Suburban Kvetch

My sixth sense

I see…old people.

They’re everywhere.  You might be one of them, I don’t know.  What I do know is that all-of-a-sudden, from out of nowhere, they started appearing to me, not in my dreams, but in a place much more frightening.

My age category.

I answered my land line a few weeks ago and took an automated survey by new cell phone company.

What is your age?

Are you under 18? Press 1

18-20? Press 2

21-24? Press 3

25-29? Press 4

30-34? Press 5

35-39? Press 6

40-44? Press 7

45-49? Press 8

EIGHT?  I had to wait until EIGHT to push the number for my age group?  What happened to the 40’s being the new 30’s?   Guess no one told A.T. and T.

I do not see an old person when I look in the mirror nor when I look at my friends who range in age from thirty to sixty, with the preponderance falling between 45 and 55.  But show me a photo of people who are 45-55 whom I don’t know - and man, do they look old!  I asked a friend once if we looked like the scores of happy, hugging groups of strangers we come across on Facebook. You know, the women who look a little weathered with  a bit too much undereye makeup and a strange tan for Kansas in January and the men who are gray, balding with a little extra skin around the jowls?

She assured me, we do not.

A friend of mine in her 40’s married someone seven years older.  That makes him 55.  I have fun spending time with them as a couple - she’s one of my local BFFs and he’s a fun guy.  When together, it seems like we are all the same age.

I’m headed to a wedding reception this weekend for a 50-year-old friend who is marrying her long-time love.  He is 63. I have never met him, but my friend certainly is not old to me.

Yet, I went out with men in their 50’s this summer.

THEY’RE OLD!

The only upside is, that to them, I am decidedly young.

Maybe with friends, it’s the familiarity, the history (looong histories sometimes)that means — although we know them best, we see their faces through rose colored reading glasses.  I look at the faces of my friends from long ago and see the child within.  I hear a school yard chant in their present-day wisdom.  In the friends I’ve made in the decade I’ve lived in my current home, age only seems to matter when there is a milestone to celebrate and a party to plan.  Their faces look like mine.  Unchanged from ten years ago if only to us.  Maybe it’s the effect of seeing people often and not noting subtle shifts.  Maybe it’s the lake effect breeze.

We see only the best parts of ourselves and our friends.  I guess that’s as it should be - holding a steady course of aging with those around us certainly softens the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.

But, when we feel a distant, gnawing sense of familiarity looking into the faces of strangers, our own reflection — for just one second — becomes a little bit scary.