OMG, am mortified/horrified and shocked...........

[CleverLemonCat]

Young neighbours have just moved in next door. This morning (wasn't eavesdropping, honest) heard a relative ask if they had met any of their neighbours, oh yes they replied...there is a nice old woman next door. Old? I'M ONLY 63!!

This got me wondering if I was giving off 'old lady' vibes.

Possible indications:

I occasionally glance in a shop mirror and wonder why my mum is there dressed in my clothes.
My pubic hair is disappearing, and seems to be making it's way to my chin
Last week I bought 3 lovely geraniums
Last year I bought and planted a hydrangea in my garden
After a couple of tiny accidents, am wondering if I should buy some tena lady knickers.
Caught myself wondering if I should crochet a bed jacket ...it can be chilly in bed whilst reading a book!
Am having actual conversations with my cat
My box room is stuffed with wool ' just in case'
This morning, completely out of the blue found myself singing the song from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and I CAN'T GET IT OUT OF MY HEAD.
Jumped - in my motor-car - and bought 3 more geraniums

Indications I am not old:

Ermm, I am young in my head!

I am not being unreasonable, you are in your prime!
I am unreasonable. You are heading into old biddy territory!

63 is not old, don't be ridiculous.

It is grandparent age, so not young.

Don't bet against it. My Nan lived to be 103 (4 months off 104). She lived for most of the last 40ish years of her life with my Aunt, Uncle and 2 male cousins. This kept her young at heart. She wore tweed skirts and twin set and pearls (age appropriate), but when cousins' mates visited she would be included in conversations and wasn't treated like a doddery little old lady. Age is a state of mind. As for gardening, watch Chelsea Flower Show in a couple of weeks and a good proportion of the top designers are 20 or 30 somethings.

You could drop dead at 40, but would you have considered yourself middle aged at 20 - I think not. Don't be defined by society's norms. When it comes to old age Sunak wants to put pension age up to 75 so you won't be old till then.

Their grandpas could be in their 40s.

Easily. My bloke became a grandpa when he was 43.

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There are some interesting characters there, from character sets not normally used in the same language, such as the Polish "w" sound (crossed L) and C cedilla which is more Portuguese and French (and therefore surely unlikely to be on the same keyboard). Maybe your cat is cleverer than you realised.

Lol. Have just got in, friend was reading posts, must have left laptop open when we left house and cat has been making her thoughts known!

She is a very clever cat!

😂

I absolutely love, love, love your cat. Cats will one day take over the world they are so clever. Thousands of years ago they were revered as gods and they have never forgotten this.

Back to ages, I saw an article in the paper about a Grandma who was mugged and assaulted on her way home from town one night. I immediately thought of my friend's Nan in her late 70s coming home from bingo on the bus, but no, this woman was 43 coming home from a night club in the wee small hours. It just shows how perceptions differ.

People are getting older. Its not that long ago that 3 score year and 10 was accepted as your life span, now you can add another 10 years at least whereas a couple of hundred years ago you would have been lucky to live to 60.

Judging by the replies to this post there are wildly different views as to what constitutes old age which proves it is a state of mind.

Well indeed…. Using the approach you’ve quoted, 20 to 55 must be young, then 13 to 19 teenager and 0 to 12 child. So the first 20 years of life are covered by two descriptions. Then the next 35 are covered by one. Before a series of 10 year stages after that. Which is completely nonsensical 😂

Middle age could reasonably cover 45 to 64
Old could cover 65 to 84
anything over 85 is elderly.

Which leaves 25 to 44 as young
and 0 to 24 as child/teenager/young adult 😅

I did my family tree and they were mostly living I to their 80s in Late 19th century/ early 20th century.

I always think of elderly being the stage before old.

Well, 3 score years and 10 was probably an average. People realised that many children died before the age of five, and that women died in childbirth frequently. So if you made it through that (and war and pestilence) you had a good chance of reaching 70 or older. The Spitalfields excavation was an eye-opener on how we see longevity in the past. Named individuals, whose ages were known as they were buried in the church crypt, had their bones carbon dated, and the results were way out e.g. someone who had lived to 80+ was carbon dated as having lived to c. 35. I think - this was the 80s - carbon dating has much improved (witness the ID of Richard III) but the findings put a coach and horse through the idea that most people died before they were 40 in the past.