Signs of Aging
I turned 30 last November, plus I had a baby the year prior. These two things combined mean that I am officially an adult. Like officially old. People say that you are as old as you feel. Well that doesn't help my outlook on aging, because I feel like I am about 46. (Thankfully I look like I am 15, so I guess averaging that out, I am back to 30ish.)
Beyond the "number" and the mommy head that I now have, I have noticed a few other signs of aging. These signs mark for me that I am officially old, and I might as well get the tattoos removed and start buying clothes from Dress Barn.
1. I don't get the emo look. All of the bangs on boys, the girl pants on boys, the eye makeup on boys, the sullen looks on their faces.... I just don't get it. On top of what the boys are doing, I really don't understand the emo girl "comb over" and the Tammy Faye eyelash thing. I think in the history of bad looks, this has to be up there. I once sported an ugly punk rock hair do, so I am not saying that I am above an ugly hairdo. But the emo girl comb over and eyelash thing takes two universally BAD looks and combines them. So here I am, I find myself saying, "She is such a pretty girl, why is she doing that to herself?" It is the same thing that Doris Kaufman said about me and my black nail polish when I was 13.
2. The music is too loud. It is either too loud cause it sucks, it is going to wake the baby, it is going to bother the neighbors, or it is giving me a headache. I used to blast music. I didn't care if it ruined my hearing or bothered someone. I didn't care if you were offended. Now I find myself taking off my headphones on the train to make sure that I am not disturbing anyone around. I am such a loser. I remember the old ladies that used to yell up from the park benches outside my bedroom to lower my music. I was 4 floors up, and blasting whatever. I turned it up louder when I saw it annoyed them.
3. I am scared of teenagers. I will change cars on the train. I will avoid eye contact. I will walk quickly pass them. There is a part of me that thinks they will harass or harm me in some way. I dunno what it wrong with me, other than that I am just old. I remember when people were scared of me! Not so much anymore.
4. I am annoyed by change. I don't see any of the younger folks that I am friends with on Facebook complaining about the homepage changes. I swear it is going to take me like 2 weeks to get used to the changes.
5. I find myself talking about the past more than about the future. You hang out with old friends and you spend most of the night talking about when we used to do this and that. We don't really talk about the fun that we are planning to have. Maybe cause we know the best times have passed for now and we have to ship our kids away to college before we can party like rock stars again.
6. I watch CBS. As a media planner I know this means I am old. If I see the ads that I am placing for the Visiting Nurse Service of New York I am old. One of my favorite shows is CBS Sunday Morning. It is a news/magazine show. I also like catching 60 Minutes on Sunday night. What is wrong with me? I used to watch the CW, MTV, and VH1. Now I find MTV confusing, I officially "don't get it."
So there it is. I am old. Crap. Well, even if I am old, at least I am not square. I will never be a square.
I turned 30 last November, plus I had a baby the year prior. These two things combined mean that I am officially an adult. Like officially old. People say that you are as old as you feel. Well that doesn't help my outlook on aging, because I feel like I am about 46. (Thankfully I look like I am 15, so I guess averaging that out, I am back to 30ish.)
Beyond the "number" and the mommy head that I now have, I have noticed a few other signs of aging. These signs mark for me that I am officially old, and I might as well get the tattoos removed and start buying clothes from Dress Barn.
1. I don't get the emo look. All of the bangs on boys, the girl pants on boys, the eye makeup on boys, the sullen looks on their faces.... I just don't get it. On top of what the boys are doing, I really don't understand the emo girl "comb over" and the Tammy Faye eyelash thing. I think in the history of bad looks, this has to be up there. I once sported an ugly punk rock hair do, so I am not saying that I am above an ugly hairdo. But the emo girl comb over and eyelash thing takes two universally BAD looks and combines them. So here I am, I find myself saying, "She is such a pretty girl, why is she doing that to herself?" It is the same thing that Doris Kaufman said about me and my black nail polish when I was 13.
2. The music is too loud. It is either too loud cause it sucks, it is going to wake the baby, it is going to bother the neighbors, or it is giving me a headache. I used to blast music. I didn't care if it ruined my hearing or bothered someone. I didn't care if you were offended. Now I find myself taking off my headphones on the train to make sure that I am not disturbing anyone around. I am such a loser. I remember the old ladies that used to yell up from the park benches outside my bedroom to lower my music. I was 4 floors up, and blasting whatever. I turned it up louder when I saw it annoyed them.
3. I am scared of teenagers. I will change cars on the train. I will avoid eye contact. I will walk quickly pass them. There is a part of me that thinks they will harass or harm me in some way. I dunno what it wrong with me, other than that I am just old. I remember when people were scared of me! Not so much anymore.
4. I am annoyed by change. I don't see any of the younger folks that I am friends with on Facebook complaining about the homepage changes. I swear it is going to take me like 2 weeks to get used to the changes.
5. I find myself talking about the past more than about the future. You hang out with old friends and you spend most of the night talking about when we used to do this and that. We don't really talk about the fun that we are planning to have. Maybe cause we know the best times have passed for now and we have to ship our kids away to college before we can party like rock stars again.
6. I watch CBS. As a media planner I know this means I am old. If I see the ads that I am placing for the Visiting Nurse Service of New York I am old. One of my favorite shows is CBS Sunday Morning. It is a news/magazine show. I also like catching 60 Minutes on Sunday night. What is wrong with me? I used to watch the CW, MTV, and VH1. Now I find MTV confusing, I officially "don't get it."
So there it is. I am old. Crap. Well, even if I am old, at least I am not square. I will never be a square.
posted by Alaina @ 12:30 PM
1 Comments:
At 8:27 AM,
*Bitch Cakes* said…
Yay! Comments! First of all, I'm nearly 38, so I have a few things to say
1- I still do not even understand what emo is. I've been asking people to explain it to me for years. I am clueless. But based on your description, yes. It sucks.
2- I remember when I was 12 seeing a bumper sticker that said "If it's too loud, you're too old". Well guess what? Even at 12, I knew when stuff was too loud and I have no problem carrying ear plugs with me when I go out. I don't understand why anyone would WANT their music so loud that it hurts your head, potentially damages your hearing, and loses the sound quality due to distortion and feedback. It just does NOT sound good loud. Turn it down, assholes! (I can't believe you were mean to the old lady like that when you were a teenager. Really, I'm shocked!)
3- I was scared as teenagers even as a teenager and am possibly more scared of them now. So I hear ya, sister.
4- I cannot figure out Twitter (which looks fairly simple) and abandoned myspace when they changed. I will never EVER understand facebook.
5- My remedy: don't hang out with old friends. Hang out with new ones and have new adventures! Of course I'm attending my 20 year HS reunion this May. It should be pretty much what you explained here.
6- You may be too young to even remember this, but MTV and VH1 used to play videos. As in music videos. And not these unscripted shows we've become accustomed to. I for one love VH1's awesomely bad 'reality' programming but I don't even know where MTV is let alone what's going on over there.
Bottom line, you're awesome. Don't worry about thinking you're old. Because for one, you're not. And beyond that, you're cool enough that age doesn't matter. Just do a good job raising that lil Ruby. I'm counting on you and my other cool breeder friends to offset the idiocy that's out there cause there's no way I'm taking on that job.
Love ya! xo
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