companies and brands change how they think about those of a certain age, my age. If I didn’t take it, if I didn’t say something, if I didn’t try to make that change, then I would have missed my chance. I would never again be able to complain about the state of things for myself, others like me, or those who, in the next few years, will be crossing into my tribe, for no other reason than they celebrated a birthday.
The myths that move me
I’ve been thinking about the myths we create. Not just the ancient ones, but the modern archetypes, too. Don Quixote, Odysseus, Gandalf, Ripley, Miranda Priestly, Tony Stark. What they all share is the audacity to keep evolving. To become something more than what the world expects from people their age.
It isn’t just the will to grow, it’s a refusal to stay in the shape the world gave them. They adapt, yes. But on their terms. Each of them finds a way to keep sharp, relevant, and quietly subversive, often all at once, not despite their age or experience, but because of it.
The market failure no one sees
I have spent the last few years circling a truth I couldn’t quite name until I did.
We talk about the attention economy, the creator economy, and the experience economy. But few about the : the space where deeply experienced people still have more to give, more to make, and more to learn, but are quietly edged out by systems designed to worship newness, not wisdom.
And nowhere is that more obvious than in consumer advertising, where Gen X, the first digital immigrants, the last analog romantics, is barely acknowledged. We’re too old to be aspirational, too young to be nostalgic, and apparently too complicated to market to.
But here’s the irony: we built the platforms, shaped the brands, and still hold the wallets. We’re raising kids, caring for parents, running companies, and rethinking what success looks like in real time. And yet, in the marketing world, we’ve become a demographic mirage. Present, but rarely seen.
It’s not just a personal frustration. It’s a market failure. A cultural blind spot. A massive underuse of one of the most valuable resources in business today: the aging knowledge worker who’s still sharp, still driven, and now, finally, unapologetically clear about what matters.
What reinvention looks like, for me
I’ve pitched to rooms where I was the oldest by two decades. I’ve seen agencies shed senior talent in the name of agility, only to stumble through reinvention with no compass. I’ve seen marketing aimed at “older consumers” that feels like it was written by someone who thinks 60 is synonymous with beige slacks and life insurance.
In my late 50s, I dove into AI, not as a tech toy, but as a tool for transformation. I wasn’t chasing relevance. I was chasing possibility. I’m still doing it.
I wasn’t chasing relevance. I did it because I saw what it could unlock, especially for those of us with decades of questions, answers, ideas, and pattern recognition already built in. Experience and innovation aren’t opposites. They’re a power combo. And if the future will be as fast and strange as it promises, we’ll need people like this.
I still want to build things, not in the empire sense. I’m not chasing scale. I’m chasing sharpness. Precision. That clean click when the right idea meets the right moment and shifts something.
At 61, I find myself less interested in being heard by everyone and more focused on being understood by the right few, the ones who are ready, the ones who feel the tension but haven’t yet named it, the ones standing at the edge of something new, looking for a map that doesn’t feel like it was drawn in 2012.
I’ve sat in rooms where I was the only one asking, “What if we’re solving the wrong problem?” I’ve worked with brilliant people who know how to optimize, but not how to pause. And I’ve seen companies chase transformation with all the sincerity of a midlife crisis, desperate for relevance, terrified of reflection.
But enough about me. Let’s talk about me.
I want to work with leadership teams navigating fog. I want to rewrite tired playbooks. I believe AI can be the most human tool we’ve ever made, if we use it correctly. And I want to help others, especially those of us deep in Act Three, see it not as a threat, but a mirror. A way back into wonder. A second wind, if you know how to catch it.
This isn’t about legacy. I’ve made peace with the fact that most of our best work disappears. This is about the next thing, and having the conviction, after all these years, to step into it with eyes open and sleeves rolled.
I don’t feel old. I feel… like I’ve been paying attention for a long time.
I know this: I’m not done thinking, making, or chasing the work that keeps one honest, curious, and interesting.
I still believe in things. Not in the wide-eyed, untested way I once did. But in a way that’s quieter, heavier, more certain. Belief that’s been earned through the friction of time.
And if I reach for metaphors, if Don Quixote, Gandalf, or someone else wanders into the frame, it’s only because I find comfort in stories that remind us reinvention has always been a little mad, a little lonely, and completely necessary.
So no, I’m not signing off. I’m just turning the page.
Again.
