Imagine you are an ageing Gen X software developer looking back on her life. Use a metaphor of the big bad wolf from the three little pigs story to communicate these dilemmas: stocks rising and falling in value at my company, a relationship with Stan where he cheats on you, and finally a little boat house to be alone and old in.
The first house I built was in the early 1990s. A pre-internet software engineering firm. Boom! went our stocks. Father tsked his tongue and muttered things like House of Cards and Icarus. But I was pigheaded and grew the company fast and furiously. I secured bank loans, spoke at California conferences with Steve Jobs, and got a sprawling cherry desk with a view of Boston's harbor. Then a cold wind blew in, huffed and puffed, and kaboom! went our stocks.

The next house I built was in 1999, a bonafide urban walk-up love nest. Stan and I moved in together within three months of meeting. Mother tsked her tongue and called it a house of fire. But I was pigheaded and didn't listen - and Stan was hot. Neighbors carrying groceries smiled at me in the stairwell. We drank wine and played chess at night and made love till dawn. Then a cold northerly blew in. Her name was Ilse. She huffed and puffed till he moved out. I licked my wounds and didn't call my mother for a month.

Then I built my third house. Both parents tsked their tongues but said little. It's smaller than the others - more modest than the first, more secure than the second. And it can stand up to the wind. So when the cold northerly huffed and puffed this time, I hoisted my sails and went with it.