Jun 29, 2009 2:59pm
How Old is Someone When They’re ‘Old’?
EmailWe're just chock full of Pew surveys today. But this is neat. How old is 'old' depends on how old you are when asked. Here is a quote from Pew:
"Survey respondents ages 18 to 29 believe that the average person becomes old at age 60. Middle-aged respondents put the threshold closer to 70, and respondents ages 65 and above say that the average person does not become old until turning 74."
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Old? If we knew “when” a person became old, we would also know the moment that person was no longer “young.” Pew research would better serve if it focused on how to accurately phrase questions. If you are just looking for bar room wisdom, your question is fine. But if you are seeking a bit deeper cerebral opinion, you’ll want to reel in, edit that badly worded bait and try another cast.
Posted by: Carl Rachel | June 29, 2009, 3:45 pm 3:45 pm
In four months I will be 80 years old.
In my mind I feel about 50 but my body feels like I am about 120. How old is old? Whatever you want it to be.
Posted by: Harley Green | June 29, 2009, 3:58 pm 3:58 pm
Age is something every living thing does and death comes for everyone. but being “Old” is truly a state of mind, If an old man sees a good looking girl does not his heart go piter pater just like in his youth? true certain skills diminish with time, But– that time is different for everbody and the concept of being old changes almost every year. when we were children an old person was driving a car, drinking beer or staying out past dark. Now “Old” for me means driving badly and complaining about the heat here in Florida- Age is in the eye of the beholder so be a kid and you will be a kid surounded by happy family, be a crappy old goat and wonder why you are alone sitting in a home filled with other old goats.
Posted by: James Rich | June 29, 2009, 4:44 pm 4:44 pm
Old is whatever age you are when you stop doing things that you love to do – when passion has left your life. I know a couple of late-20-yr olds that are old because they stop playing the sport they love, stop doing whatever it is that they love to do, stop caring what they look like after they get married, etc. Once you cease doing things that make you individually happy, not as a mother/father/spouse, but as yourself, you become old.
Posted by: Ehm | June 29, 2009, 5:00 pm 5:00 pm
It is very relative. I am 60 and don’t consider myself old. I didn’t consider my Father-in-law old either when he was 80. He was an active man all of his life. He had a good attitude too. So I believe age is relative to ones attitude and level of activity.
Posted by: Alan Filippi | June 29, 2009, 6:40 pm 6:40 pm
I’ll be 70 next month. Sometimes I have to remind myself that 30 years have passed since I was 40 and that is probably why my body creaks a little. But old age to me is around 85. Mom still lives with DH and I and she just turned 99 this month – but about 5 years ago she started going backward in development and is now around 1 in her capacity to do anything. If I have my druthers I think I’d like to check out before that happens to me.
Posted by: lessandra | June 29, 2009, 8:08 pm 8:08 pm
The term of “old”, what’s that? Hardly say, precisely. It entirely depends on people, isn’t it? Somebody may think about something about the term, the depth of the wrinkles, the number of the teeth left, the age about children caring, or …whatever would possibly annoy people’s feeling. But, …huhu~if even though, i mean if wrinkles, lost teeth, chindren pickup…nothing really poise a barrier between people & their life. “old”, the term would become an old-fasioned souvenir. For what? Of course, it depends on people, people’s heart.
Posted by: Yabin Li | June 30, 2009, 1:35 am 1:35 am
Some look 40 at 60, and others 60 at 40. Chronological age registers the movement of the clock and the calendar but biological age is to a significant extent the expression of how one has treated one’s body and mind over the years. Geneticists point out that each time the cell divides the telomere which “caps” its DNA shortens ever so slightly. Evidence seems to suggest that this shortening varies from individual to individual, and is to some extent in our control, a sensible diet and physical activity playing a beneficent part.
Posted by: Candadai Tirumalai | June 30, 2009, 9:42 am 9:42 am
Old is when you can’t carry your grand babies around the house twice. Almost old is when you can only carry them around the house once. If that happens get a rocking chair and supply the hugs they need.
Posted by: E. Grant | June 30, 2009, 10:52 am 10:52 am