David Stubbs So, according to a new survey, "life begins at 53". Cue photos of handsome, tanned, silver-haired couples regarding the sunset with a glad eye. Well, I'm 50 but tell that to my permanently injured knee, or my hairline and my girth, terminal victims of recession and inflation respectively. As I drag my frame to the gym to be depressed at the surrounding acreage of lithe, buff flesh that I could only hope to emulate with the aid of a time machine rather than a weights machine, I hear the inner cry of my hunter-gatherer ancestors. "50? What are you still doing here, you decrepit sack of uselessness?" And they're right. When I was a teenager, my dad told me I dressed like an idiot and listened to rubbish music. Today, I regard young people and guess what? They dress like idiots, listen to rubbish. Now, it so happens that I'm part of the first ever parental generation, unlike my dad's, to be right about this. But no matter. The point is, the generation gap is as wide as ever and the youth culture the baby boomers set in train means that the world is for the young, not the old. That we're going to live longer will only lengthen and deepen the misery – and widen the gap further.
Liz Hoggard I'm not surprised 41 has been sacked as entry level for middle age. It sounds so young! Like you, David, I was born in 1962. But I genuinely believe this is the best bit. Maybe it helps to have been born female. Happiness experts say the worst age for a woman is 38, with so much turmoil to navigate. By 50 we've made our choices about career and children (plus society has been helpfully preparing us for decrepitude since adolescence). But actually I feel indignant that middle age has been sold so badly. Frankly I don't recognise the list of signifiers – booking cruises, complaining about modern bands, comfortable shoes. And don't bash the National Trust – it's awash with hipsters. But I do agree life is no longer a dress rehearsal – we need to get out of our comfort zone, learn new things, listen to a different radio station, sleep on a different side of the bed. I'm no great fan of phrases such as "anti-ageing" and "age-defying". Isn't it just another way of denying everything you have been – and will be? I'm sure young people will howl if we delude ourselves we're still young. But actually we owe it to them to provide a role model, to say this life stage is not all grim. Instead of pretending society is run by 26-year-olds on Twitter.
DS Alas, choices about career are increasingly made for the over-50s, increasing numbers of whom find themselves out of work and with as much chance of finding new employment as they have of auditioning successfully for One Direction. I agree – booking cruises isn't high on their list of signifiers, or options. It's a kind thought to provide role models to the young of middle age but I suspect the young do not give a hoot about middle age, which they regard as an ancient, distant, alien and irrelevant condition. My own daughter (just eight) asked me recently: "When are you going to die, Daddy?" I'm sure she's fond of her old man but as the decades pass, and her own much-needed property inheritance is put on hold as I prolong my days taking up yoga or trying Radio Seven, I suspect that rather than feeling inspired, she'll be impatiently regarding me the way Prince Charles must do his mother some days. As for comfort zones, don't knock 'em – the cosy M&S trousers, the postprandial nap and the greeting of the dawn chorus as you make your third trip of the night to the lavatory are among the few pleasures left to us on the long trek to the grave.
LH Well, I'm impressed by the eight-year-old. Always important to raise the girl children with a sense of self-worth. But I do agree about decisions being made for the over-50s: it's not a good time to be at the mercy of the markets or to be haring around town competing with the Bright Young Things. All the more reason to develop a portfolio career, I guess, so we're not dependent on one income stream (or one unkind boss). And many of us are planning to live communally later. Though it would be naive to forget that age and social class both matter when it comes to poverty. But what great good fortune for the class of '62 to have been born into a less authoritarian era (another reason we have the illusion of youthfulness) where we're allowed to tell friends the truth and not keep up pretences. The brilliant thing about life now is that I never have that awful "back to school" feeling on Sunday nights that lingered well into my 20s and 30s. I do think we need to make allies of the younger generation (though not in a sickly, down-with-the-kids way). One of life's pleasures is cross-generational friendships where we enjoy one another's strengths. And actually everyone likes reliable colleagues who aren't after their job!
DS Yes, we of the class of '62 did have it lucky – granted, we had to endure the penal servitude of the 70s but there were still student grants for some of us and you didn't have to win the National Lottery to afford a one-bedroom flat in Charlton. My worry is that, much as our parents begrudged us our long hair, our children will begrudge us our longevity. Communal living will mean costly care homes, with our kids aghast as, over decade after decade of deferred senility, we eat up whatever bequest we might have left them with our youth culture-inspired desire to live for ever, kept buoyant by tea dances conducted to the Human League and Soft Cell. They may not feel like being cross-generational chums with us if we outstay our welcome and frankly, I'd advise future oldies to make their kids eat any birthday cake they bring them first, in front of them, just to check.
Maybe, on reflection, the secret of middle age is not to defer it, but to embrace it early, like Jacob Rees-Mogg. For him, life began at 53 because he was clearly born aged 53 and has stayed that age since. You can't lament your lost youth if you never had one in the first place…
LH The trouble is the middle-aged curmudgeon does have all the best lines! But you know as a woman, I can't be so downhearted. Fifty years ago, the roles for women were strictly prescribed. You only have to watch Mad Men to see how suffocating it was. We are the first generation to have access to full education, economic independence and control over our bodies. We can never be complacent about such rights, but it's been thrilling to see in the space of two years the word feminist coming back into general use. Many more young women (and men) are debating casual sexism, harassment and ageism. Maybe it helps that our fiftysomething role models are Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore, women who have kicked over the traces (the French have a phrase "bien dans ta peau": happy in your skin). But I'm eternally grateful there are second acts in women's lives now. At 50 my grandmother (who left school at 14 to work in a shop) may have dominated the private sphere of our family, but she had effectively retired from the world. She became an older woman in a cardigan. That waste makes me tearful. Yes I, too, regret the blurring of the jawline and waistline. But to have come this far feels like a gift.
The new version of Dangerous Women: The Guide to Modern Life by Liz Hoggard, Clare Conville and Sarah Jane Lovett is published on 3 October (Orion £6.99)
