And luck. I abused my body quite a bit more than most. Worked at some pretty physical jobs (field construction) and at 70 I’m in pretty good shape. I now go to the gym a couple of times a week and love to hike on the weekends. My vital organs are (shockingly) in good shape.
I don’t think so, but many do (search the board for old thread). I think that’s mostly selection bias (people forget all the very ordinary clothing from the earlier decades, only remembering trendy stuff) and that younger people pay more attention to fashion than older, as a general rule. And the more you’ve seen, the more you see things as looking like the past (and you didn’t know that 70s fashion was also pulling from old fashions). Then, of course, the lessening of monoculture.
I have a cherished photo of my grey-haired mother climbing up the outside of the staircase and over the railing (in a flannel nightgown, no less), because the entryway and foyer were jammed with my pajama clad friends attending my “Come as You Sleep” party (high school years).
I and my friends marveled at and cheered her. I’m four years older now, than she was then.
I think once I had kids (ten years ago) the summer/not summer cycle became more important as they were out of school.
But when I was a kid, we seemed to somehow just pack a ton more stuff into the summers, even if we spent a lot of time not doing stuff. 4 weeks at summer camp seemed like forever (in a good way).
I find it weird that I can have a conversation with my younger coworkers where I can describe events like starting my career in the years leading up to Y2K, starting my first post-MBA job in Lower Manhattan…the week of 9/11, how my wife sort of caused the 2008 financial crisis, Hurricane Sandy, even COVID started like half a decade ago,
It’s also strange hearing 80s songs in bars and restaurants. In my mind, that would be like being in the 80s and having them constantly play music from WWII.
In fact, the 50 year time period from 1925 to 1975 seems way more a dramatic shift than the 50 year period from 1975 to 2025.
Glad you’re not accusing your wife of causing Hurricane Sandy… 
Yep, even “Friends” is like 30 years old… And if you dressed like them nobody would turn their head on the street as you walk by.
Subjective time—how long or short life feels—is shaped by a number of factors, especially the amount of change one goes through in a lifetime. When life is packed with emotionally charged, unique events, those moments stand out in memory. Later, looking back, those stretches between events feel richer and fuller—almost as though they stretched out longer. On the other hand, when daily life doesn’t change much (like most human generations throughout history, when events changed little from birth to death), everything tends to blur together, making entire years feel like they flew by in a blink.
My grandparents (born in the latter 19th century), who I knew well and often spoke with about their past, lived through an era many regard as one of history’s most transformational: the tail end of the 19th century through the mid-20th. They went from horse-and-buggy transportation and kerosene lights to watching Neil Armstrong land on the moon and witnessing the birth of the computer age. It’s not hard to imagine how, despite the length of those decades, all the upheaval made it feel like time was racing forward. So many things in their lives changed so quickly.
Of course, our own time is no slouch when it comes to rapid change—just look at how fast the digital world has taken over. The Internet, smartphones, even self-driving cars—all of that would’ve seemed like science fiction not that long ago. Whether the pace of modern life feels faster than it did back then depends on who you ask. Some may argue we’re living through the biggest shifts yet, while others—like my grandparents—experienced what felt like an entirely different world by the end of their lives compared to the one they were born into.
I believe our current generation’s subjective perception of time is radically different/faster than previous generations—since we first descended from the trees onto the African savanna—exceeded only by my grandparents’ generation.
Speaking of 30 year old friends. I met up with a couple of old friends of mine who I used to work with years ago. One I met 25 years ago when we worked at Deloitte and the other a few years later when all three of us worked at a different company.
It weirdly feels like a very long time and at the same time, very recent.
Sure, it’s not the kind of style that would immediately look wildly out of place if you saw one person walk by, but watching “Friends” now, it’s very obvious those are not modern fashions. No one would see a photo of the show from back then and think it was from a show set in 2025.
Another observation on this. The bit of my brain responsible for telling me how long ago a particular time period was, is different than the bit of my brain responsible for telling how long ago a bit of video was made 
Me remembering the 1990s: That wasn’t so long ago, maybe 15 years or so, definitely less than 20 years at most. Everything was the same back then except I was young, single, and childless
Me watching TV shows or news from the 1990s: Holy crap this looks old. It looks like it was recorded in the 1960s! Look at the clothes, the cars, the video quality!