OK, I'm going to tell you what's going on and a lot of people may not like it because I will be talking about the elephant in the middle of the living room. It's about the money. Entire institutions of total B.S. are built simply to make "those who do not know what they are doing appear as if they do". Plug in whatever B.S. you want: extreme programming, UML, Rational Rose, agile programming (whatever that means?!?), and most importantly, object orientation. Real pros don't use these unless they are forced. Many of us have been "agile" for 20 or 30 years before some idiot MBA came up with the term. Institutions would rather implement some of this B.S. and plug in lower paid (and usually younger) programmers. And services firms MUST do this or perish. Why pay you $100K when they could plug in 2 $50K newbies and bill them out at $150 per hour? In IT you don't have to be good; you just have to stay one step ahead of the user. And who couldn't do that?
My suggestion: find someone smart (they ARE out there, but not always easy to find) who understands the value of a professional who can "hit the high notes". Go to work for them. You'll both be a lot happier in the long run.
Could someone go in the next room and have pg put down that book and cup of tea? His robot was supposed to have posted hours ago about how startups are the answer to the problem of having to prove your worth to unreasonable people.
People look at someone applying for a position like this as a big red flag. I think it's that simple. As others have pointed out hiring is typically a "lemon market". Unless the hiring manager is really good it makes some sense for them to move on to the next candidate.
It works the other way around. Older people stop learning new things and their brains correspondingly lack freshness. With dedication, there is no age limit on an activity. Every field is learned by doing.
You probably won't be a luminary in the field, but that isn't the question.
My suggestion: find someone smart (they ARE out there, but not always easy to find) who understands the value of a professional who can "hit the high notes". Go to work for them. You'll both be a lot happier in the long run.