I know, I know. It's a matter of mind. Still....age often does have a negative effect on one's thinking and memory capacity.

How old do you feel, versus, how old you are?

From what I've observed, it does seem the early 80ies does begin to take it's toll.

It's all a game..

No one who sees us, me and La Saucie, believe our ages. We still get carded at Norm's, on senior discount day, and at the movies, when I say, "two seniors, please."

elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> No one who sees us, me and La Saucie, believe our
> ages. We still get carded at Norm's, on senior
> discount day, and at the movies, when I say, "two
> seniors, please."

I think you look your age, dawg.
You're 40, right? :)

Dead is old.

"Alive or not, the dead never belly laugh."
--Pathos Lágrimas, oration at a penguin's funeral.

Old is when you fart dust...

Gatorman

Year ago I met someone dying of old age - at 53. Our neighbor next door is 92 and still working. I figure I'll retire at maybe 100 and then live to over 120. I figure at 100 we will be old, at least getting there.

In my experience, the threshold for "old" seems to get older every year. When I was 20, 40 seemed pretty old. Long past that now, and I still don't think I've hit "old" yet!

If I don't look in the mirror, I feel like I'm about 25.

If I assess my age while I'm writing computer code, I feel like I'm about 40 -- have to write a few more things down than I used to, but have so much more experience that I'm still pretty darn fast.

If I assess my age when I wake up in the morning, it depends...some days I feel like I'm 25, some days like I'm 85. What it depends on is probably what I did the night before, and for how long :)

In earth years, I'm 56.

Oh, though I do think I don't *quite* look my age, when I take my 1 year-old daughter out in public, some other people clearly do. I'm frequently told what a beautiful grand-daughter I have there.
Sigh.

... Dang software doesn't recognize intent!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/09/2016 07:50PM by elderolddog.

I have a woman in my ancestry who lived to 103 and had a child at 51. Another one lived to that age who was born in 1699 and died in 1802.

rhgc Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a woman in my ancestry who lived to 103 and
> had a child at 51. Another one lived to that age
> who was born in 1699 and died in 1802.

Let's hope we both got some of those genes then! :)

Interesting thing about the "beautiful grand-daughter" folks; when informed that it's not my grand-daughter, but my daughter, the inevitable response is: "You dawg! Give me a high-five!" Apparently to celebrate the equipment still functioning...

Suck it up, rookie!

Old is my age plus an ever decreasing future.

If the hills weren't there when you were born you are old

"I'm going to live forever! And so far, so good!"
--Lazarus Long

Some time in his 90s, Mark Twain was asked, "So how are you feeling, Mr. Twain?"

He replied, "Not bad, considering the alternatives."

My 88 year old, nevermo dad went through chemo treatments 2.5 years ago for a slow-growing lymphoma. I remarked at the time that he could die of old age before the lymphoma ever got him. He said he planned to avoid either one. He's doing great and will be 89 in December. He still drives well and lives on his own.

Other Susan

I'm 37 and freaking out about getting close to 40. I try to take good care of myself and my face looks pretty young still. I'm lucky that I have a slim figure, too. But since I'm a divorced single mom I worry that time is running out to find a good life partner.

I notice that the 50 year old body responds to exercise differently than it used to and the mind needs short breaks rather than hammer 15 hours straight like it used to. But I kind of like having to pay more attention to my body and mind after all these years. I'm sure they're due. Actually, I feel like I'm getting younger every day. When I was TBM, I was a stodgy old fool.

>
> ...needs short breaks rather than hammer
> 15 hours straight like it used to.
>

Sex for 15 hours!!!! I guess it's not bragging if you can really do it.

My go-to guru when it comes to aging is Jack LaLanne who lived to be 93 and would have lived even longer, except he refused to go to the hospital when he had pneaumonia. He just didn't feel like going so he ended up dying.

His definition of "old" is twenty years older than whatever age you happen to be right now.

If you are 60 "old" is 80. If you are 20, "old" is 40. If you are 80 "old" is hundred.

The secret to successful living as you age is diet and exercise (big surprise.)

Exercise is more important than I realized. The key is to exercise every day even if it is for just 15 minutes. Yoga is good because it stretches your spine. Once your spine starts to compress all kinds of ailments surface.

My other go-to guru for successful aging is Helen Gurley Brown. She exercised two hours a day, every day and she looked fabulous. She lived to be 90. Get her books.

While we all want to live for a long long time, it is even more important that we enjoy those years.

Throw out your medications. Break out the vitamins. Eat your veggies. If your teeth are gone and you can't chew your vegetables buy a juicer and drink them.

And whoever is reading this, you are not old. You will not be old for another twenty years.

Lois

There is a basis for believing that you inherit how long your body is good for. You might add on a few years with good habits, but it's in the genes, in terms of when your body is going to wear out.

Great. I heartily thank my g-g-grandmother (104), my g-g-grandfather (102), my grandmother (102), my grandfather (99), and my mother (78 and still going strong) for my genes, and look forward to teasing you about golf for another 50 years :)

I totally agree with you about exercise. I feel so much better when I'm active, even if it's just a matter of getting down on my knees to scrub a floor. A friend of mine who is 83 still skis. She is one of the most vital people that I know. A joke among our mutual friends is, "I want to be [her name] when I grow up."

I also share an admiration for Helen Gurley Brown. Back in the 70s and 80s I used to read all of the magazines of that era aimed at younger women, particularly Glamour, Mademoiselle, and Cosmopolitan. What I found over the years was that once you got past the sexed-up cover and mandatory sex article, what was left was a consistently positive, fun, engaging, and entertaining magazine. Helen Gurley Brown lived her life with zest, and it was reflected in her publication. She wanted all women to be empowered and to have fun.

That's exactly what I was going to write when just reading the subject line. Always 20 years older than your current age.

How old is old? Anything older than 55...I'm still young!

My mother in law is going to out live all of us.

I think I was at my oldest around the turn of the millennium--chronologically I was 49.

Since then I've steadily been getting younger. Now at the chronological age of 65, I feel younger (mostly) than I have in several decades--I'm in about my mid-30s, I reckon.

Physically I'm falling apart, of course--two types of the Big C., anemia, high blood pressure etc. etc. I can't drink anymore. I can't hear worth a damn, and I have to read with one eye shut. My teeth and toenails are the same color--neither what they started out as. Hairs sprout from everywhere. Whippersnappers see me and instinctively offer to help me with the grocery bags. But none of that bothers me. The stress level is way lower, I get a lot more exercise, and the Mrs. and I fool around more than I ever did with any previous significant or insignificant other.

I go up on the roof sometimes and look at the stars. I take great comfort in the fact that they will outlive me. Life goes on within me and without me.

I started typing medical records at age 29 and 30 years later, I'm still typing. To this day, when I type someone who is 60, I think they are old. I have to remind myself.

I think I wear my age well, but who knows. My hair has very little gray and I have very few wrinkles. I don't worry so much about the chronological age, but my body isn't really happy with getting older. My memory isn't nearly as good as it used to be, although I have no trouble with my job and remembering words for it. I do worry more about how well I'm doing physically. I've been to the doctor more in the last year than I have been in all my life including pregnancy.

The one thing I can say is that I wouldn't go back to being younger.

Growing up TBM I didn't meet too many geriatric Mormons at church. We did service projects for a few when they needed help around their homes, but they didn't show up to the meetings many of them due to advancing years.

Where I now worship, the aged are revered. We have many people in their 80's and 90's. A couple or more past 100, who get out as regularly as they're able to.

Some of them look really good for their years, and have really good mental outlooks. They're very positive people in general. I believe that is what contributes so well to their longevity. They are young at heart, and optimists.

They give me something to aspire to and I look up to them as role models for how I hope to age well.

Another source of their strength is their community and larger family, they consider their tribe that is inter-connected. They really thrive on the community aspect and share common bonds. I believe that contributes to their aging well in addition to good genes.

I used to have high blood pressure...but it went away. I used to have high cholesterol but it declined. I'm on NO medications. Period. I can run - at 72 - almost as well as at twenty. Too bad I couldn't run a four minute mile. Anyway, I seem to be getting younger except for my bald head.

Speaking of "old" --

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/fashion/im-too-old-for-this.html

You are never old so long as you have a wicked sense of humor. It is the Fountain of Youth.

I believe you're right Ponce.

Telomeres are caps on the chromosome that bundle DNA. As cells divide, divide, divide over and over, the chromosomes shorten, until the cells can no longer divide (replicate). Then aging and death ensues. A British twin study showed that people who exercise 3+ hours each week, vigorously, had thicker Telomeres, which protect the chromosomes, allowing them to keep dividing longer.

Here is a very readable article which explains it:

http://www.cbass.com/Strengthtrainingandtelomeres.htm

Not to mention reducing risk of heart disease, increasing lung function, and all the other good stuff exercising does :)

Some additional work, by the way, suggests that *moderate* exercise is the best for "anti-aging" effects on telomeres. Not much exercise was no good, too much also. Those hard-core marathoners and such age faster than people who sit around and do nothing :)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2581416/

I'm almost 62, but feel in my 40's. We're retired but we both have fun part time jobs.

I ignore the news, TV, and instead practically live outside 6 months of the year in rural WA state, and snowbird in Indio, CA Dec-Feb.

We party in Portland and practice yoga. Still have sex once a week with DW too.

We figured out the church/cult in 2006 and resigned in '07.

Thank you Internet and specifically Simon Southerton for writing "Losing a Lost Tribe, Native Americans, DNA, and the Mormon church".

The DNA evidence against the BoM was conclusive for me, as was the facts about the BoA.

Joseph Smith made them both up. Game over. The gig is up.

That makes an important point, who wants to live to be 90 or 100 if you are still in the Mormon Cult? Nothing to enjoy except meetings, tithing, senior missions, temple work, and a no-coffee no-alcohol diet.

There is so much more to look forward to in life when you are out of Mormonism. Now it's all about living life instead of worrying if you are going to make the CK in the next life and doing hours of work for dead people.

But doesn't everyone else look older? Maybe they look much older with the new glasses.

I decided I was old a couple of weeks ago. I had to get new glasses and when I came home with my fancy new frames and clear new prescription lenses i happened to glance in the mirror and got a shock. I had aged 10 years in the trip to OPSM (glasses shop) and back!

I have regained my sense of humour since then, and accepted the 'new' lines and wrinkles. But please be warned, new glasses are aging!! Heh heh!!!

Somewhere in my 50's I started looking for "senior discounts" and loved being told I didn't look that "old."! Now, with my cane or walker, and heading into 75, I feel ...yes, a little older! I like being a Senior and wear it proudly!
I was still 49 until some of my body parts had expiration dates and I didn't get the memo! Then BAM. Now I stagger around like a "Drunken Sailor" as they say and concentrate on staying upright!

My "fast forward" is broken and I'm on slow motion. It ain't pretty, but I get there! Nothing much to do about it but good medical care and hope the pain doesn't knock me down as I really hate those pain pills and the problems they cause.

So, Yes, I think I can claim being old, physically, but not mentally. I'm still picking up what you folks are putting down!
I love hearing the younguns say they can't remember something, a name, or whatever. I do that too!

I have no idea who that person is in the mirror. I've never seen her before! She does have a small resemblance to a cousin of mine. I think it's the hair, or lack of it and the way it flies around and stands straight up in the morning!

Getting older is fun, in a way. I notice I laugh a lot. :-)

I am seventy and in a few months I will advance another year. In my mind I am still in my twenties. I would be prowling the clubs and I love EDM (electronic dance music) but my true age catches up with me when dancing. Maybe things will get better when I get my second knee replacement.

I used to clean house for an 88 year old former Relief Society General Authority where I went to high school my junior year, in Ogden. We clicked and became pretty good buddies the short duration I lived in Ogden that year. She would say to me she only felt like she was 88 when she looked in the mirror. The rest of the time she felt like she was still 18.

:)

I am often told that I don't look my age. People often take me for someone in late 60s or early 70s (I'm actuallly 82).

One day I stopped in a local store and wanted to talk to the manager. The clerk got on the intercom and buzzed the boss. "There's an elderly gentleman here to see you," she said.

I realized then that I look old. But "elderly"?

"Old," is 10 years older than YOU are!

At least that's what my Dad used to tell me. When he was 70 he referred to my father-in-law as "the old man." So I asked him, "Dad, how old is old to you? You're 70, he's eighty, not a HUGE difference. So, Dad, what is "Old?"

And the answer was as above, "Old is ten years older than I am."

I turn 60 in less than a month....feeling "old."LOL

I'm surprised no one has got Wine Country Girl to weigh in here. She is old (she says), but young and hot.

Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you're aboard, there's nothing you can do.
Golda Meir

Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.
Henry Ford

Do not go gentle into that good night but rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Dylan Thomas

There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.
Sophia Loren

I'm happy to report that my inner child is still ageless.
James Broughton

Somewhere between 85 & 115…

Middle age is 10 years older than you are at the moment.
Therefore "old" is 20 years older than you are at the moment.

Old is forever. That's pretty damn old. That's a long time, by my standards. Everything else is fleeting.

Today I'm younger compared to tomorrow, but compared to eternity I'll take today.

Considering we only measure time in earth years, and time doesn't exist as we understand it elsewhere, well that's a conundrum.

Maybe ... we're timeless too?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/11/2016 10:29AM by Amyjo.

The German writer Heinrich Spoerl tells a cute story:

He was on the streetcar one day. It was packed with people, and he had to stand. He was sorry that he was standing, not because he wanted to have a seat, but because there was a charming and beautiful young woman next to him on the car, the kind that you want to write poetry to, and just hold in your arms. If he were seated and she were standing, he could perhaps strike up a conversation if he offered her his seat.

But it was no good, because she was already sitting, and he was standing.

Then the most terrible thing happened. She looked up at him, and said, "Would you like to sit down? You can have my seat."

He said that at that moment he knew he was old. He had been handed his pink slip, dismissing him from the army of eligible and attractive men, and stamped with the label "out of commission." All with just a few words from a beautiful young woman.

That is NOT a cute story! It's a wonder she didn't offer to take him casket shopping.

(in CA it's a law that you have to buy a casket for a cremation? And there are no cheap ones!)

elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That is NOT a cute story! It's a wonder she didn't
> offer to take him casket shopping.
>
> (in CA it's a law that you have to buy a casket
> for a cremation? And there are no cheap ones!)

Uhhhhhh...

Unless the law has been changed in the last few years, EOD, this is NOT true...

When my Dad died, the CREAMATORY required that bodies for cremation be in a cardboard container. Said cardboard container consisted of two VERY big sheets of cardboard, pre-pressed with lines for folding into a box shape, one slightly bigger than the other to make the "top" of the container. (You had to provide your own packing tape to tape the ends of box shapes.)

I called around to various mortuaries to find the cheapest price for the two pieces of cardboard, and the mortuary closest to my Dad's condo said: "Come on in...[the cardboard box] is free." And it WAS.

But the need for the cardboard box was a requirement of the CREAMATORY...it was not a matter of law.

The law could have been changed in the meantime, or you could have been TOLD this by someone in the funeral industry who wanted to sell you a casket (the non-cardboard, VERY pricey kind), but if so, they were bamboozling you...

...and I think you're way too smart to be bamboozled!!!

:) :) :)

EDITED TO ADD: I just saw that you had a question mark after that statement, so My Bad...I apologize for not seeing it. [Insert embarrassed face here. Thank you. Thank you very much.]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/11/2016 12:31PM by Tevai.

Over 55!? Nope. That's still middle-age.

I do find that the old number moves as I get older. My Mom is 88 and she still teaches dancing. There's just nothing oldish about that gal to me.