That´s how the saying goes and as usual with this kind of squishy reasoning it covers just about everything without saying anything. The verb feel of course is useful for describing a number of things which in many cases you would find hard put to attribute to any age determining quality. To feel a pebble in a shoe can be painful and restrict movement but that´s about it. For all intents and purposes I intend to restrict myself to feelings coupled to age excluding a number of other interpretations. Even then it is still a matter of interpretation. The interpretation of the world around us and the realization that this interpretation is mutual and ever changing. As a child, as I believe the case is with most children, I was impatient to get older. It would appear that the status of age is a knowledge we seem to acquire early in life. Somewhere along the way the desire to be older than I actually was left me. I don´t know exactly when that would have been but I guess around the age of 21. I have no explanation for this other than the last age related restrictions were lifted and I most probably saw myself as a fully fledged adult. This desire however was never at any time replaced by wanting to be younger. In fact the thought of having to once again go through all the trials and tribulations of puberty, youthful stupidity and recklessness not to mention a multitude of examination papers was never an attraction even later on in life when becoming aware that old age was creeping up on me. Paradoxically this had little to do with me other than the fact I was getting on in years which I just viewed as an irrelevant number in contrast to the legalities attached to becoming 21. The very first time I realized the significance of that number in relation to how the world and indeed I, myself included, view a person of age was when I glimpsed a reflection of myself walking past a shop store window and wondered who the old man was. It rather startled me although I do remember laughing out loud at the same time thankful that there was no one in the vicinity to add a label of insanity to my what must have seemed like extraordinary behaviour. The second time I recall vividly as it had several connotations. I was on my way to work on a crowded bus in Södertälje, a town renowned for its large group of non European immigrants mainly Christian Syriacs from the Middle East, when a beautiful young woman of about 18 offered me her seat. I thanked her kindly doing my best to hide my surprise which in fact was twofold. Firstly I saw little reason for me not to be able to stand on a local bus for a short period of time but then becoming aware that she was showing the respect due to older people e.g me that most surely was part of her upbringing. I don´t know whether it made matters better or worse that in Sweden this type of behaviour has become increasingly rare to the point where holding open a door for a female might well reap a look of disdain. I have to admit that even until a few years ago the penny hadn´t dropped entirely as to my status so gracefully enveloped in the epithet “senior citizen” when on a domestic flight in Malaysia my wife and I were allowed to board the plane ahead of everybody else. I checked our tickets several times and it wasn´t until several days later I realized it was a case of children and old people first.
More years have passed and things have not got any better. I´m giving Old Father Time a run for his money and even though I may concede that he now definitely has me looking the part, his inroads on my mental status are of a limited nature. I might add there has been no activity from me to halt or even inhibit the process by frenzied activities in the local gym. In my mind Golf and Bridge are two very acceptable substitutes. Becoming aware but not resigning myself to my new status in life has assisted me in battling further assaults on my integrity in a more intelligent and for me less disturbing way. Thankfully I might add as the time I was given incorrect information on which floor of a building the person I intended to visit was housed. Returning to the reception desk explaining as such, the receptionist then repeated her earlier directions in a condescendingly louder voice. I felt like reaching through the little hole in the glass window and throttling her but refrained as my brain conjured up tomorrow´s headlines in the local newspaper. Not, “angry client attacks receptionist,” which I could have lived with but more on the lines of, “deranged pensioner now in care of social services.”