Just cause I like to know where other people have been at this stage in their life. Feel free to answer as you like.
Me:
Job: Teacher
Significant Relationship: Nothing
Income: 50000
Social Life: Frustrating
Health: Great
Other: I have a new car, I exercise, I could own property at the end of the year, I am successful in most definitions of the term…but I don’t feel it. And I feel a bit stuck. I am better then last year though (no depression anymore)
At 26, I was working on my PhD – social life active (let’s just leave it at that for relationship status also) – income negligible – health good, though I was drinking heavily, which I wouldn’t realize was a problem for another 5 years.
Well this is 3 years ago for me.
Job: Supervisor.
SR: Nothing.
Income: 25000 (£)
Social Life: I don’t understand the question.
Health: I’ve had good health at some point in the last 3 years. not sure if it was at 26 though.
Job: Customer Service Representative for a major American retailer
Relationship: My last relationship was about sixteen months ago, and involved a prolonged paternity scare. He’s not mine.
Income: $20,000, give or take. It’s pretty average for my education and geographic locale.
Social Life: Mostly online. I have two local friends, only one of which I see outside work. I’m mostly okay with that.
Health: I’ve regained half of the weigh I lost the two years previous. I have no other known health problems.
Other: I drive a fairly new car, but live at home. My health could be better due to the weight gain, and I suffer from bouts of apathy, ambivalence, and mild depression. My life’s pretty much idling.
Note: I’m 26 until January 30.
Job: Factory worker
Relationship: engaged
Income: 60,000/yr (fairly decent for the time, my age, and my lack of any post secondary education)
Social life: partied & drank way too much
Health: great, except the hangovers were starting
Living situation: owned home
Satisfaction level: Low, because of my job mostly
That was when I started realizing that money isn’t everything…
ETA: For me, 26 fell in the 80s.
The year was 1994 …
Job: data entry for investment bankers
Significant Relationship: married (going into my 4th year)
Income: don’t remember exactly, probably ca. USD 22,000
Social Life: none to speak of
Health: very good
Other: had moved to North Carolina the year before in the hopes that my then-wife’s new job opportunity would wind up paying off our bills and allowing me to go to grad school. That didn’t really work out, but the bank I worked for had a splendid tuition-reimbursement benefit which wound up putting me through school for free starting the next year (1995).
When I turned 26 I was living with my (then) boyfriend (now husband) and in the last year of my PhD in Biology.
By the time I turned 27 I finished my PhD, got married and was pregnant. It was a busy year, the year of being 26.
Income- 10K on a grad school stipend
Health- Fine
Relationship- long term live in/fiancee
Social life- Friends in Grad school- was in the lab 12-14 hours a day, so they were my pals.
It was one of the best years of my life…
I was 26 in 1986.
Job: Programmer
Relationship: Damned if I can remember. I was always involved with someone but it (they?) obviously weren’t significant.
Income: Probably about $40,000.
Social life: Great. I was still having lots of fun being a deadhead back then and there were always lots of people around to hang out with.
Health: Fine for someone that smoked.
My first new car was about 4 years old, I rollerskated all over the place for fun but it was great exercise, I frittered away every penny I made on Dead tour, music, drugs, clothes and whatever else caught my eye, saved nothing, planned for no emergencies and exhibited little to no common sense or concern for my own safety. It was great.
When I was 26, I quit my not-so-awesome job where I made the not-so-exciting sum of $19,500 a year to move halfway across the country for school, where my income was negative, in the neighborhood of minus $35,000 (financed through student loans). It meant starting all over in terms of relationships, etc., but that ended up being quite a good thing.
At 26, I was 4 years out of the USAF and entering my senior year in college for my Mechanical Engineering degree.
Job: Full time student. 3-5 hrs a day in class. 10-12 hrs a day on school work outside of class.
Significant Relationship: Dating my wife to be.
Income: Between the GIBill, grants, and part time work in the summer - ~$10,00/yr
Social Life: Hectic. Partying hard and living up the college life when I could.
Health: Great
At 26 it was 1989, I was 4 years out of school and working at the late, lamented Digital Equipment Corp. I’d bought a house in Nashua the previous year and just bought a new car.
Job: Software Engineer at DEC
Significant Relationship: None at the time
Income: around $40K
Social Life: Most weekends hiking or skiing, friends back at College and in Boston to hang with frequently
Health: just ducky, thanks for asking
When I was 26 it was 1987.
Job: Helpful Hardware Woman
Significant relationship: Married, 5 years
Income: 10 to 12,000, no benefits. Scraping by.
Social life: I had a husband and a cat. That’s about it.
Health: I had an ectopic pregnancy, and the major surgery that went with it. At that time I thought I’d never have kids, although I wanted them; that’s why I got the cat. My daughter was born two years later.
I am 26 until June of next year.
Job: Health insurance agent
Relationship: Long term boyfriend
Income: On paper 40k, but they also provide me with free health insurance and they pay my subway fare and I get quarterly bonuses not included in that amount.
Social life: I have a handful of close friends, my book club, my boyfriend, my roommate and my cats.
Health: I’m a little heavy but other than that I’m pretty healthy.
This was 2005…
Job: Same job as now, my own Web design business
Relationship: Dating a guy at some point but briefly; parted on good terms
Income: I think this was the first year our business was stable and I made $35k+
Social Life: Probably the same as it is now - boring
Health: I don’t recall if I was still pretty fit or just gaining my weight back. sigh
I bought my house when I was 26, which means I also had no credit card debt for a brief period there.
Let’s see here …
Job: Graphic Artist/Public Relations. I changed jobs three times during the year I was 26. Sounds bad, but each change was a step up and a chance to learn wholly new facets of the field (in which I no longer work).
Significant Relationship: Met, dated, and got engaged to my wife during the year I was 26.
Income: Around $22,000
Social Life: A lot of fun that year. Did a lot of new, fun things with my then-new S.O. We had a tight network of common friends back then. Life was good.
Health: Pretty good. I took my good health for granted back then, and I’m quite certain I didn’t visit a doctor for anything that year.
At 26 I had:
no job
annual income of c. 5000e
a girlfriend and a cat
great health apart from mental issues
Boscibo: I’m completely stunned at your “factory worker /60 000 salary” combo. That’s the pay congressmen or high-power CEOs here enjoy. I had several factory jobs back in the 90’s, and the biggest salary I ever got was 1200e per month, or 14k per year.
Job: Consultant for one of those 90s dot-com consulting firms. I had just started business school in the evenings.
Significant Relationship: Long distance…plus whatever 
Income: 57000 (in 2008 dollars)
Social Life: Ok. I was working long hours a lot, and most of my friends were in NY while I was in Boston. Still plenty of time to party, ski and visit friends in NY on the weekends.
Health: Great
Job: HR Clerk
Significant Relationship: I’d just (about a month before my 26th birthday) moved in with Crusoe.
Income: £13000
Social Life: Pretty poor, as I’d just moved cities and didn’t know many people
Health: Fine
Other: In the four years since then, I got married, got promoted 5 times and more than doubled my salary, and joined and later became Chair of a theatre company - through which I made load of friends and gained an incredibly busy and fulfilling social life. My life changed so much for the better in such a short space of time, sometimes it still stuns me.
I turned 26 in 1998. I defended my PhD that year.
Job: Had a teaching fellowship at a university.
Significant Relationship: Had been married for two years. (Still married to the same lady. :))
Income: Mine was maybe $20,000, and my wife’s $25-30,000.
Social Life: Great. We lived in a very friendly apartment complex with a lot of 20-somethings.
Health: Great. I was in the best physical shape I’d been since high school, playing soccer 2-3 times a week (full-field, 90-minutes). Had the occasional migraine, but they weren’t the problem they have since become.
It was a good year. They haven’t all been as good since, although many have been pretty good.
Badass and bulletproof.