In my early teens I must have looked/acted soooo old one day that my friends, Sarah, Char & Cara nominated me to go into the shop and buy a bottle of Thunderbirds. I strutted in and confidently asked the shopkeeper, "where's the Thunderbirds"? to which he replied pointing, "just over there"...then waited til I had my young hand on the bottle and said "but you're not having any". f*cker!
The girls and I shared a family size bar of Dairy Milk instead and they took the p*ss out me all day.
Anyway, things change alot don't they?
I was so excited then, about suddenly appearing older and thought that even my choice of beverage could add a decade or two, maybe even get me a fake provisional driving license but now, ooh I honestly hate it sometimes.
I know getting old is, as my partner puts it, "better than the alternative" but JEEEEEEEESUSSSSS, it's uncomfortable isn't it?
Am I even supposed to play Tinie Tempah in my car with the windows down an inch or should I just superglue Phil Collins greatest hits into the cd player and the set volumne at 5?
Certain artists make me turn the volume down automatically. I know I'd look ridiculous stuck in traffic next to a bus stop of teenagers if Kesha's shouting about having 'stockings ripped all up the side'. And by the way Kesha, your teeth would never be that white if you really brushed them "with a bottle of Jack" young lady, so stop lying!
I recently made a mix CD for my kids 4th & 2nd joint birthday party and in the end, it was the parents who were flailing wildly to Pass The Dutchie, Firestarter and Young MC. One child even stood in the middle of the 'dancefloor' with his hands covering his ears!
Is it becoming a parent that makes us suddenly old? I know i've aged LOADS since. Putting on weight has made me look like a real MUM. Although my mum is now a size 8! (Coz she's a bit mental and nervous energy does wonders for the metabolism).
I have loads to say on this subject but not the time to do it this morning, so i'll come back to it but please share your thoughts on it...
I'd like to say also that there are really good points about 'maturing' too. I was a dickhead towards my brother as a teen and really just because he was into different stuff than I deemed 'cool' at the time. Now I look at him and although he is still, like my pal Janet, 'anti fashion' there is something very genuine and solid about him never having followed the crowd and not caring about, or even registering different trends. I think that is a great and rare trait.
With that in mind, look sympathetically at flocks of youth now. Worry for them. Do they fit in? Has their phone got the right apps? Are they smiling too much? Have they just been caught being polite to a grown up? Is their comb over MASSIVE enough, or has the hairdresser exposed too much eye???!
Then there's the orange ones and these I feel sorry for most. Teeny children, feeling like they have to dress top to toe like New Look porn stars. Wanting boob jobs before their bodies have even stopped growing. Having to wear so much make up already.... are they gonna find themselves on YOUTUBE, pukin' up Pernod at a house party?
At least there is a 'thing' now called Geek Chic... real geeks wouldn't know that though, which makes them cooler still!
Anyway, it is fantastic to be different and to just be into what you're in to and sod everyone else's shallow crap... it just seems to me that you have to be oblivious to what is 'cool', to really live like that. I'll come back to this ...
On that note I'd like to leave you with word's from Twisted Sister's Dee Snider - "your life is trite and jaded, boring and confiscated, if that's your best, your best won't do".
hmmm growing old...if it is having kids that make you feel old then I am in trouble. I was a mum of two by the time I was 22 (married at 20 - under the insistence of my mother who was convalescing after a hystarectomy and finding out I was pregnant to tell my (now) husband that she would "have him knee-capped" if he didn't marry me! lol).. anyway, I think the kids keep me young (with trends, music etc - though how my daughter listens to Death Metal is beyond me, quite honestly!) they also are aging me at a massive rate! One of my girlfriends, Tina, had four children within five years (and always wanted more) said to me two weeks ago "if I had have known how hard it would be when the kids hit 13 I would've stopped at one!) you, my friend, have years until you have to deal with THAT little hair-greyer - i do not envy you the wait though!
ReplyDeleteMy daughter says that her friends think my husband and I are "awesome" (hate that word but... anyway, I digress...)as we are in touch with our youth and know how to enjoy ourselves ( I think this is possibly because we drink like fish, smoke like chimneys and swear like sailors - but I don't really know)... Some days, I look in the mirror and really do not recognise myself. My hair is greying, I have wrinkles around my eyes and mouth... but my eyes still sparkle! I love my husband, my kids, my house, my cats and dogs (sounds like a crap Oscar-winning speech!) but I hate my job... sincerely! I am a Legal Secretary with a boss who treats me like I am five years old!! I am working on changing that aspect of my life (lottery, gambling, bingo...)and believe that I will feel genuinely feel younger when I am happier in my work.... I will let you know if and when that happens!! - I have gone on long enough... xxxx PS - I am also in double trouble if you are as young as the man that you feel as he is ten years older than me!!!! Love S x
I was wondering about that this arvo actually. When's the change? When does fun mum, influencing and guiding her kids turn into annoying drunk mum dancin out of time? When do they stop looking at you for insiration and start looking at you in disbelief?
ReplyDeleteWhen they are about 12/13... But by that time you have mastered your disapproving look >_> and by the time they are 16, the stuff they get up to is so extreme that you don't care what they think of you... only what your neighbours think of you! (little story time...) The bloke and I went on holiday last year to Spain to stay with friends. My 16 yr old son and 15 yr old daughter were keft in charge of the animals. Neither had school/college commitments and my mum and dad live 15 doors away (and have master keys to the house lol) for the first 5 days everything was great. Really relaxing holiday, kids always in when we called, house quiet, mum and dad singing their praises... on the fifth night, I was just sipping a large vodka when my mobile rang... it was my mum...
ReplyDeleteShe proceeded to tell me that one of my sons friends had fell from a bedroom window on to concrete. There was an ambulance on its way and that the Police wanted me to call them on my home phone. i phoned the house, spoke with the Police who confirmed that the lad (also 16) had turned up to the house completely drunk... my son and his friends (15 of them who had been deathly quiet when I had called 15 minutes earlier)had put this boy to bed to sleep it off. Ten minutes later, they went to check on him and he was not there. They searched the house and finally found him outside, unconscious. It turned out,the boy fractured his skull in 2 places, broke both arms and punctured both lungs!
It also transpired that there had been wild parties every night up to that little episode with up to 50 in my house at a time. My neighbours were too polite to tell me (or my parents) about it.....The moral of this story?! NEVER EVER TRUST A TEENAGER!!!! They are evil and I am not exagerating!!!!!
Having said that, when they ask you if you want a cup of tea (another indication of underlying age setting in...)you love them wholeheartedly and unconditionally again lol...Sorry to hijack your blog with my tales of woe...but I want you to be prepared !! xx S
Ma'am this is exactly what this blog was for! I'd love for people to comment on comments and keep discussions going.... it's great.
ReplyDeleteSo, the boy is ok npw then? Sneaky fecks eh? Are they frightened more of you, or of their father? Did you get the next flight home or sink another Blue Curacoa? haha x x x
So it happens in stages then, the age thing...I mean, you get more grown up and distant from them as they get into the flow of being a total sh*t? 11yrs, you're still coolish - 12yrs, they're mono syllabic & your sad - 13/14 they're shot of you and 15/16 you are a proper parent. By the time they appreciate you and calm down, they are 35 yrs and you are too old to remember what the problem was in the first place??!
ReplyDeleteOh and would your teenage kids find it acceptable for you to be listening, possibly 'spittin' (haha) most of the words, along with Tinie Tempah?
ReplyDeleteI have just asked George if it would embaress him if I was singing along to Tinie Tempah.. he said "what like last Friday night?"... memories came flooding back of me slurring and shaking my head to written in the stars last week :-/..oh well! In answer to your earlier question.. the boy is OK now.. and I did forget to mention that once we knew that he was OK my main worry was that he (or his parents) would sue me! There is an almost American compensation culture in Northern Ireland and I had to check my household liability insurance in case the owrst happened. Fortunately, the boys parents were lovely and they thought we may sue them!! we were obviously just concerned for the boy who spent a month in hospital! - There are some good (even amazing) stories about the kids which I will share when they become relevant :) PS... we have since measured the distance of the fall (which the boy went head first) as 29 feet (EEEEK!!!) xxx S
ReplyDeleteOk and PPS.. in answer to a couple of earlier points - we could not get a flight home an earlier than the 7th day (no flights peak season)... When we got back - in a completely unrealted incident - there was no window in the front bedroom of the house (later found smashed in the foliage due to high winds and being left open)(FFS)
ReplyDeletePPPS - (sorry) It has also since come to light that the little bugger who bungeed from the window was/is suicidal and he has since been banned from my house LOL
I have actually come to realise I have not actually 'grown old' in a lifestyle sense as I have not really changed much since the age of about 12 except for the obvious changes you cannot avoid and the fact i suffer from O.D.F. these days from doing too much in the past. Still have little tolerance for constant swearing, smoking, morons, bone idleness, political correctness, unfaithfulness, backstabbers and the french. Not cared about following fashion trends as such as most of my out of fashion taste has come back in vogue three times already. I have noticed however people have less manners than years ago. An increasing barrage of foul mouthed, spitting, ignorant, lazy wastes of food with no patience or time for anyone except their own selfish goals or the next beer or smoke. One in question was in the dive known as Chatham. I opened the shopping centre door to some bloated pig swill with a bow in it's hair, pushing a heavily laden buggy desperately aiming for a particular shop, only to get a resounding, 'Don't yoo fink i cood fakkin' do it meeself, I ain't a fakkin' invlid?' (written in the best council accent possible). SO I merely gave by well known, 'you really are the shit on my shoe' look and walked away. Has not deterred me from being 'me' as nothing will.
ReplyDeletePerfect example of bad manners there. Do we notice them more as we age? Or are they getting worse in general? "In my day..." is always said with a hint of sarcasm and a raised eyebrow but I think it's true. AND THE BENEFITS SYSTEM'S GOT ALOT TO EFFIN' FOR!
ReplyDeleteIt was 2007 when I realised I had 'gotten old' (OK, I know being 34 I should probably have fallen in before then but I have always been slow on the uptake). I left work in 2004, one of the youngest in my team, cracking wise arse jokes at the oldies. Fast forward to 2007, one redundancy and two babies later I dragged my wrecked body back to a new organisation and found myself in a department full of smug young people who apparently thinking it is hilarious to call me grandma Jules! Grandma feckin Jules! The cheeky little blighters are lucky I don't give them a thick ear. Its probably best to surround yourself with older people if you want to stay young. Having said that, my better half is 10 years older than me and I still look older than him. Love your blog Deb, (grandma) Jules (Molloy)
ReplyDeleteJules, i'm imagining you rocking back and forth on your patio, on a ranch in tennessee, chewing a piece a straw and cacklin like ROSCO P COLTRANE from Dukes of Hazzard! Do you make your own moonshine? Are you on a moonshine drip in your office? Next time one of the 'young' call you grandma, chelsea smiley em with your bus pass!
ReplyDeleteI know I am old everyday when after work, i get in my car and expel air for the first 10 minutes of my journey home!
ReplyDeleteYou know you're old when you look in the mirror and see your mum looking back at you- or you reach an age when you clearly remember her being younger!
ReplyDeleteOr when your child brings friends round and you suddenly want to pull daughter into the kitchen to dance with you just like your dad did coz it's 'cool'- except it's NOT so you stop yourself just in time.
Or when 15 year old son brings a friend round and they all look the same so for the first half of his visit Jamie was Stuart in your head- or was it the other way round? No-one corrected me until I worked it out for myself...
Maybe it was when leggings came back in fashion and I realised that sadly I had missed them and I really do like clothes and shoes to be comfortable now!
Or when I arranged a lift home shortly after the work's christmas meal to let the younger work colleagues carry on clubbing without me convincing myself it was ok coz i've 'been there done that'- and had worn flat boots under my black jeans rather than heels coz I could wear socks to stop my feet getting cold...
Or when you joke about not knowing if you are going grey yet because your hair hasn't been it's natural colour for about 13 years, then you notice in your roots one day that there may actually be some grey in there under the red/ blonde/black/ purple or whatever the current colour is...
hahaha now I feel even older! Re the leggings, I have squeezed my fat arse and Max Wall legs into them this time around in defiance as I wasnt allowed to as a youngster (coz Mum said they were tarty) and I am putting my poor daughter in 'legwarmers' thinking I was being 'retro'....now I fear I'm just OLD! x
ReplyDeleteOMG - Who said about forgiving your kids all their ill feelings and naughtiness when they make a cup of tea? that's me.You know you are old when all that matters in life is to get the little 13 year old bugger to make the poxy tea in the first place.You ask at 4pm . . . you get a muffled response of something along the lines of 'yer in a min' as they skulk off shuffling , not 'Lifting' their feet.4.1o still no tea ' Am I getting that tea?' distressed ' HANG ON!' 4.20 'Tea?' 'I'm JUST doing something' 4.30 'wheres my tea?' STOMP STOMP STOMP 'Don't bother,I'll make it myself' .'i knew it,god , thats why i never bother'.
ReplyDeleteSo when they volunteer to make tea ...wow! I think i must have cracked it as a parent! I have not done wrong after all! I'm cool and hip and trendy enough for her to want to make me a warm beverage! god,they fool us so easily.That makes me feel old
Aw THANK YOU for that. This post has defo stirred something as it's the one that people have commented on most. It's such a massive and heart wrenching (and heart warming) subject.
ReplyDeleteI said to my 'S' yesterday that I hope our babies get a profession they really love because I'd hate to think of them waking up with their alarm, already fed up and weighed down, like we do. We're always telling them to SHHHHHH at 6am when they wake up LAUGHING, SHOUTING & thundering from room to room, incase the neighbours get upset. That made me feel old. And I've discovered I have baggy elbows! ;(