...just a number...

My friend L recently informed me that he went on a course last week and met a young woman who was, in his words, simply perfect.

They laughed, they talked, they connected... and L had visions of their beautiful future together in front of a warm fire, two labradors and soft furnishings all sewn up in his mind's eye.

However his dream was rudely interrupted, when the young lady in question turned to him and uttered the worst sentence known to a man of his age...
"Oh, you are so nice," she smiled, "you remind me of my dad".

Oh.

This weekend I went to see a band that I hadn't seen in twenty odd years. Pootle and I scanned the room when we arrived, and Pootle deduced quite promptly that we were the youngest in the room. Correct that - she was potentially the youngest in the room. I looked around and noted that I recognised many of the faces ... and alas, they were no longer that young.

It came as quite a shock to me to recognise some of these men and women. They were faces I remembered from the past; they were middle aged drinkers, and old rockers that had once been lovers of pints of Bitter on a friday night at the local pub, and all night ravers on a dark night in an empty field. Now, they were parents...maybe even, grandparents...

Where did that time go? Am I the only who doesn't feel my actual age? If I don't look in the mirror and see the obvious reminder of where I am in my timeline, then I still feel as though I am in my mid twenties.
Seeing and recognising those 40 plus year olds in the bar shocked me, not because they had aged...but because I had aged right alongside them.

Another nail in my coffin was a conversation I had with a young lad this morning. Upon discovering he was just about to turn 21, I had a sharp intake of breath - I was now old enough to be his mum! Just like L had experienced this past week, I was now in a position where this young lad could say, "Oh, you are just like my mum,' then laugh as another wrinkle appeared on my forehead.

So what to do? Should I act like the person in the mirror, or act like the person that is still within? The one who still does like the odd pint of bitter? Who has fond memories of staggering home in the early hours of the morning and still getting up for work three hours later? Or is it time to embrace the next stage in the timeline? Middle aged acceptance...

Dare I say it - but I think the secret bitter drinker in me may just win. I think I'd prefer to stay in my twenties and avoid all mirrors. I am beginning to realise that thinking that we are old is what ages us...not the age itself.

It is, after all, just a number...