Me too. I have two older sisters, 8 and 10 years older to be exact. At the age of two I saw them in Girl Scouts or school groups, swimming lessons, grown-up school (books with no pictures) so I thought that’s what I was getting when I got “old”. (Except the Girl Scouts part, so I thought I’d be whittling sticks in Boy Scouts)
That is deeply insulting. Think of the twisted “genius” of Guccione. :mad:
Anamorphic, I had the exact same experience. Loved Zep when I was 13-14 – in 1983-84 – and felt they were definitely from “the past,” though they were still together just a few years previously.
Similarly, I was fascinated by the Apollo landings when I was five – in 1975 – but even then, I’m pretty sure an felt it to be something from “the past,” like World War II – yet the last moon landing was in 1972, just barely too early for me to register it as a “current event.”
I had somewhat the opposite experience where I knew nothing about music as a kid – my mother would have the radio on a station with oldies, which then meant fifties to early Beatles with a bit of the Doors for some reason. So when the older kids on the bus had their boomboxes (played the same songs over and over), I had no notion of how old or new any of the stuff they played was. Years later, I realized that – this also being right around 1984 – Another Brick In the Wall was pretty recent, same with Old Time Rock and Roll.
As for Zeppelin, it’s weird to me to think that they were still together when I was very little. At the end of high school, one kid played Stairway one day and I thought that was a woman singing. That’s how little I knew about, umm, ancient bands.
So interesting how time is to a kid. I had a book that was like Amazing Facts or something, and the history examples… I might see mention of the same events again on wikipedia now, and realize how fuzzy my understanding of the times had been. Like something could’ve happened in 1680 or 1930 and there’d be hardly any distinction. Just “a long time ago”.
Or occasionally on television there’d be a clip of a television show from before my time – generally something timeless like The Gong Show – or even Johnny Carson before his hair was white, and these were all amazing and rare glimpses to me, back in that dead, dead pre-youtube past.
True, oara. I distinctly recall being about six years old and drawing in a coloring book with knights and castles. I asked my parents “what was it like when you guys were living in the Middle Ages.” They gently explained to me the different time scales of human lives vs. historical times.
This is kind of derailing the original thread, but I thought I’d share an experience when I would have been the person that seemed ancient. In June 2014 I went to see Jack White in Paris. On my own. I got chatting to the lads next to me - a couple of young American guys. We were, of course, discussing the act we were about to see. I mentioned having seen the White Stripes in 2001. The way they looked at me…
I then, of course, thought about it rationally. In 1983 when Robert Plant first toured solo I was 19. Imagine if I’d got talking to the person next to me and they casually mentioned having seen Led Zeppelin in 1970.
Bob Newhart - I watched his show back in the 70s and am just watching the first season again - he had his 40th birthday!
now that seems really young to me! :rolleyes:
Old Time Rock and Roll is now almost 38 years old. 38 years before that was 1940! Old Time Rock and Roll is now much older than old time rock and roll was when Old Time Rock and Roll was released!
There’s an episode where his wife (Suzanne Pleshette) is suddenly feeling old because she’s 30. So she starts dressing like a teenager to make herself feel more youthful and unpredictable. Her “teenage” outfit consists of tight jeans, smart denim jacket, and t-shirt with a glittery lips design - making her look very much like a 30-year old of today.
Actually, no. People used to dress a lot older than they do today and 40-50 year old people did have that hair and that dress in the 70s. There was still such a thing as a “housedress” back then, although I’m sure no one currently under fifty has ever heard of such a thing.
^Plus, Edith was constantly stooped over, like someone’s grandmother (I don’t know what the “stooped over” disease is called).
Osteoporosis?
I didn’t truly feel old until I realized that I’d passed the age that Will Riker was on the first season of ST:TNG, and am now closing in on “old man” Captain Picard. (he was 47 in season 1!)
I looked that up before I posted and even though I was sure that was it, osteoporosis is “brittle bone” disease (e.g., your hip breaks if you put too much weight [or torque?] on it). Closest I could find was Kyphosis (“humpback spine”), but I’m not too sure of that, either.
I think Osteoporosis can cause little old ladies to hunch over. Well, either that or Scoliosis, but it’s obviously not that.
Hahaha, that’s wonderful 
So Captain Picard wasn’t like maybe 62?
This thread is really teaching me that I thought every bald guy was a thousand years old.
A little similar to the knights and castles, one boy in kindergarten said that his father was the captain of a ship. Given how little I knew of the world, how little I’d seen beyond a five mile radius from my house, that seemed totally plausible to me. What, we don’t live near an ocean?
Well, he was… But only in his final appearance. (Star trek nemesis, which, by the way, was 13 years ago. )