Here is an example of a conversation that I have been having a lot lately.
ME: I’m so old!
PERSON: You’re not old!
ME: I’m older than I look.
PERSON: You’re what…24? 25?
(This is after I tell them I’m older than I look)
ME: I just turned 30!
PERSON: No! Really!? You’re thirty? You don’t look thirty.
What makes it all worth it is the looks, double takes, starts I get when I reveal my real age. If you ever bump into me on the street, I will try to start this conversation. It makes me feel good. Don’t feed me. I know 30 isn’t really that old. I don’t look my age; I don’t act my age, but I am starting to feel my age both pop culturally(“Nevermind” by Nirvana was released 18 years ago! I remember when I first heard that album like it was yesterday. It changed my life or something) and physically. My job is physical and I have more aches and pains than I used to and get more tired.
I have that conversation a lot too. I’m also thirty and I look younger than that. I’m also a grad student in a program where I am, well, not the oldest member of my class, but the median age is probably about 25 or 26. So I think everyone assumes I am also about 25.
I just brush it off with “well, I’m really immature, no wonder you didn’t realize how old I am!”
The length of time I can remember back is starting to scare me. It’s nearly ten years since I graduated from college! Jesus.
My birthday is up coming soon, so that conversation in reverse has occurred often recently.
someone: “Hey, Barb said its your birthday soon”
me: “yep”
someone: “How old are you going be?”
me: “27”
(if they are older): “Geez, I thought you were 33, 34…I have socks older than you”
(if they are the same age or younger): “I thought you had like ten years on me”
This has been happening since I was 20. So far it’s to my advantage*, but I’m basically screwed in the near future.
I started a conversation with a coworker, who is 20, with the phrase “When I was your age…” What makes it funnier is that he looks older than he is, I look younger, so we look about the same age.
That is a dirty, dirty lie! Why it was as recent as 1991…
While I do look my age, I feel old all of the time. If you are in your twenties and tell anyone over 35 that you’re old, they’ll laugh hysterically at you. Still, I feel like I’ve been around for freakin’ ever.
I think it always comes as a bit of a shock, though, when you realize your generation no longer defines what’s ‘‘cool.’’ Not too long ago my little sis-in-law, who is now 18, attended a concert for a newfangled band she really liked called Jet. I had never heard of Jet.
‘‘There’s going to be some other band there called Oasis,’’ she said. ‘‘I don’t know if they’re any good or not.’’
What’s even better is when people who know – because you have told them before – how old you are still insist that you’re younger. I will be 37 next month. I neither look nor act my age, and two of my coworkers (one is 27, the other 25, I think) periodically mention things like how weird it is that my daughter is 16 – I don’t seem like the kind of person to have had a kid in high school. I have to remind them that I’m not – I had her when I was 20 – and every time, they do the double-take and “holy crap, Litoris, you’ve told me that before. How old are you again? I keep thinking you’re my age or younger!”
On a side note, when my daughter was a newborn (I was 20 at the time), I took her to the mall and some random blue-hair walked up and began lecturing me about how I should stay in school and how it was so sad to see junior high kids with babies. When I told her how old I was, she said, “now, sweetie, I’m not mad at you. Everyone makes mistakes, but don’t lie a bout your age!” Ok, grandma…
Ha, I’m not old, I’m only 53. Of course, I look 63. (It’s not the years, it’s the mileage…and my buddy says my face looks like I haven’t seen a paved road in half a century, heh.) Last time I bought a bottle of wine, the cashier and I got a good laugh as she scrutinized my visage as per her corporate requirements. She had to make sure I looked at least 40, or she’d have to card me. There was no doubt in her mind that I was entitled by my senioritousness to purchase alcohol without producing ID.
I’m 34, and while I can see the signs of aging that denote someone indeed in their thirties (wrinkles around the eyes, grey hairs, etc), apparently no one else can; everyone else thinks I’m 7 to 10 years younger. It’s kind of flattering, though it’s disconcerting when a girl will start flirting with me at school or at a club or something; I tend to attract 21 year old girls who like “older” men… or at least “older” when it means 25 or something. The backpedal that occurs when they find out my real age is a bit disappointing.
Same thing here. I just turned 31, and most people think I am much younger. I see lots of skeptical glances when they know what I do for a living (museum director).
Then there’s the flip side. I was trying to gather some women for a multi-generational round table discussion on farm life, and realized that I no longer represented the younger end of that spectrum. I feel like SUCH a fogey with our high school and college interns. Yesterday I made a reference to tightrolling my jeans and was met with blank looks. :smack:
I still get treated as a youngster at work, and I’m 39! It doesn’t help that I’m 5’ tall, but I must look younger to other people. I don’t feel younger, and I don’t feel like I look young anymore. I guess it’s a function of not having kids and being the youngest at the job for so long. (Although that changed recently with a new hire. 30! What a baby!) Government - people stick around for the long haul.
When I turned 35 one of the guys at the place I was consulting said: No offense, but you look much older.
I guess I did, since I’ve been going gray since I was 20, but how do you start a sentence with “no offense” and expect the person to *not *be offended?
Heh. I’ll be 38 next month. I don’t look it. I don’t know whether or not I “act” it, I’m not sure what that means. Most days, I don’t feel old. But *some *days…
For me, the thing that is most simultaneously amusing and disturbing is that I’m frequently asked out by guys who are closer to my daughter’s age than mine.
I can’t remember the name of the multi-band tour my daughter went to last year that included Oasis, but pissy divas that they are, they didn’t show. She was bummed, she’d been excited to see them. She lists “Wonderwall” as one of the top twenty greatest pop songs of all time. She’s seventeen.
I see the point you’re trying to make, but Jet’s been popular for a good five or six years.
I know I look younger than I am, but figure that I at least look like an adult. Others disagree. My neighbor’s kid’s (who’s about twelve) friend invited me over to hang out when he saw me in the back yard this summer. A couple of months ago, my family had several relatives come in from out of town. One of them knew my parents had two kids, aged twenty-six and fifteen, but had never seen us before. I was mistaken for the fifteen year old. A few years ago, someone thought I was thirteen, so at least progress is being made.
I’m 49 and I guess I look younger than I am because people commented on it all the time when I was working, and the first time I posted a picture online people thought I was faking it if I was really the age I say that I am. When I say that I’m retired people assume I must be closer to 60 and really look shocked. Something tells me that I’ll get carded when I reach the age to ask for senior discounts. Personally, I look in the mirror at the graying hair and think they’re nuts and that it must be a combination of looks and personality that project a younger image to others and not looks alone.
I’m still trying to think of something to say to the OP other than to get off my lawn.
huh?
I guess I did, since I’ve been going gray since I was 20, but how do you start a sentence with “no offense” and expect the person to *not *be offended?