Just When Did You Get Old?

[Tony Tony Tony]

A was riding on the top deck of a bus not too long ago when I got annoyed by a group of teens larking about at the rear. Eventually I shifted downstairs then the realisation dawned that I had become the sort of crusty old git that got worked up at teens being teens and even travelled downstairs on a bus!

What was it that made you lot realise you were one step closer to the grave? (Unless of course you are one of them teen twats that larks about on public transport)

[Buelligan]

Pretty close to when I was born, IIRC.  I have larked about on the bus, when there were such things.  Pulled wheelies and shapes, strangers, shouted my truth in political meetings.  The kind of political meetings filled with people whose politics are not mine.  I've laid down drunk and stoned in the road and laughed at the stars.  But all the time, that whole time, I saw it there, across an ocean of days, the silent dark.  The infinite smothering nothing.  Stopping eyes, ears, time, all of it.  I think that's mostly why I did it.

[imitationleather]

You're only as old as the woman you feel.

I'm 34.

[steve98]

When I took ten minutes using my stick to nudge a sweet wrapper off the pavement and into the gutter.

[Jockice]

Three occasions. All of which took place in the same pub (The Washington in Sheffield) several years apart.

In the late 20s my mates (who I went to school with) started having a conversation about Van Morrison, who they all agreed 'just writes great songs.' I mean I like some of his stuff but he is the very epitome of music for the middle-aged.

In our early 30s with the same people. One of them mentioned one of those house programmes that are on all the time but I never watch. However it turned out I was the only one who didn't and sat there in silence as they had a lengthy conversation about it. I've still never voluntarily watched one, but that's not because I'm trying to stay young, I just don't get what's so interesting about them.

In my late 30s with different friends (but again around the same age, give or take a year or two) we ended up chatting to a group of lads in their early 20s at the same table. Fair enough, but I went to the toilet as one of them was coming back and heard him laughing on his phone about talking to 'middle-aged men.' Now, I've always looked younger than my actual age but he didn't say anything about talking to 'middle-aged men, except for one of them.' I was crushed

[El Unicornio, mang]

When I realised I was older than every Premier League player. The commentators constantly referring to any player 30+ as "an old veteran", "coming to the end of his career", "incredible that he's lasted the full 90 minutes at age 36" etc doesn't help.

People in their 20s who have never even heard of Bruce Willis or The Stone Roses or any other pop culture things which haven't been popular in the 2000s and just look at you blankly when you mention them.

Also, realising that the old biddies you see on the bus were actually the same age as I am now (42) when Britpop was going on.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

I hit 40 a couple of months ago. That's... that's bad isn't it? I keep waiting for it to dawn on me. I definitely have started to separate anyone under the age of 30 into "young bastard" status.

[Butchers Blind]

I've started making that noise when you sit down.  Dead soon.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Oof!

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

Oh I can't remember, it was all so long ago.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

A was riding on the top deck of a bus not too long ago when I got annoyed by a group of teens larking about at the rear. Eventually I shifted downstairs then the realisation dawned that I had become the sort of crusty old git that got worked up at teens being teens and even travelled downstairs on a bus!

If that's the barometer then 7

Cheers

[Blue Jam]

When I realised I was older than every Premier League player.

For me it was when Matt Smith was cast as the 11th Doctor. The first Doctor to be younger than me. I think he was only 26 at the time but still.

[Buelligan]

They're all younger than you by the time...

[BlodwynPig]

"Oi, grandad nice shell suit, bwah ha ha ha"

"WHY YOU LITTLE BASTARDS!"

The hecklers were 50 year old men in mobility scooters.

[The Bumlord]

When I fucked my back for a week after standing up from a chair.

[Jockice]

A couple of years ago it hit me that I'm now older than Bill Grundy was when he interviewed the Sex Pistols. What a fucking rotter.

And since then having a conversation with a woman in her early 20s who despite being born and brought up in Sheffield had never heard of Jarvis Cocker and only vaguely knew that there had been a band called Pulp.

[idunnosomename]

when i walked round my garden 100 times to raise money for NHS charities

[Butchers Blind]

Also realised I've started using the bannister while walking up the stairs. Grave.

[frajer]

When a bin man kicked my head off and I just took it like an old sack

[Icehaven]

In about the last 2 years or so (I'm 41) as I've started seriously worrying about future security and money etc., which I never have before, and being concerned about that kind of thing was always just in the dim and distant future. I daresay hitting my 40s has a lot to do with it (as if turning 40 hasn't long been a mental hurdle in terms of ageing, it doesn't help that it's also now the moment you're officially older than Homer Simpson), coupled with the last year showing how precarious everything really is, and how having some kind of safety net has gone from being something I might get round to one day to the main thing that keeps me awake at night. I've also noticed I'm plunging into nostalgic pop culture more than ever, and mostly for stuff from my own childhood and teens (so mid-80s to the late 90s), but that might just be  a common response to a big crisis.

All that, and hearing two teens/early 20s have this conversation in Poundland a few years ago:

"Who's Dizzy Rascal?"
"Some really old, bad rapper."

If you'd asked me at the time I'd have thought he was still well known and popular among the kids, so that told me exactly where I was.

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

A few years ago, we had a student lodging with us. They were a quiet bookish sort, so we didn't have the expected generational disputes - no partying for three days straight, while I grumpily yelled at them to turn down that racket. They did, however, introduce me to the concept of Let's Play videos: voluntarily watching someone else (usually some witless little berk) play video games. Apparently this was what the yoof called entertainment. I walked away, utterly baffled.

[holyzombiejesus]

When I set the Freeview box to automatically record Gardeners World. Although I've always been quite dull and boring. Even when I was quite hedonistic, I had a hankering to get back to my flat, Radio 4 and a book. Might be getting introverted mixed up with old, actually.

[Rolf Lundgren]

Meeting my new dentist who was comfortably and visibly much younger than me. My assumption that dentists should be old people with accrued years of knowledge and experience thrown out the window in one check-up.

My mum talking about the vicar at her local church who turns out to be the same age as me. Same as above, vicars are born old.

On a more depressing note, it's doing something silly like stubbing my toe and then feeling it for the next few days. I'll be happily sitting on the sofa and feel a twinge. I don't know if it's my pain threshold going down or generally getting clumsier but any minor accident now doesn't half hurt when a few years ago I would have shrugged it off.

[Icehaven]

A few years ago, we had a student lodging with us. They were a quiet bookish sort, so we didn't have the expected generational disputes - no partying for three days straight, while I grumpily yelled at them to turn down that racket. They did, however, introduce me to the concept of Let's Play videos: voluntarily watching someone else (usually some witless little berk) play video games. Apparently this was what the yoof called entertainment. I walked away, utterly baffled.

A friend of mine's son has a Youtube channel like that, and he's made enough money from it to buy a house at 21. It's another world.

[Sherringford Hovis]

I'm a vacillating Benjamin Button.

19 years old - basically a human-panther hybrid. Stamina, strength and aggression in such abundance that work gave me a special-coloured commemorative hat. Then a couple of Brummie wide-boys offered me my own pub and I revelled in a decade-long bender that should have killed a concrete rhinoceros several times over. Soundtrack: goth, hair metal, indie.

By 29 I was one jowly egg-on-stilts getting paid actual money to play videogames, hefting a 38-inch waist and all the muscle-tone of Corporal Jones' monster brawn. Got a dog at 30 and panic-walked myself down to slick racing-snake proportions dragging him out of hedges where tasty tramp-poo abounded and fishing him out of the canal every time he attempted affray with his duck nemeses. Soundtrack: minimal techno, shouty protest agit-pop.

By 38 I'd ballooned back up to lardy layabout due to post-marriage malaise and a combination of mental health issues with hilariously inappropriate medication from head-shrinkers whose incompetence was dwarfed only by their indifference. Soundtrack: hideously badly produced mashups, Motown

I'm 48 next month: 31-inch waist/44-inch chest, VO2 max touching 50 - fit as fuck and harder than a bullshitting competition against Dominic Cummings but terrified that I'm immediately due a rebound to Obelix proportions any day now. Soundtrack: post-rock, dub

Measuring your perceived age against pop-culture is toxic. Don't define let yourself be defined by the creativity or opinion of others.

[BlodwynPig]

Thomas is 42.

Wonder if there any 18 year olds joining this forum or in a few years there will be no-one younger than 30 on here.

[Buelligan]

When I set the Freeview box to automatically record Gardeners World. Although I've always been quite dull and boring. Even when I was quite hedonistic, I had a hankering to get back to my flat, Radio 4 and a book. Might be getting introverted mixed up with old, actually.

Gardener's World's been a lifelong pleasure for me.  Sure, they let some kid idiots on there sometimes who know bugger-all with their new-fangled ideas but I can put up with that.  The Joy of Compost.  Knowing I was well ahead of the game vis a vis Aeoniums.  Moments of joy, watching the lives of eccentric and rarified plants and their lovers.  Nothing better.

When I had the covids really bad, I turned the computer over to Gardener's Question Time on Radio 4.  There are apparently hundreds of years' worth of programmes swimming out there in the ether, thank fuck.  I lay there for days and nights, listening to my lungs whistle, trying not to panic, anchored to life by Flowerdew, Beardshaw and Biggs ruminating on humus through the decades.  Saved me, that did.

[Marner and Me]

Last night, had a few drinks and watching people in an office chair with a full can being slowly spun around in it to Gary Glitters Rock n Roll Part 1 then when the music gets quicker the chair goes quicker the poor sod in the chair has to down the can, admittedly very funny first 5 times watching it I thought, I'm to old for that. Then again I think if circumstances were different and I was a bit more pissed I'd do it.

[Ferris]

Has yet to happen, for I remain young and full of vigour.

(Aside: actually around 26 when I was out with friends and we stayed until the bar closed and I just thought "this is shit, I'm not going to get anything done tomorrow now, would have much rather gone to bed at 10.30").

[Jasha]

She'll catch her death of cold dressed like that