OK, I’m 63 and a quarter (nearly) and have been retired for over 4 years, but have never felt “old”, though am unfit, overweight and drink too much.Today I went to see the touring ‘musical’ Let It Be – I probably don’t need to tell you the gist of this – and I quite enjoyed it, though it wasn’t as good as the Bootleg Beatles doing Sgt Pepper last year. However, on my way home I began to reflect on why I felt let down; then it came to me – a vast proportion of the audience seemed to be older than me. These people shouldn’t like the same music as me. What happened to the generation gap? I suppose that I am of the first generation when the “gap” was invented – but it seems to have moved, and I’m not sure how I feel about that. I have no kids of my own, so I am not used to so-called generation gaps further down the line – I like what I like, and don’t care what youngsters like, but I do take exception to oldies liking the same as me. I realise that I am being extremely unreasonable in having this view, but am I alone? Should I just get a life? I really think that I expected everyone to be the same as me! Perhaps they are, as I suppose people 10 years older than me would have been going to see the originals as I went to see the rock bands of the early seventies. I think I’ve answered my own question, but I still feel uneasy.
Am I Old?
by 28 Comments
Alright. You are not old. You are yourself. I hate to be the one to break this to you but nobody else is exactly like you. You are unique. A one off. You may share some cursory likes and dislikes with others of various ages, backgrounds, ethnicities, sexual orientations, religious or lack of religious beliefs and various sundry other aspects of human existence but absolutely nobody else thinks exactly like you. Nobody in the entire history of human existence ever has or will.
All is but a dream within a dream.
Propaganda!
Blow by blow, the passion dies….
I felt like this when I went to a special cinema screening of the Monty Python live shows a few years ago. The audience were of an age that could, quite credibly, be seen shuffling into a Vera Lynn gig – and I was one of them!
I see no problem here. The joy of barely being in my 40s but with Afterword tastes is that I can go to gigs and genuinely feel like I’m the youngest person there. Certainly that was the case at a Georgie Fame concert about 10 years back when I was surrounded by people my parents age. I stopped going to ‘new’ band shows about 10 years back when I realised I was the oldest person in the room.
Being an occaisional attendee of folk gigs I’ve been used to being one of the youngest in the room for a long time. Now I’m over 50 I’m fully aware that the odd young person probably considers me one of the generic ‘olds’ in the audience myself.
68 here, saw the Fabs in ’63, saw The Bootleg Beatles do Sgt. Pepper last year, saw you in the audience @geedubyapee but you looked older than me.
I very much doubt that
You’re probably right. Until what’s left of my hair turned white I always looked young for my age. I was still being asked if I was 18 in pubs when I was 28! That’s one reason I grew a beard. Now I’m mistaken for Santa Claus.
Hi @geedubyapee have you met @SteveT? If you do you`ll feel much younger and never be troubled by doubts of old age ever again.
Heard an interview with the “National Seniors Chief Advocate” on the radio the other night – he said that a zillion surveys and interviews showed that 60 year olds don’t view themselves as old, but that people over 70 definitely are. Seventy-years-olds consider themselves sort of middle-aged, but that old age started at 80…..as you might guess, 80-year-olds thought they might just be on the edge of the cusp on the far horizon of old age, but that 90-year-olds….you get the picture.
There are physical limitations that appear, but the rest is all in the mind.
Everyone is the same age. But at different times.
No, you are not.
My father-in-law is 79 next month and is beginning to show signs of slowing down, after 19 years of happy retirement. My grandmother just turned 94 and has been old for a few years.
So you have another 15-20 years of ‘late middle age’ left, I reckon.
Whereas my dad, 89, has been old for about 70 years. Seriously, I don’t think he ever was truly young and certainly has never shown any interest in what ver kids like even when me and my brother were young. In comparison, while not being painfully hip, my wife and I always give our children”s interest a fair go.
It is the drab anonymity of the old at concerts that grates, yet the opposite attracts more disdain still, the paunchy punks with limp mohicans, the ponytailed hippy in tie die with fewer strands than the punk, the shine of the black painted quiff on the bespectacled rocker. I hate all these old fogeys out at night, especially that one that gurns out at me from the mirror as I adjust my hair to a rakish angle, on the way out to yet another farewell tour.
Afterword t-shirt!
It’s going to have to be in a small font size.
The T-shirt’s going to be XXXXL, so I don’t see the problem.
Or a small marquee.
Is that so we have to stare at your chest?
(I’ll get my apologies in early – sorry, Mini!)
Who said I had a small font?
Applauds!! 👏👏 I am you!
I don’t go to see much in the way of ‘young’ bands, other than good local acts down here in Devon at festivals, pubs etc., so most of the biggish concerts are by old favourites…over the last year or two off the top of my head – Robert Plant, Fairport, Show Of Hands, Bootleg Beatles, Police Dog Hogan, Feast of Fiddles, Bryan Ferry, Cropredy Festival, Looe Festival…next year Steely Dan and Steve Winwood, you get the drift. I am always surprised at the number of younger people at these gigs to be honest – yeah, I realise I am old (68), but the mix of ages is rather comforting somehow….as long as they shut up and listen.
I regularly tell the story of listening to my 80 year old mother and three of her similarly aged sisters discussing a friend of theirs who had died. One of them asked how old this person had been. The reply was 84. One of the sisters said, very seriously, ” but that’s no age to be dying”.
Til the day he died my Dad would frequently talk about having seen ‘some old fella’ in the street or wherever. I didn’t like to break it to him that most of them were younger than he was.
I’ll read something in the newspaper about “a 64 year old man” and automatically make a judgement about him based on the fact that he’s an old man.
An old man, the same age as me. But I’m not an old man!
I’ve just walked past the Leeds Universities, first day leaflets were being handed out with student deals. Did not get offered one, also saw the Radio 1 breakfast show coach with wonderful Radio 1 DJ standing outside. Can’t remember his name.
I recognised him as his photo was on the side of the coach, didn’t even offer me a friendly ,’Hi chaps’.
I must be old.
Yes. But who cares? It’s better than the alternative.