Age cannot wither

[andrewducker]

Over here there's a discussion wherein I say I was surprised to note how adult we all look. And both Kirsty and Marianne conflate that with "old", whereas what I meant was "We're now looking about the same as my parents looked when I was a kid. Or the majority of my teachers. i.e. we're in our mid 30s."

To me, old means "over 60". Adult means "over 24" and middle-aged means "40-55". But I've bumped into a load of different definitions and usage


[Poll #912015]

Comments

[cx650.livejournal.com]

Age is an attitude, not a number.

[wychwood]

Very definitely so, I'd have to agree.

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

Answers to these sorts of questions generally depend on the age of the person answering, and it is traditionally held that one's views change as you age.

[soon_lee]

Agreed. It's a movable feast.

'Old' is defined as your current age plus an undefined number of years.

[moniqueleigh]

I agree with the folks who say it's more of an attitude than a number. I've known 18 year olds who were more "adult" than some 35 year olds. And I've known 30 year olds who seemed older than some 80+ folks.

But on average, I count adults as around the 21-22 mark (unless they're of the perpetual high-school/college mindset). I've honestly never really thought about what I consider middle-aged, so I just guesstimated an age for that. To me, "old" has always been my great-grandparents, now my grandparents' age bracket. My parents are "getting old" but probably firmly middle-aged, and they're in their mid-50s.

[mair_in_grenderich]

what about "grown up"?

[andrewducker]

That's what I had "adult" in there for...

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

Adult and grown up are hardly synonyms. there are obvious examples around this page.

[thishardenedarm.livejournal.com]

your claws are showing...

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

yeh I didn't delete that one :-P

[mair_in_grenderich]

In my warped little mind, 'adult' is associated with being (legally) old enough to buy a house / get married / have adult responsibilities, and 'grown-up' is associated with having the maturity to do so.

[azalemeth.livejournal.com]

Part of me wants to say '16+' to the first one, yet, by looking around at my friends, another part instantly yells back "No!", and selects 22 to be on the safe side.

Age, maturity, and wisdom cannot really be summed up in numbers. I think it's much better to give an answer in terms of a range where it's becoming more taken-for-granted that you act in certain ways....

[channelpenguin.livejournal.com]

depends entirely upon the person.

Even if you were to use a set of physical metrics, it would *still* vary.

[channelpenguin.livejournal.com]

strangely I almost put exactly what you said about being in the the age bracket you most remember your parents being in when you were at home - but had a moment of not remembering if your parents were a lot older than mine whent they had you and thus that I might be talking rubbish.

When my parents were my age, I was 11... yeah, I'm old :-)

Also, I was *joking* when I said 'old'. Thought that'd be obvious :-)

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

Off topic I know, but now we're in the same city theres no excuse to meet up at some point for drinks/coffee :P

When are you free?

[andrewducker]

I'm currently all of free next week, except for Thursday. Drop me an email at andrew@ducker.org.uk and we'll arrange something!

[cybik.livejournal.com]

Depends on the person. My dad is 70 but I wouldn't say he was "old"; I'd still say "[late] middle aged".

[paddie-gal.livejournal.com]

well, I said that an adult was over 20 - that said, I didn't really feel like a grown-up until about 3 years ago, which would be 26-27 years old. equally, I know people (specifically, siblings) who are in their mid to late 40s, but feel that they have no grip on real life, and are in effect "younger" than me.

broin is obviously not included in this, he's not *nearly* that old. Yet.

[andrewducker]

Oooh - I'm so not touching that with a big stick...

[paddie-gal.livejournal.com]

You're not allowed to. but I am!

[andrewducker]

Ha! You're just lucky he unfriended me a while back and won't have seen this...

[paddie-gal.livejournal.com]

huh, didn't realise he'd done that...any reason?

[fetket.livejournal.com]

Hmmm My answers couldn't go in your boxes... 21, 25, 22

[thishardenedarm.livejournal.com]

thing is, there has been a major demographic shift in the last few decades, with longevity, quality of life and cultural "participation" of the older all greatly increasing. I'm part of a generation (40 and up) that are very reluctant to get out of the sandbox (usually only a collapsed lung or nasal septum will stop us) and in the larger metropoli (unlike in this fucking village) you'll find a kind of intergen mix at both high cultural and club and music events that would be unheard of a few years ago. Which is all to say the answers to your questions will have a much broader standard deviation than they did a while ago, probably so broad as to be fairly useless with so small a sample.

second thought: we are all going to die. It really cant be said often enough...