When do you start to feel "old"?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

So, when do people start to feel old? -Let me tell you a few things about me before you answer that…

Years ago, I loved going out, hitting bars and clubs, knocking back enough beer (and shooters) to stop a bull, and waking up in strange rooms.
Today, I’d rather stay home with my dog, watch A&E and enjoy a late-night Whiskey & Coke on the rocks.

Years ago I was considerably thinner. I’ve put on quite a few pounds in recent years. Not overall body weight, but more or less pot-belly weight.

I (or more accurately, my wife) has noticed white hair. Not grey hair…WHITE. They are a totally different texture and shape to my other hairs, and can stick out quite noticeably. This is of course in the hair I seem to have left. I’m no Gordon Jump just yet, but the hairline is starting to creep back a little in the ‘corners’ (above my eyes).

Of course, I don’t seem to be losing much hair; as what has departed from my head seems to be sprouting-up on my back, shoulders and in my ears.

I can’t stand young people. 18-20 years olds in thier souped-up Honda’s make me want to just throttle them. I can’t look at some fat punk-kid in his baby-blue, over-sized silk basketball outfit with his stupid hat askew and not want to push him onto the subway tracks for the good of mankind. God help him if that hat still has the tags on!

My tastes have also changed. While I still like the music I grew up with, I find myself listening to Jazz. Mostly soft vocal jazz, not so much the brassy Glenn Miller-esque stuff (-then there’s the fact that I can actually make that distinction, that ads to my cause for alarm). I also saw ‘Chicago’ with the wife…and liked it.

Then there’s TV. While hockey still reigns supreme in my household, I find myself wrapped up in documentary programs on A&E, The History Channel, or TLC. This didn’t really register as weird until today when I actually noticed the commercials on these shows. Home medication delivery. Assisted seeing devices. Artritis medications. Hair colour. Ads for various elixers offering relief from an varying aches and pains. The scariest part for me is that I actually found myself intigued by the silver-haired gentlemen offering relief for my sore joints.

I wear glasses. Up until this year, I had perfect vision. 20/20. Then, very suddenly, I noticed I couldn’t read distant street signs. Then I degenerated to an inability to read the license plate of the car in front of me. Now, I can’t drive without my glasses.

I’m also 27 years old.

So, what’s wrong with me? Am I getting older before my time? When is this stuff supposed to happen? I always thought it wouldn’t be before my 30th birthday! Anybody out there a victim of this ‘rapid aging’?

2

I am getting “old”, too :frowning:

I have put on weight so, for the fist time in my entire life, I started working out…and every joint snap-crackle-pops on me.

I am a documentary junkie…I only watch TLC, Discovery and A&E.

I don’t CARE that I don’t have a hot car…I drive a 7 yr. old Cavalier with manual everything (and no CD player) and I don’t look cool in it and I don’t CARE. Hey, no car payment!

I work on a military base where a lot of young trainees come into my shop and I am AMAZED at how silly/dumb-acting the youngsters are. Not all, but most.

Sometimes I’d rather stay home and read inane crap online then go out to a bar.

I ENJOY spending time with my parents!

I miss Atari and real Saturday morning cartoons.

I’m getting little wrinkles and sagginess. Bleh.

I don’t like ANY clothes that are in style…and I’m not embarrassed to be seen buying clothes in Wal-Mart (now you KNOW that’s a sign of aging!)
But, I’m so much more wiser/self-assured as I get older, that I’m okay with all that.

Oh, yeah, I’m 27, too.

3

Take heart, guys. A guy isn’t really old until something matters to him more than sex does. You’re just maturing.

4

For me, it happens upon waking. And I’m only 29. For a few more days.

5

I feel like I’ve been getting old since I turned 22 :confused:

Then again I blame my job

6

I just turned 38 today…well, yesterday, its after midnight. I feel old.

I truely realized I was an old man one day in a supermarket of all places. Used to be, most of the punk comunity knew me…I constantly had punk kids coming up to me, who I couldnt remember for the life of me and talking to me…As I got older, this happened less and less. One day, im in the checkout line, and I see these punks standing there, and one of them starts walking up to me…I was trying to place where I knew him from and he said “Excuse me sir, could you spare a Quarter”…the sir part really got me…I sheepishly handed him a buck and went home and got seriously depressed.

7

I turned a quarter century this year, that hit me pretty hard because I’ve always looked at 1/4 as a decent sized fraction.

I have videos that I bought a decade ago.

My most recent girlfriend was too young to really remember Nirvanna and the fact that she (18) and I are both adults is a little strange.

My parents have started asking when I’m gonna get married.

I am older than a whole bunch of professional athletes.

8

I’m only 19. I already have a receding hairline. My memory sucks.

But I still like video games and going out…so that’s a plus.

9

WAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!

Listen to the young whine about aging!! :rolleyes:
You only start to feel old when you allow yourself to feel old.

Those 18-20 years olds in their souped-up Honda’s and that fat punk-kid in his baby-blue, over-sized silk basketball outfit with his stupid hat askew? You’re not old, they’re idiots!

Changing musical tastes? You are now realizing that there is more music in the world than what your peers though was cool in high school. I quite enjoy Glenn Miller. But then, I grew up with Glenn Miller, so there’s some pre-disposition.

The crap they show on TV now is, well, crap. This has nothing to do with getting old. You’re just smart enough to recognize excrement when you see it. (My roommate & I both agree that there was more and better programming on TV when there were only 13 channels)

This has nothing to do with growing old… I just want to say that Formula 1 and CART are the sumpreme sports in my house.

I miss real cartoons too… that is, cartoons that were drawn at 24fps; not the 6-12fps garbage they show now. Again, this is not “growing old,” I simply remember that cartoon sused to be drawn with a measurably better quality.

Clothing and styles? I couldn’t care less! Show me a store where I can get a pair of Levi’s 501’s and a decent T-shirt… that’s where i’m going to spend my dollars. And you can bet your ass that my Levi’s won’t be showing mine!
The whole point of this is that you can’t help growing older. There’s not much you can do about grey hair (I had my first dozen as a sophomore in high school) or wrinkles or creaking bones. I have all of the above and I’ll only be 33 on St. Patrick’s Day. I think of myself as young, and so most people I meet think I’m 5-8 years younger than I am.

10

I love hard rock and heavy metal.
I’m a techno-junkie and have all the toys that goes with it…usually I am the first of my friends and co-workers to buy it.
I rent about 80 percent of all new DVD films at the local rental shop.
I live in jeans and tshirts.
I go out to the bars and clubs often enough to have bartenders bring a drink without having to order it.
I have friends 20 years older and 20 years younger than I am.
I almost never watch A&E or Discovery…usually HBO, Sundance, Bravo or Network.
I still prefer to watch tv while laying on my back, on the floor.
When I saw my first grey hair, I decided it was time to shave my head, so I have no idea if it would be any greyer now than then.
I like my job.
I like my house.
I like my life.

I’m 52.

11

I was older at 28 than I am now at 33.

At 28 I didn’t work out. The stresses of work took their toll on my health. I had ‘The Miller Gut’ and it was getting worse. I had microsurgery on my left hand for damage caused by clenching it too hard due to low grade stress.

In the meantime, I started working out 2-3 times a week (and have for almost 3 years now, so it’s not a fad), I started worrying less about the things I have no control over. I now have 6 week old twin boys. (It bothered me that my 32nd year vanished while dealing with the aspects of my wife’s preganancy…I want that year back.)

I don’t watch TV channels so much as shows. Firefly (snif), John Doe, Farscape, Good Eats, Some car repair stuff on TNN, and damn near everything on Food TV.

The excercize thing was the most important change in my life. Realising that I don’t have a genetically perfect body, and if I don’t have a six-pack, it’ll be alright. I can bench press more (by about 50 lbs) than I ever could ever. I can bike 16 miles in 60 minutes on a mountainbike. (knobby tires, less advantageous gearing than a roadbike)

Listen, you’ll be ‘old’ in one way or another a lot longer than you were ever considered young. Get used to it.

12

When I was in my 20’s, I’d look at “old” people and think "How can they act like that – they’re old! Don’t they know how stupid they look?

As I got older, I realized that deep inside, you find an age that you’re comfortable with and that’s how old you’ll always feel. My “inside” age is about 22. I’m 50 by the calendar.

I don’t keep up with popular music or tv shows, but then, I never have. I read the books I like (science fiction and fantasy, mostly) and look for new and outstanding works in those genres. I am continuing to learn new things and to keep my brain working.

I really think that when you stop finding new and wonderful things to learn about in the world or when you stop having the desire to search out new things to learn is when you get old.

Of course old is also aching joints, wrinkles, sagging jaw lines and grey hair. That’s the part I hate, because they keep reminding me that I’m really NOT 22.

13

Not yet!

But I am feeling “older”. Like Archergal, I used to think that I felt the same as I did when I was 22. I’ve now advanced that to about 32. I’ve mentioned before that I turned 60 a few months ago.

Got news for you kids: getting beyond 20-something is incredibly liberating, and it’s even better after 50!

14

For me, it comes when I’m having an adult-to-adult conversation with someone and we discover that when some major event in my life occurred, they hadn’t even been born yet. It hasn’t happened too often yet, but it’s happened, and it’s a jarring experience.

Gray hairs don’t bother me, I just wish my knees and back were in better shape.

15

I will turn 60 this summer. So far every decade has been better than the one before. My inner age is thirty but “she” does have short-term memory problems.

From about age 25 to the present, I have found myself growing more and more comfortable in my skin. New interests are embraced and not questioned.

My mother turned 90 three days ago. She is very much in love with a man in his eighties. I accuse her of robbing the cradle.
I can remember crying all day on Mother’s 50th birthday because I thought she was officially “old.” LOL!

16

I noticed that most people I meet these days look like someone I already know. That’s how I might measure this, rather than using the body because I can surf now for more than 6 hours straight, yet at 20, only two hours.

17

. . . When Dopers post things like "I was only a year old when the Challenger exploded, so I don’t remember it . . . "

18

I’m 50, and I still don’t feel old.

19

I feel old on Monday mornings heading for a job that I’m no longer thrilled with.

I don’t at all feel old while I’m riding my motorcycle to that job.

I feel old when a direct colleauge has to ask, while preparing copy for the evening news, “what were the names of the Apollo One guys again?”

I feel old when I’m standing in line at the 7-11 and Steve Miller’s “Fly Like an Eagle” comes on the radio and two kids in front of me in line look at each other, laugh, and make the comment, “Why are they playing the post office song on the radio?” :smack:

Otherwise, I don’t feel all that old. I’m 42 in May and I guess I’m actually not all that old (I wouldn’t have agreed with that statement at 17, but…)

There are many days that I feel like a 12 year old.

Oh, wait, let me correct that - there are many days that I ACT like a 12 year old. :smiley:

20

I finally accepted my olditude when one day at 25 I dropped the soap in the shower, and rather than just picking it up, I had to create a strategy for getting it back without sliping and tweaking my back.“Okay the little shelf won’t hold my weight , and neither will the shower curtain, but if I put just a little weight on each, I can slowly lower myself until I can put my left hand on the edge of the tub allowing me to grab the soap with my right hand.”