It’s a good thing I’m retired. I can do only one physically-tasking thing per day, and then I need the rest of the day to recover.
Vacuum and dust one bedroom? Need a recovery half day.
Sweep and mop the kitchen floor? Need a recovery half day.
Feed, weed, and snail-bait the garden? Need a recovery half day.
Gentle geezer workout at the gym? Need a recovery half day.
Etc.
All these things sound hauntingly familiar! I sneezed too hard day before yesterday and my back is still too sore for me to consider mowing the lawn, changing the sheets, or taking the vacuum upstairs. These are three things I wouldn’t have given a thought to doing all in one morning just a few years ago, but nowadays I know I’d be lucky to do two in a full day and still be able to walk upright.
And understanding exactly why ‘merkins’ were invented…
Same.
Late-1900s, or mid-1900s? Because some of us are pretty close to mid-.
Consarnit.
A few years back I was given a seniors’ discount by accident. The person in line in front of my made such a production of reminding the cashier about the discount several times, I figured the cashier just didn’t want to get into it with me as well. I noticed it when the bill was lower than I was expecting, and checked my receipt. I was going to say something, but then I thought, “Goddamn, that’s a good discount…”, so I rolled with it.
I got a new dishwasher, and I’m stupid excited about it. I’m clearly an Old at at this point. (I’m 49)
This year marks 50 years out of high school for me.
Also, welcome to the Dope!
Ouch. I listen to it weekly.
Jackson Brown is 74yo.
My wife and I string trim our yard once or twice a year. No mowers here. Would not work at all.
I was working on a part yesterday and said to myself “No, that’s way to steep and uneven. I’ll bust my ass for sure.”
I’m glad I’m not the only one!
At 74, I’m at the point where everyone under 50 looks like a kid.
In 16 years, I’ll be 90, FFS! How did that happen??
Haven’t read every single post so maybe I’m repeating but…I’m hitting fifty in a couple of months, and it’s sinking in that I’m in all likelihood closer to the end than the beginning. Folks in my family tend to live a long time: my maternal grandmother, who smoked for 70 years or so, lived to 97, though the last fifteen years weren’t any fun (oxygen tank and very little mental acuity).
What’s weird though, is that I feel like I’m not aging in certain ways at the same rate as my parents did. I mean, my back is utter garbage and my rotator cuffs can go to hell, but my interests never hit an age bump like my folks’ did. When my dad was much younger than me, his musical tastes had settled into bland easy-listening and WalMart country. I saw X for the sixth time last year, and have tickets to Nick Cave, The Heavy, VNV Nation and Christine and the Queens later this year. I still love horror movies, comic cons, and long-form TV series that don’t spoon-feed me every plot twist. I’m taken on learning a couple of different languages in the past decade. I feel like I’m mentally in my thirties, but my body routinely laughs and tells me to get over myself when I shake salt into the pasta I’m boiling and then need to ice my shoulder.
I’m also celebrating (not really the right word, considering…) twenty years at my current job. 40 percent of my life. That’s scary. And friends having multiple grandchildren freaks me right out. The days whip by, even the bad ones. This birthday is gonna be rough…
It could be worse. You could celebrate your fiftieth the day before the world goes into lockdown.
Yes, so much this. Very much this, but I don’t notice the disparity so much between me and my parents as much as I notice it between me ( early X-er, or “Joneser” really ) and my 10+ year older friends as they aged. With some of them, the age bump you described was like someone throwing a switch. I swear it was like they had a sit-down with themselves and said “Self, now that you are age XX, you can no longer like this, but now instead must like that” and seemingly proceed to check off a series of boxes in their age-bump to-do list. Not all of them, but a noticeable amount of them.
Sudden likings for bland food ( though not suffering ulcers ), even more mellow versions of yacht rock, cars that have mashed potatoes for suspension…and don’t even get me going on their politics.
Youngster.
My 50th HS reunion was two years ago.
Some days I can’t even do one thing.
Old age hit me square between the eyes yesterday. Torsion spring on the garage door broke. Figured, “I got this”. I replaced an identical spring on the other garage door two years ago. For those who don’t know, winding a garage door spring is somewhat dangerous. If you lose control of the winding bar BAD THINGS can happen. When I replaced the other spring two years ago I wound it up to full tension by myself, never gave it a thought, it was no problem.
This time around I only got 16 of the required 32 one-quarter turns on the spring before I realized I couldn’t wind it up the rest of the way. I just didn’t have the strength. I got the muscle bound, 22 year old neighbor kid to do it. It cost me a beer. He gave me the senior discount.
Last night i spilled potato chips all around my chair when i opened the bag. Picking them up required getting over the side and between the chair and the side table. A lot of bending and twisting, but i was super careful, supporting myself with my arms and repositioning to avoid twists. Went to bed congratulating myself on having gotten away with it.
Hah! This morning i am walking like a Victorian miner. By evening i had to concede that there was no way i could cook dinner. Thank goodness for housemates, pizza delivery, and naprosen!
This reminded me, does anyone else do that thing where if you have to pick something up, one leg swings out like ballast as you bend over and you run the risk of karate-kicking whoever’s behind you? Caught myself doing that once and now I very consciously haven’t done it since.