Writer Calvin Trillin Explains Mid-Life Crises

"In all of the theories about why so many people have attacks of wackiness when they reach middle age - resign from the bank to go live in a van with a teen-age mushroom gatherer, and that sort of thing - one factor has been neglected: When someone reaches middle age, people he knows begin to get put in charge of things, and knowing what he knows about the people who are being put in charge of things scares the hell out of him."

Yep.