You Know You’re Getting Older When…

“Live your life and forget your age.” – Norman Vincent Peale

In my mid-20s, I left Massachusetts for warmer climates. For years, my mom stored my childhood belongings, until she permanently moved to Florida. As she packed up her house, I sifted through my memories and saved a few things in a box. Recently, my sister gave me the box. Oh the things I discovered… my college degree, old photos, my high school yearbook. I also came across a few sheets of paper I had written in my early 20s…

You know you’re getting older when…

1. You start having conversations about the weather.
2. When you receive recipes in the mail from your friends; when you send your friends recipes.
3. You look around a bar and everyone looks younger than you.
4. When you leave a bar at 1:30 a.m. so that you can go home and sleep.
5. Someone gives you a free shot, and you try to give it to someone else, and you have to ask like eight people before someone finally drinks the shot.
6. You can’t pull all-nighters anymore.
7. When it takes you twice as long to read a book as it used to.
8. When you’re at a bar, and you’re legal.
9. When you can’t remember high school classmates’ last names.
10. When you can no longer recognize people you used to be neighbors with.
11. When high school classmates are engaged.
12. When you go to bed by 12:00 a.m.
13. When you start hanging out with your family over your friends.
14. When you look around a room and you see several people you have a history with.
15. When your “baby” siblings are graduating from elementary, middle school, and high school.
16. When you start a paper two days in advance of the due date instead of the night before.
17. When you’re applying to graduate schools or trying to get a “real” job.
18. When you go out for coffee instead of a drink.
19. When you refuse free drinks.
20. When you give up Thursday nights because you have a 9:35 a.m. class.
21. When you attend all your classes, even when attendance isn’t required.
22. When you no longer have to flirt with bouncers to get into a bar.
23. When you no longer have to flirt with cops to avoid getting arrested for underage drinking.
24. When your younger siblings start driving.
25. When you retire your fake ID.
26. When you’re approaching the alumni status.
27. When your little cousins aren’t so little anymore; they’re in high school.
28. When you’re older than all of your siblings and cousins, but they’re taller than you.
29. When your childhood dream boys are old men and aren’t so cute anymore.
30. When your friends start getting “real” jobs.
31. When you are bored at a bar.
32. When you go to a bar on a Saturday night looking like you need a shower, a different outfit, and a new hair style.
33. When you’re up at school and you go home from the bars sober.
34. When freshmen look like children to you.
35. When you’re in on a Friday or Saturday night doing homework.
36. When you skip a football game to do homework.
37. When you get up before 1:00 p.m. on a weekend day to do homework.
38. When you talk to your friend at 11:30 p.m., and you’re tired.
39. When you’re in bed by 11:00 p.m.
40. When you realize you’re human.
41. When it gets more difficult to drink alcohol on a daily basis.

Tags: age, aging, getting older, old, older