<p>You know you are old. You know you are old when your kindergarten students stop blurting out “Mama” when asking you for something while distracted (such an endearing thing…), and blurt out “Grandma” instead. 
It happened the first time to me, last week. I shouldn’t be surprised. Most of my kiddies have moms who are in their early twenties (first child at age 15 - 17), and grandmas who are younger than me!!!</p>
<p>EK, I used to get doubletakes when I announced my kids’ ages, but now I say 24 and 21, and nobody blinks. Sigh.</p>
<p>garland, same here. I used to get all the time “you arent’ old enough to have children” and “you can’t have 4 children” which was nice…while it lasted…guess I caught up to my cohort! </p>
<p>They say it’s all downhill from here–I’m sure that’s one of the effects of gravity. Everything sags. :/</p>
<p>sometimes I get people who don’t believe I have a 16 year old, let alone a 24 year old, but then other days- I am waiting for them to ask me if they are my * grandchildren*</p>
<p>I agree that you are as old as you feel- but I have changed my opinion of plastic surgery.
While I am not as vain as my mother, who had a facelift when she was 42- for want of anything else to spend her money on I suppose- since she had already booked a cruise and bought a new car, when she became a widow.
But I do realize that one of the ways we get info about people is by visual cues, and when I start to look like my last nap was a month ago, you better believe I am going to think about some extra " help" in the fountain of youth dept ;)</p>
<p>Aaah, I really can’t relate. One thing about looking like the southbound end of a northbound mule is that the inevitable aging is not as noticeable.</p>
<p>I am still proudly proclaiming that I am going to go gray with dignity. Right now i’m doing the silver strands/temples thing; we’ll see how it goes when its all gray. But, I’ve never dyed my hair in my life, and i’m probably too old to learn now, LOL! So, face lifts are right out; they’d clash with the gray.</p>
<p>garland:). Hairdye is your friend. To the point that when I came back from my last 2-week trip to China, my S looked at me and said, “Mom, um, the hair? Need a little spritzer…” as he gestured at my temples and the stripe of gray I had convinced myself blended in with the blonde…</p>
<p>My staunch mother tsk’d tsk’d that dye business–until I convinced her to give foils a try. She keeps just a hint of blond in now and loves it. She does get those “You can’t have a duaghter who is 49!” comments. Still. Lucky duck. She loves that too. My dad likes to say that she gets those becuase he has taken such good care of her.</p>
<p>My folks still look MUCH younger than their ages & are very active–dad still works because he WANTS to & golfs as much as he wants to. Mom golfs at least 3x/week, walks an hour/day & swims 1/2 mile every day. Dad recently said the eulogy at his uncle’s funeral–uncle was >100 & we have every expectation that both our folks will be similarly long-lived, healthy until the end.
My D is petite, looks REALLY young & expects she’ll likely always be thought much younger than she actually is. I’ve always been told I look young as well. My niece just turned 25 & is still thought to be in HS much of the time. Here’s to hoping we all age gracefully–in looks & bodily functioning.</p>
<p>When I was younger, I grew a mustache to try to look older and be taken more seriously by older clients. Last year, I decided I no longer needed to look older and shaved it.</p>
<p>Facial hair has never been a biggie in our extended family, mostly because they are not particularly “hairy” folks & attempts to grow facial hair has always looked very scraggly (I have uncles who have NEVER shaved a day in their lives & no one would ever guess). Genes are an interesting thing.</p>
<p>Well, my mom never died her hair either, and she still gets complimented on her youthful looks. I actually know a lot of women in my area who go gray gracefully–I think it can be very attractive.</p>
<p>My Sister in law went gray very young, but no one knew it because she always dyed her hair a really nice shade of red which fit her vibrant personality. For her fortieth birthday, though, she stopped dying it, and her thick, nickel-silver locks with her beautiful, youthful face were just stunning.</p>
<p>I was at the hair salon recently and my hair guy asked me to guess the age of a striking looking woman sitting across the room - his next client. Well, I could tell she no doubt had had some work done, but I nevertheless went along and quietly whispered that I thought she was about 55 or so (thinking to myself that she was in reality probably much older than that).</p>
<p>Well, it’s a good thing I guessed low because my buddy <em>yells</em> out to her -as is his wont and personality "Guess how old Roshke thinks you are? :eek: It turns out the woman is in her 70’s. Even though I had guessed a good 20 years younger, I got the distinct impression that the woman was actually offended that I didn’t say she was in her 40s or younger!</p>
<p>My grandmother had a full head of undyed brunette hair for her entire life and only a few strands of gray well into her 80s. Unfortunately, she was in a nursing home for the last several years, but when we went to visit her we could always immediately pick her out in a group!</p>
<p>I don’t have enough hair left to dye any color. For years there has been a race between my hair’s falling out and its turning gray. But I have always looked younger than I am (when I was younger, that was a problem) so now when I tell people that our son is in college they sometimes think that I’m younger than I am, which is sometimes useful. But my knees (and my DW sometimes) remind me of my real age.</p>
<p>At age 50, I still only have a small handful of grey hairs. :)</p>
<p>I’m just happy I have hair :)</p>
<p>I am 44 and have gray hair in streaks. I don’t mind the color as much as the crazy hairs that stand out like corkscrews. The rest is very dark brown. I have vowed not to dye it. Peer pressure is tough even for us old people. Every friend and family member (close to my age) except one dyes her hair. DH has lots of gray. I have told him that I’ll start dying mine when he decides to dye his! It just seems like one of those things that once you start it’s very hard to stop. So I’m swimming against the tide and trying not to start (yet).</p>
<p>So I always used to vow that I would never dye my hair. That was when I was 19, and able to throw my naturally blonde hair over my shoulders at will. Then, at the age of about 42, the gray streak became pronounced. Meanwhile, I could no longer put “blonde” on my driver’s license because the lady at the DMV looked at me when I asked her and said “brown”…And the hair was still long down my back. So. I had to look realistically into the mirror and ask the question: “Am I ready to be a hippie middle-aged lady with long brown hair streaked with gray?” At the time, I was working at a dot.com. The average age of everyone else was barely 30. So I bit the bullet. I cut my hair short. Well, actually I paid a very nice person in SF to do it:). And I mean short. Think Carly F. I also got it dyed. Blonde. And, two months later they promoted me to VP. Which I have been ever since at various places. I figure now I will keep this up until I retire. At which point, looking-like-Berkeley denizen here I come. Will also stop wearing heels ever.</p>
<p>Perhaps. Or, keeping my options open, I will cut it all really short, dye it platinum (now it is your basic streaks of honey blah blah blah) and try to go for the Annie Lennox look.</p>
<p>“Am I ready to be a hippie middle-aged lady with long brown hair streaked with gray?” </p>
<p>Nope, that would be me!!!:)</p>
<p>cheers, I did post once (by accident) in the student cafe. They just ignored me. </p>
<p>I’ve colored my hair for a long time, mostly to add blonde highlights. But for the past few months I’ve been fazing those out and adding red and brown foils instead. I just love to change and vowed never to get in a hair rut. I usually can’t go longer than 2 years with the same style/color. </p>
<p>I’ll let you all know when I get to the 4-0</p>