Shouldn’t “middle” anything be midway between young and old? As in:
0-30 Young
30-60 Middle aged
60-90+ Old
I agree the 90+ is a bit of a hedge. But to start middle age at 45 or 50 or 60 seems like starting old at 90 or 100 or 120.
On the other hand, I wish 46 were still young or middle age. Never mind why.
Are you considered young, or young at heart, if you’re really immature? Never mind why on that one, either.
Seeing the title of this thread brought back memories of the old 60’s movie “Wild in the Streets”.
When I was younger I thought people of retirement age were old. My opinion has changed, now it’s 80+.
I’ll echo Eve’s numbers instead of just adapting them. There’s nothing in her list that I especially disagree with. With that being said, I’ll also second **Yoesmite ** and say that while you might still technically be under middle age (or old or elderly), if you dress it or act it, you’re there.
Having just turned 40 this March 2, I gotta say:
NOOOOOO!!
You want old? Ha! My great-grandmother lived to be 102. Downright ancient, she was, and very cool. Not many people get to that age with their minds intact.
In my mind, middle age is about 45-55ish, oldish is 55-75ish, old is 75-90ish, impressively old is 90+. 90+ is fairly common in my mom’s family, but no matter what, it’s still impressively old.
No, forty is not considered old.
IMO, when talking about getting on in age, old is really a state of mind. Decrepit, however, is the state when our bodies start to fail, which I think is what most of us classify as signs of aging, or being old. If our bodies didn’t show it, how would others know how old we were? Some would maybe be more dated in their ideals, mannerisms or what have you. I would say then, that we typically judge ‘old’ by what what meets our eyes/ears (see wrinkles, stooped, feeble or hear a cracked worn voice).
Take Tina Turner or Cher for instance…just look at them, are they old? They’ve been melted down and re-molded more than once I’m sure, so physically they sure don’t look aged. Do they act old? Nope. If their bodies still function as a 30 year old, there’s no reason we should classify them as old. 'Course, there’s no telling how many tubes of Ben-Gay they go through after a performance, but I haven’t seen them spitting their teeth accross the floor during a show either. 
(Okay, I’ve never seen a Cher concert, I admit.
In that light, I’m never going to be old, and I hope to keep from being decrepit for many a year yet too!
My view of “old” is moving further and further away too. I used to think 40 was unbearably ancient. Now I don’t ! 
I wouldn’t call anyone old until at least retirement age - 65+.
Oh yeah, see sig!
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Vmy son was asked (at age 5) what ‘old’ was. he said, emphatically, 80!
end of story. 
I recall being with a group of friends around age 10 doing the math to figure out how old we would be in the big year 2000. I was dismayed to discover I was going to be 40. My thought at that age was…Wow, is that OLD! Funny thing about aging, its all a matter of perspective. Apart from physical aging, it is simply a matter of attitude. I was mistaken for older when I was younger (never carded in a restaurant when I ordered wine at age 16) and mistaken as younger when I was older (hit on by 21 yr olds who upon hearing i was 37 said, we knew you were older but would thought you were only 26 or so). I am blessed by a youth gene that runs in our family that causes us all to enjoy looking and feeling pretty good. But I would say that Old to me is when the body and/or the mind no longer cooperate in a healthy manner, and it isn’t necessarily measured by a date on the calendar. Anyone past the urgency and invicibility of youth is susceptible to the experience of being old.
It’s not the age so much as the mileage!!!
I have to agree with the people who said it was relative. However, my own criteria to decide if someone is “old” is “would you date them if they were your type”.
This is probably how Harrison Ford and Sean Connery get to be a different category than their “real age” implies. I am notorious for liking older guys, and have been with a guy who was 51 when I was 22, but he definetely was the Peter Pan type, hence his need to date 22-year old girls.
It applies the other way round as well. Some guys are in their thirties but I wouldn’t date them as they are “boys” in my mind. Other guys of the exact same age are already middle aged.
Therefore I give you Pookah’s three bear’s theory of age:
“Old”: too old for me
“Young”: too young for me
Me: just right
Pookah puts it well.
The Friends cast all seem to be “young adults,” but if you look at the actors’ ages, most of them are at least 35. But does that mean they’re middled-aged? Not by my standards. And the other actors I mentioned—Julia Roberts, Johnny Depp—they don’t seem middle-aged to me, not by a long shot.
Some people have a young attitude or an old attitude and it transcends their actual chronological age. It’s annoying, I think, to try to peg people by how many years they’ve been on this earth, because it is so relative. For instance, if a 35-year-old looks 25, has a similar outlook of a 25-year-old (with perhaps some more experience), then why should they be lumped into the same category with the 35-year-old who dresses in the old-fogie styles, looks like they’re at least 45, and has a tired, worn-out attitude? These people are not remotely on the same plane, age-wise.
I guess I take this to heart because I am often mistaken for someone much younger, as are several of my family members. I guess it runs in the family. I don’t want people to peg me as someone who ought to be dressing a certain way, or thinking a certain way, or anything else, based on my age. I am who I am. Once, a coworker wildly underestimated my age because (as he put it), I had “such a young, enthusiastic outlook on life.” Bless his heart. Well, I’d like to keep that outlook, and I don’t want people trying to pigeonhole me based on my age. I’m not ready for that. I don’t think I ever will. I don’t think anyone else should be either.
My dad recently showed me a birthday card I made him when he turned 40 that said “By the time I’m 40, you’ll probably be dead,” or something to that effect. (I know, I know, but I guess it must have been funny to my 9-year-old self, at the time.)
My parents are now in their late fifties, and I can’t bear to think of them as old. Sure, they’re retired, but c’mon, my mom has an Avril Lavigne CD! They do more in a day than I do all week!
I can see 30 on the horizon, and I remember when 30 seemed unbelievably old. So, I guess you’re only as young as you feel. Some days, I don’t feel all that young.
But at this stage in my life, my grandparents are old (80-85), my parents are middle-aged, and I’m just pluggin’ along.
I just turned 40 less than a week ago. I like to think of it as “not young anymore.”
(I’m going to leave my sig in deliberately this once, since it seems semi-appropriate.)
In the great football game of life, 40 is the two minute warning before the end of the first half.
Don’t sweat it. You have two full quarters left to make a comeback.
Hope does spring eternal. (says the almost 42 yo)
I am looking forward to being 40. ( I have 13 more years to go! )
Old to me is 70.
You, and other posters with similar posts, misunderstand the term “Middle Aged”. Age is relative to what you are talking about. When I race a twenty year old, I am the old man they are trying to beat. If my second grader had a 10 year in his class, that second grader would be an “old” second grader.
My understanding of middle age is based on a relative scale of where you are in life:
0-16: childhood
16 - first child: young adult (“first age”)
first child - last teenager: adult
last teenager - retirement: middle aged
retirement - infirmity sets in: older adult
infirmity - death: old
Obviously, there are exceptions, such as those that get pregnant at 13, or never have kids.
You could do the same thing based on work
0-21: kid
21-retirement: adult
retirement - infirmity: middle aged
infirmity - death: old
In athletics
0-14: childhood
15-23: developing athlete
23-33: prime (distance runners out to 36, perhaps)
33-40: old athlete
40+: has been
I prefer pooka’s method. As a 43 year old male:
0-18: child
18-22: developing prospect
22- me+10: prospect
me+10 and up: potential parent or grandparent of prospect
I’m 50, but I don’t feel much different from when I was in my 30s. Except that I need trifocals now. And I take longer to get over aches. And my baby is about to go to college.
I don’t consider myself to be old. Middle aged works, I guess. Old is older than my mom. Old is when you can’t take care of yourself. Old is when you’re just to tired. I’d like to live to be 100, but I don’t want to get old.
I divide everything into three’s
I hope to have them all.
I have two close girlfriends who are in the 55-60 bracket who keep telling me, “just wait until you’re my age (I’m almost 48) and everything will suck and you’ll be 100 lbs overweight and your hips will have to be replaced…blah…blah… blah) look what happened to me!”. Well, they’ve been saying this since they were my age, and so far, I’ve managed to gain a few lbs, but I’m working out to keep my inner geezer at bay. My father is nearly 75 and everyone thinks he’s 15 years younger. He’s smart, funny, informed on current events, and he walks the mall and drums every day for exercise. He takes vitamins and cuts his own grass. He does things to keep himself young and he “is” younger than my much-younger girlfriends. Old age is partially looks, but it’s mostly attitude.