On getting old

I realised something this weekend. Somewhere between the hundredth gray hair I had to pluck out and the intense feeling of disapproval I now feel towards teenagers I realised I am now, officially, old.

There have been a few signs, I’ll be honest. I find myself saying ‘kids these days’ and ‘when I was young’ with ever increasing frequency. I have habits, not all of them are bad. I no longer feel like coco-pops for dinner. All the blogs I used to read about empowered single women now heavily feature the same women getting married and having kids. They post pictures of their dogs/children in ridiculous hats and I find this hilarious.

But this weekend it really hit home. Checking myself out in the mirror I realised with horror that my boobs are now not what they used to be. Not that they’re around my knees or anything, but gravity is unfortunately making its presence felt and aside from sleeping suspended from a wooden beam, I’m pretty sure there’s not much I can do about it*.

Next on the list of ‘Things That Show My Age’ for this weekend was getting my learner drivers licence about a decade too late. Apparently I’m the oldest learner my particular RTA officer had ever had. Because of this she had to check her manual to look up the special requirements for advanced age learners – seems I’m so old, I don’t need to fill out a log book. Woo!

Then, rather than play Guitar Hero all afternoon, my old fart instinct made it impossible for me to do anything but clean the house and weed the garden. I actually quite enjoyed this which again is irrefutable proof that I’m well beyond cheddar on the ageing scale. I also spent some quality time ‘Worrying About Work’ and, in all honesty, various other things that I am letting slowly destroy my carefree youthful demeanor.

And all of this at 26.

To be fair, ageing is not all that bad. I have a lovely life. Last week when I was wondering where my youth went one of my good friends pointed out that I spent it on string of hopeless men. Thank God I don’t have to do that again. And all those years worrying about being fat. Well, that’s still there, but now I actually have something to worry about. Rather than people rolling their eyes when I grab an imaginary spare tyre, now they’re all like ‘yeah, you better start watching that’.

PS – I did actually succumb to the Wii and Guitar Hero is MAD. Hello childhood dream of being a rock star. MUST get microphone.

*I guess there’s surgery but I’m a writer, so that puts that particular option right out of reach.