Growing old resentfully

HAVE you ever been in a public place with a large gathering of people and thought for a minute: “If every person here under a certain age (choose your cut-off age) were to be suddently made to disappear, I could be the only one left!”? Well it's happened to me and it's tending to happen more and more frequently now. Indeed, you know you're getting on (not to say 'old') when you can say this quite often and you know you may be over the hill (not to say 'past it') when it becomes commonplace! Admittedly, using a cut-off age of 30, as I'm doing, is perhaps a bit on the low side, but I can't help being a young buck! Hehhe...

THEY say that “beauty is in the eyes of the beholder”. And this is, I suppose, true, up to a limit (everything has a limit), and similarly that age is a question of mentality, that is to if you think young you ARE young. Well, that too may be true... up to a limit, and a much more uncompromising limit than the former, because age catches up with us sooner or later no matter how young-thinking we are or how young we believe ourselves to be.

Two well-known old fogies

HOWEVER, whether we think young or think ourselves to be younger than our years, as most of us tend to do nowadays - in keeping with the notion of never really growing up or maturing – we can never turn back the clock or the march of the years except perhaps in a very superficial way with something like cosmetic surgery, currently very much in vogue. Yet even disguising our age by such surgical means, we ourselves know how old we are and we know that our internal biological clock is still ticking away and has not slowed down by one iota because of the surgeon's knife.

BUT there's nothing like being in a roomful of people and noting that you're probably the oldest person there, and I’m not just talking about being at a kids' party! I’m talking about grown-ups' places. You're at work, at the cinema, in a restaurant, bar, party, family gathering, even in church, or in any other number of places with other people and they all look disconcertingly young and fresh-faced.

I SUPPOSE the ultimate recognition of one's advancing years is when the sort of people who were always older than you (and so they should be!) are now YOUNGER than you. People such as teachers in general and the head teacher in particular, high-ranking police officers, your family doctor, your local MP, hospital consultants and registrars, and the worst and scariest one of all: the Prime Minister himself (and the President of the United States!), not to mention the Dalai Lama! When all these types of people are younger than you, you know you're old, however young in spirit you might be or however immaturely you might behave. There's just no getting away from it. Once all these people were figures of professional, legal or religious authority who were ALWAYS older than you, now many of them appear to be fresh rosy-cheeked youths and here you are a dried-up old codger or matron visibly withering away!

Age piggy-back!

THE simple fact is that because old age or senility represents a state of being close to the end of life, few if any of us can entertain that thought without a certain amount of trepidation and anxiety, so we prefer not to acknowledge such a state. And who can blame us? Except in a few extreme cases, none of us can contemplate their own extinction with equanimity. Self-preservation and a strong desire to cling to life are natural instincts.

SO I suppose when we look around us and see lots of young people, or at least people younger than ourselves, we feel a tinge of envy of their youth and the many years still left to them. We may sometimes even resent their moving in on territory we considered our own, as we gradually get nudged out to a more peripheral role in society. But it is of course all part of the process of renewal which governs all forms of life and dynamic process.

SO I have no choice but to face up to the fact that my GP receiving me in his surgery is younger than me; that my local MP chairing a meeting of residents is younger than me; that the head teacher I may go and see about my child is younger than me; that the police sergeant I speak to at the local police station is younger than me; that the doctor on duty in accident and emergency is younger than me; that my neighbourhood vicar taking the service is younger than me; and finally, indignity of indignities, that the prime minister or president of my country is younger than me... MUCH younger!

There's a video game for everyone!

OF course, none of this applies to the real me, you understand... ahem... I’m still a fresh and feisty fellow of tender years. I’m using myself, 30 years hence, as a hypothetical example to make a point. But maybe it applies to YOU, or, if not to you, to people you know. Maybe it's something that just applies to other people, who seem to grow old before our very eyes while we stay forever youthful.