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Our Cultural Norm of Settling Down Is Weird and Doesn’t Work Anymore
Millennials and Gen Z are looking for more than what a settled-down life can give them
He’d been drinking so it probably wasn’t the best time to have a ‘where is your life going’ conversation. But parents are like that, they always choose inopportune moments for an inappropriate question sesh.
“I mean, you can’t travel forever. You’re going to settle down again at some point, aren’t you?”
Ah, settling down. That thing we’re all supposed to do regardless of our situation, current marital status, and whether it suits our personality or not. A guillotine comes down. Life before settling down can be whatever we like. Life after doesn’t change. You get the house, the kids, the car, the career, and stay in formation every day from now until you die.
Urgh.
“Well, Dad, I don’t know just yet. I feel more settled on the road than I ever did in suburbia.”
Then he said something that has noodled me ever since we had this conversation 8 weeks ago.
“How can you possibly feel settled living out of a suitcase?”
I did a bit of Googling before writing this article and the internet is full of definitions of…
