Somehow I said “He’s young, he’s barely 40”, and that’s when it hit me! Smack! It felt like a good slap across the face. At that exact moment I realised what I had just said: Forty wasn’t old. I started thinking of how "old" people would always defend their age group for some reason.
One has to be forty or over to understand this. Remember when in primary school they would ask us where we would see our self in the year 2000? I remember coming home and telling my mother:
“Today at school we had to say where and what we would be doing in the future, like in the year 2000. I told sister Yvette that I would be old by then. In the year 2000 I will be 34 years old!”I still see my mom, peeling potatoes, slowly turning around with this puzzled look on her face, and all she said was “I’m 36, do you think I’m old?” At the time I did. I didn’t tell her that, at least not that time. Now, I’m over 40 and I don’t think it’s “that” old. Yes I do see the changes, and mostly feel them, but still. In my head I don’t feel like a forty years old woman…
My girlfriend laughed last night when I voiced that observation or rather “realisation”. Her comment was “I don’t think fifty is that old either, and yet my body is telling me otherwise”. Whatever my body is telling me is one thing, but to go to the butcher and be called “ma’am” by a man older than me, that’s another slap, and yet:
Really, I don’t! It's all part of growing up… uh… I meant old…older… argh, whatever!
18 comments:
I know what you mean! I'm amazed at how young I feel, surely I'm not approaching ... middle age?!?
I totally agree. The eighteen year old in my head has real issues with the mirrors of the world lately, but I do take some comfort in the fact that we are much younger now than our parents were at this age. And simply going by your writings I would not have been able to guess your age beyond '30 something'.
I love the pic of the woman saying I don't give a shit-toooo funny.
I too feel exactly the way you do.
First I never imagined me being 40
Second I always felt younger and didn't give a shit about numbers, but...
Third-this year I am realizing things from injuries and healing times that make me think that fortydum has hit me wheather I want to accept it or not.
Keep fighting and rage on into the night stinkypaw!
time is really fuct up. when i think about it too much it hurts my head.
i believe the key to staying young is changing your hairstyle frequently.
I'm totally with you on this one. As a child, I remember thinking that people over 40 were ANCIENT. I'm now 42 and not surprisingly, I no longer feel that way. Hmmmmmmmmm. But I just became a great-aunt a few months ago so I guess I really am getting old!
I love Gordon Ramsay too and I'd love to be able to do say some of the things he says. :-D
I know what you mean!
Just last night, Bill and I were out and saw a group of teenage girls...a couple of them were wearing boxer shorts on top of their jeans. Perhaps it's a new fashion thing with the younger set...but we commented on how old we must be, thinking it was weird and not "cool".
I used to think that 40/50 was old, but it doesn't seem like it is anymore...especially since I'm getting closer to 40 every year. I look at my parents who are in their mid 50's and they don't seem old to me...not like 50 year olds seemed when I was a kid, anyways.
Oh my god, that pic is amazing. I might just put it on a t-shirt and gesture to it when people speak to me.
Sorry i can't relate to your horrendous oldness. I mean, 40, shouldnt you be doddering about with a blue rinsed perm by now?
Its worrying that i have started looking at the 'kidz' of today, and wondering how the hell i got so old! i catch myself thinking ''what is she wearing? common tart. she'll catch her death of cold''.
tnb: It's scary at times, how fast it goes.
marius: Are you saying I write "young"? It's true though, looking at pictures of my mom at 40 she looked older than I do now.
wreckless: That's another thing, recup (from injuries, nights out, etc) does take longer now...
princess: Agreed, that's one thing I often change. Like I will be doing on Friday pm!
ananke: Wouldn't be great, at least once, to go nose to nose with a dumbass and scream it in their face?! Oh, I think it would feel soooooo good!
kim: Boxers over jeans, haven't seen that yet... yikes! Your parents are young (but so are you!), and it is all about persceptive, isn't it?!
pigeon: Figures, you'd like that picture! The blue has been tempting me for a while now, but not the perm! Nope, thanks but no thanks!
Since I was born old, it's nothing new to me. Now if only I could get used to all of these aches and pains!
Ugh... I'm not going to age well at all. I'm gonna be one of those crazy botox, lypo, collagen, hyperbaric chamber junkies I just know it.
tammie: Not something I really want to get use to... I want those pains to go away!
marfsbaby: Welcome to my blog! As long as you know it and are ok with it, that's what matters!
Are you saying I write "young"?
Absolutely! :-)
marius: ok then! I'll take that as a compliment! :-)
Huh? Gordon's made it over to Canada/US now? What? Are there not enough people over here for him to shout and scream at?
Glad you like him though, he's fab.
Old is a state of mind. While I have recently hit 40, I have a friend at work who when I needle her, she will look at me and say, "What are you, 12?"
I totally get it. I get younger and younger the older I get. :)
I totally agree with Brave Astronaut: Old is a state of mind.
Nevertheless, I cannot believe that I've been 60(!!!) for six months. Lucky for me, though, I'm going through my second childhood: Martha only has to get up once a night to change my diaper.
pawpads: I just love Gordon, and he's been in the States for a few years now. I don't know if he's been to Canada yet.
brave a: Totally agree!
pink: Just like me! ;-)
charlie: Funny how we go back to the way we first started, no? You don't do your nights yet?
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