This weekend I, 27 year old man, stopped by one of my rental properties with my friend, a 24 year old woman, to drop off an extra key to a new tenant. When he saw us together, he asked if she was my daughter. :mad:
I’m pretty sure the guy is an idiot, but it bothers me anyway. So I am turning to the SDMB for tips on things I can do to appear younger or maybe things I should be avoiding that are making me seem like I might have a daughter in her 20s.
P.S. I am hoping to avoid picking up any obnoxious habits like wearing pants that don`t stay up or saying “like” and “um” a lot, even though they might technically do the trick.
P.P.S. In all seriousness, I realize this fellow who thought I had a 24 year old daughter was totally out of the ball park, but people generally assume I’m older than I am and I’d like to counteract that a bit and am curious if anyone has any good suggestions.
I think the easiest thing is to not worry what people think.
I’ve had people think my daughter is my girlfriend (she’s 23 years younger than me) and I’ve had people think my girlfriend is my daughter (she’s 6 years younger than me.)
When I was about 45 I was carded at a liquor store and offered the senior citizen’s discount at a grocery store on the same day. Don’t put too much emphasis on what the odd fellow thinks about your age.
I don’t buy cigarettes because smoking is a nasty habit At my local convenience store I do buy beer regularly and the cashiers know me. Last time I bought beer, there was a new cashier, so I got carded. After you hit thirty, I think it stops being a compliment and starts to be an annoyance.
I don’t smoke regularly, I just threw that out there because to get carded for cigarettes mean that the cashier thinks I’m in high school. I’m a father of three, it’s a strange juxtaposition. I get carded for booze too, but I live in a college town and I sort of expect it.
I think this gives you a pretty good impression of my face, body and hair (it’s definitely receding which doesn’t help, but I don’t think too badly yet). I’ve since shaved off the scruffy beard.
That picture is from Christmas day which explains the goofy sweater. I wouldn’t normally wear something quite that whimsical, but I guess I dress a little ‘old’. For example, I wear sweaters about 100 times more often than sweatshirts, but not goofy old man Christmas sweaters. Most of the time I’m dressed “business casual”, because most of the time I am working.
In this particular case, I was wearing jeans and a raincoat and the guy has never seen me in anything except work jeans and a ratty t-shirt because the couple times I’ve met him I’ve always been at my rental house working.
I’m clean shaven now and had a scruffy little beard for about a year, as pictured in the link I posted. Ironically, the only time I was EVER carded, going back to 19, was when I was 26 and had some facial hair. I got carded a few times and I suspect people fear that men are growing beards to make themselves look younger.
Go to one of those expensive hairdressing salons. Preferably the type that’s a tanning/hair/esthetics place with a bunch of young stylin hot chicks working there. Tell them what you told us and ask them to do whatever they think would look good with your hair and to show you how to style it if they put gel or whatever in at the end. After that you can go to cheap hairdressers and get them to duplicate the look if you want. Guys tend not to realize that men’s hair trends change over the years and lots of us have the same haircut we had in high school or college. Trust the young hotties in the expensive salons, they work there instead of Supercuts because they have skills.
update your wardrobe. For younger shoes, try dressy sneakers. Not basketball shoes but stuff like these:
Invest in one expensive pair of well-fitted designer jeans. You know how some old chicks have “mom pants”? Same goes for guys. A sweet pair will run you $150 - $300 but it’s better to have one awesome pair of stylin jeans than 10 pairs of $20 jeans. I did some experiments where I wore one pair of jeans for like 3 months straight. Not only did no one notice I wasn’t changing pants every day but a friend I hang out with DAILY asked around 3 months in “hey man those are nice jeans did you just get them?” haha now I just have 2 pairs of jeans total.
For shirts just make sure they fit nicely.
Try updating your jacket too, if you’re a guy with a jacket that’s too big or looks old or is from a trucking company or something. I’m always a fan of leather jackets personally, one good one lasts forever and goes with t-shirts and dress shirts.
This is all totally superficial, I completely acknowledge that, but if it’s something that concerns you, don’t be ashamed to indulge in a little superficiality. A lot of guys are embarrassed to care about their appearance but that’s silly. And you don’t have to break the bank. One good versatile outfit (dark designer jeans go with pretty much anything) is enough to do wonders for your style.
It’s just the picture, they never tint. And I do wear contacts about 50% of the time but they’re very uncomfortable for me. Maybe a new pair of frames is in order. I appreciate the tips though.
This is pretty much exactly what I was going to say. You don’t look old, but nobody who is 27 dresses like that. You don’t have to wear under-sized tee shirts and rock a semi-ironic PBR trucker’s hat, but your current style looks more like something the teacher would wear on parent/teacher night than what a young man in his 20s would. How about tee shirts, jeans and a shave?
oops was writing my post while you uploaded a pic. Receding hair isn’t a biggie, I still recommend the hairdresser. I have a 32yo friend who goes every few weeks even tho his head is basically shaved down…if he grows it out he has a big bald spot and stuff. He looks great with a nice clean shaved down haircut because it looks like it’s on purpose and a style choice.
If you’re going to wear sweaters, wear nice sweaters. Grab a designer one that fits instead of using some old sweater you got for free from somewhere. But try dress shirts or t-shirts instead. If you care about warmth or don’t like your body you can layer clothes and get the benefits of a sweater without the bulky old man look.
No cargo pants, only old silicon valley guys wear those.
Your glasses would actually look cool with the right overall style. You look like you could pull off the “graphic designer hipster” type look nicely. You don’t have to BE a douchey graphic designer hipster haha but just in terms of what styles people are wearing these days, you can definitely work with what you have.
Style is all about looking like you did stuff on purpose. The best experts are girls and gay guys ages 20 - 30. One of my favorite shirts was a recommendation by a pushy gay salesguy at a mall clothing store who said to trust him it looks fabulous. I didnt really see it but I got a ton of compliments on it.
My favorite way of approaching getting the salespeople (young stylin ones) to help is say “look I’m gonna buy a couple shirts today, that’s a given, but I need help choosing them”. That way you ease the “they just want to sell me anything” worry, they know you’re probably a done sale, the money part is over, now they can just focus on making sure you’re happy with what you buy so you come back.
Sweater aside, you definitely don’t look like you’re in your 20’s, I’d guess late 30’s on the low end. Counting the sweater, you look like an AARP member.
Have you considered getting some ear gauges, facial piercings and maybe some tattoos?
But yeah, definitely shave if you want to look a bit younger.
:mad:
At my local convenience store I do buy beer regularly and the cashiers know me. Last time I bought beer, there was a new cashier, so I got carded. After you hit thirty, I think it stops being a compliment and starts to be an annoyance.
