The big 4-0. It was supposed to be a moment of reflection. A time to consider what the next chapter of life will hold.
But that morning of my fortieth birthday, something was different.
I awoke to a sharp, unsettling sensation, as though something in the universe had shifted and my very DNA had been altered. The low, almost imperceptible hum of a Fender Rhodes electric piano reverberated through my bones. The room was the same, but something felt… wrong. Almost…sinister.
I grabbed my phone, half-conscious, still trying to shake off sleep, when I saw it. The screen lit up like a portal to something foreign yet familiar. A doorway into a world of adult-oriented rock.
It was Steely Dan. Their entire discography. Every album, every track, downloaded without my consent. As if it had materialized overnight, as if it had come for me.
“I’m not a Steely Dan fan,” I said to my reflection in the mirror. “I’m a 2000s indie kid. I like the Strokes, and… some more recent bands I can’t name at the moment. I’m not some middle-aged dad.” Granted, I literally am forty and have kids, but you know what I mean.