Growing old with gangnam style? Take it as read
FOR someone so old I'm, not sure I should have danced gangnam style in my front room, blew a raspberry at an insanely irresponsible motorist and sang loudly to songs on my car radio while driving into Derby. "It's Raining Men, anyone? Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves?
I just can't help myself, even though I am convinced most people under the age of 35 think I should be shot and put out to pasture due to my advancing years.
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And don't be fooled by the relatively youthful picture on this column. It was taken six years ago and I am sticking with it.
It cheers me up because growing old doesn't and another birthday is drawing near this weekend.
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Sadly, I have discovered that being past 40 in Blighty generally involves being patronised, treated with contempt and made to feel like a degenerating, geriatric old fool.
Take new technology. I have embraced it. I use a computer 24/7, Google like crazy and tweet a bit too.
But when I confess that I don't know how to use a gadget I have never come across before I am greeted with a stream of sarcasm and raised eyebrows.
I grew up with pens and paper, not a computer mouse.
I didn't use computers until they emerged at my workplace.
For goodness sake, my first stories were banged out on a typewriter!
And yet I am made to feel an idiot for not immediately knowing how to use, for example, a Wii by people who can't remember what it was like to manage without a mobile and nurse their phones like a pet hamster.
Red phone boxes on the corner anyone?
Passing years have also made me dread visits to the doctors and opticians. I've been as blind as a bat since the age of 13 but, though well into my 40s, have never needed reading glasses and don't consider that I do now.
Nevertheless, I was recently informed that I have a reading prescription and, though I can read perfectly well without specs, am having to focus to do so.
Let's just say I had a difference of opinion, though I confess, I am not a qualified optician.
It's just that it's bad enough struggling through a life of wearing grotty glasses – or fiddly contact lenses – without contemplating reading glasses too.
Afterwards I also realised that I was irked because, yet again, I'd been made to feel like a rickety old donkey.
"Just wait 'til you pass 40, it all goes south," a female pal a decade older than me once informed me.
Not if you're a celeb with a bit of dosh for photo rejuvenation, nips and ticks.
I Googled growing older and came across this: "i (sic) just turned 16 like two weeks ago, and i already feel old. i look at little kids and im like, wow i wish i could run around and get dirt all over myself without being given dirty looks."
My heart bleeds, particularly as this poor soul has no grammatical skills.
In response to this sad post I found this: "I just turned 68. I'll let you now when I start feeling old."
Power to people past 40, that's, what I say.
I'm off to roll in the dirt and dance gangnam style.
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