This is the inevitable thread for ILxors in their forties

Xpost to the absentminded thread
My favorite part of being in my 40s is the realization, maybe once a month, that I’ve been walking around all day, going to bars and shopping etc, with my fly open

over the summer I watched a couple documentaries about the LA Riots and then the one about the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings ... and I thought, this is middle age, this is like my parents watching documentaries about the Civil Rights movement and Mississippi Burning

Same way my granddad used to lay on the couch and fall asleep to kamikaze attacks on batteships in the Pacific theater, I'm certain my grandkids will come into my den to find me snoozing away to ash-covered stockbrokers stepping their way through fallen rubble and drifting paper.

Lol

I’ll yet be over there in March. Having my 49th year literally be a year of COVID is weird — my birthday was one of the last classic fun days before lockdown — but in a weird way the enforced calm is probably what was needed given everything else in the world.

i don't want to alarm you, but this is actually your 50th year

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/898/402/48d.gif

i don't want to alarm you, but this is actually your 50th year

Guy at the liquor store venting a little about a woman who came in on Saturday night, wanting to buy vodka even though she didn't turn 21 until Sunday.

I mentioned the same thing you just said and got the blankest stare, before he mumbled something about tell that to the ABC.

This is his 50th year, but he’s still 49.

This is like when people ask how old a child is and parents say something like “he’ll be 4 in December.” Is there some shame in being 3? Just say he’s 3!

/rant

Even worse when they do it in bars.

Even worse when you tell the ticket lady he's 8 so he can have the free admission and your daughter pipes up "No, Daddy, he was 9 last week, don't you remember?"

Teenagers on tiktok are posting video of high schoolers from 2003 like it’s vintage 1950s footage and it’s making me feel unwell pic.twitter.com/sROVmfII3C

— ellory smith (@ellorysmith) October 14, 2020

The best thing about this age is getting socks for your birthday, and being happy about it.

damn truth! i got a birthday coming up and I should research what socks I want so that I can let my family know!

The weirdest thing for me about getting older is reading old e-mails and realizing how much the entire way that society functions has shifted and changed so much in the past 20 years, like it's alarming

i suppose that's the nature of the western world universally? Like the jump from 1903 to 1925 must've seemed impossibly seismic too.

there was a major earthquake in 1906 so ... otm

Ya perhaps. I mean, the shift to having SMS being the primary form of interpersonal communication is obv an enormous shift, but it's shocking to see how huge a development it is when you, like, look back at the e-mails we were sending each other pre-2005.

The weirdest thing for me about getting older is reading old e-mails and realizing how much the entire way that society functions has shifted and changed so much in the past 20 years, like it's alarming

― flamboyant goon tie included, Monday, October 19, 2020 11:54 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

I was packing up things in our basement and came across a printout of an email from 2000 when I was first dating my wife and the email was so formal and then had lyrics I quoted to her it was like reading some letter from the civil war or something.

Yeah that's what I mean, exactly. Music books films all age with some manner of gracefulness but basic communication has changed so quickly

I've got a box of actual letters in my attic from my then girlfriend - and other mates - who were scattered over the UK at Uni in the early 90s. Pre-mobiles too so does indeed seem like a different world

welp, here I am. what should I expect for the next decade.

various parts of your body are gonna stop working for no particular reason and when you bring that information to a trained medical professional the gist of what they are going to tell you is "yeah, that'll happen"

neat!!!

Neanderthal just wanted to let you know I also turn 40 in the next 30 days, so if you ever wanna talk about your body or various changes you've been noticing within your body, just send me a webmail - mine works ;)

xp i wish i was kidding and yes it sucks. i would recommend enjoying and strengthening whatever physical facilities you have in anticipation of needing as many resources as possible to cope with sudden, debilitating and unavoidable decrepitude when it emerges.

just wanna say I absolutely am NOT kidding and it doesn't necessarily need to suck. I'm here to support my fellow ilx0rs and help them cope with the bodies that Lord God has given unto them, and the behaviours we can do to maintain these physical vessels. I'm a big proponent of cycling 20 miles a week at least, running once every three months, and making crockpot beef stew and texas-style chili con carne at least once every astrological quarter, and I'm NOT ashamed to share these life-extending secrets with you, Neanderthal.

I know Scorpios and Saggittarrii are natural enemies, but I'm willing to put all that bullshits beyond us and talk to you mano-y-mano, amigo style about our bodies in a private setting if you're willing.

awww I am a Scorpio and my best friend is a Sagittarius ... and actually, the physical stuff ... my 40s are over half over and I haven't really had any body parts problems tbh, except for needing more sleep. Also people will flirt with you and you'll do the math and realize that you are possibly the same age as their parents and it will be weird.

humblebrag

Now more than ever ("now" meaning in your '40s as well as being stuck at home) you need to stay active, at least to some degree. I'm not sure I've had any more random body failures than usual, at least nothing age related, but I'm definitely at the precarious stage where I'm as likely to injure myself exercising as I am because I *don't* exercise. I've never been one to stretch much, but I'm beginning to see its importance. If I could keep a straight face I could otherwise see the appeal of yoga, for flexibility, which seems as important as mental and physical strength as I creep toward decrepitude.

The weirdest thing about being in your '40s, imo, is remembering when either of your parents turned '40, and thinking, huh, is that what I look like to other people? Because I don't *feel* old.

I feel that last sentence a lot.

I have seen pics of myself from 5 years ago where i look significantly younger.

Saw one from when i was 27 and wanted to cry.

I plan to age well. Gym time!

I have made two big lifestyle changes since I turned 40, there is still time and your habits are still malleable!

The latest unexpected health issue is waking up with my hands and fingers aching. Both my parents turned 40 before I was born, I have no role models in that regard.

I really need to get back to the basic yoga stretches I was doing a few years ago. Lately my lower back hurts all the time and it didn't when I was doing some simple stretches in the morning. But I am undisciplined, except when it comes to meeting deadlines.

Almost done with this decade; I'll be 49 next month.

Feel you all on the 'do I look like my parents who looked old at my age?!?' front. I maintained a youthful visage for a good long while (like I remember the time less than a decade ago when someone thought I was the younger brother of my brother who is five years younger than me) but boy has that ever stopped being the case for the last little while. And I do think the Grandpa-ening probably started right around the time I hit 40. I can't even say exactly what it is, though. My eyes, maybe? My eyes look older. Squintier. Saggier. A little less devil-may-care, a little more ready-for-medicare.

remembering when either of your parents turned '40, and thinking, huh, is that what I look like to other people? Because I don't *feel* old.

I recently felt some pleasure at the invisibility of the middle-aged person when it comes to young people. There were these four guys (looked to be early 20s), two of whom recently moved into the apartment building next door to mine. They are musicians. They are kinda into jazz, from what it sounds like (e.g. Take Five on loop play). So it made sense that one day they decided to get an upright piano. ... that they then had to figure out how to get out of the pickup truck and into the apartment building, which had steps going up from the sidewalk to the front doors .... So I just stood there, smoking, looking at my phone, trying not to look conspicuous, but the ridiculousness of these guys piano moving attempts ... there were four of them ffs ... and then I realized ... to them I am this middle-aged woman who probably knows nothing about moving upright pianos and they paid me no mind. And while I briefly had the instinct to tell them that actually, I have had plenty of experience moving upright pianos, I decided to just go with being invisible.

though I feel like in your 40s the divide gets sharper and perhaps more bleak between the single ppl and those who are settled down with spouses and/or kids. Not in a "we don't interact with one another way" but the existential issues are more sharp, and there definitely is an aura of "there is probably something very broken about you" around those who are over 40 and still single.

Thanks for the thread revive, I just crossed this rubicon about three weeks ago. Don’t “feel” old though reminders abound, like when I played flag football a month or so ago and was very very quickly sucking wind. Grew out a beard for the first time during quarantine and the gray plus the bags under my eyes probably make me look my age. As a nonparent it’s definitely wild to realize that when my dad was 40 I was 14

I learned years ago, while volunteering in my kids' school, that once you hit your 30s, more or less, specific distinctions blur and young people just think you look "old." A friend of mine who teaches in college, though, he went with the eyes theory, that the eyes are the true age giveaway. Maybe. All I know is that I have a grey beard but I still rarely feel like the oldest person in the room. Granted, I only have a couple of friends in their '50s, but none of them seem particularly old, either. Good genes?

Ah yeah, I recently thought that my father was my current age when I was 18 and started college which seems very weird to me since he was OLD then !
And it's not just an impression, objectively he was in a completely different situation with two kids (my sister who was 22, me), married for around 25y, owning a house in the suburbs, bought several cars, etc.
I'm not the total opposite but still, married for only 2y, no kids, living in a small flat in the city, still going out for drinks with friends regularly (well, less so this year, obviously)...

The funniest thing about my age was a few years ago when a 16yo kid asked me if I was... 18 ! Because I was driving a car so she thought I was old enough to have a driving licence : I guess that 18 was the oldest she could think of !
Also, I regularly get a "jeune homme" (young men) from sellers in shops. Which is nice but kinda weirs for a middle aged guy...

for me, 46 is the last year I remember what my parents were like at my age on a daily basis. I had left home by the time my parents were 47, so the memories of when various aging things happened to them are way more vague, in terms of predicting the likelihood of when various things will happen to me and what they will feel like: what year was the knee surgery, what year was the cancer, what year was the dental work that cost $10k, etc.

also, now they are in their 70s and often don't remember things that happened in their 40s so if I were to ask, "mom, what year did you have that knee problem?" the answer would start with I don't remember and then my parents would end up bickering about where Frank's Florist was in relation to the Post Office.

it struck me the other day that when my mum was my age I was getting married

:(

Also people will flirt with you and you'll do the math

Being flirted with - by people of any age group - has absolutely not been a feature of my forties. What's your secret? (Asking for a friend.)

I was walking down the street yesterday and saw an old soccer ball in the street. I was nearby to a park, so I dribbled it down the sidewalk and kicked it up on the grass as I walked by the park. Now my foot hurts. Story of my forties.

xp - a vagina? idk

if I were to ask, "mom, what year did you have that knee problem?" the answer would start with I don't remember and then my parents would end up bickering about where Frank's Florist was in relation to the Post Office.

irl chuckled out loud at that one. encapsulates what my parents were like in their 70s, too.

Ahah, that's rough !
I haven't played football since... I was 30 something. And I was already borderline dying after playing like 15min !

From age 25-40 I did regular high-impact cardio and stretching via dance practice and performance, which took a toll on my feet but also kept me in okay shape. We quit when I was 40, and I probably hung onto my fitness for a while but by 43 (last winter) I was so tight I hurt everywhere and range of motion was shit.

Been fighting to get that back with daily stretching and more exercise and it's working but it's all about constant maintenance now whereas 10 years ago I could it once a week and be good.

Re appearances: I'm going grey and I'm not into it, but thank you, subcutaneous fat, for my plump and youthful visage!

I'm a Scorpio who had a Sagittarius roommate in college. He used to make chili con carne de venado.

Dude's still one my best friends, but never living with one of those again.