Time and age

I have been thinking more and more about getting older, and not always in a bad way!  Various things are starting to make me realise that I am growing up.  I don't really remember feeling this when I went to uni, when I started teacher training, when I got a job and was responsible for a class full of children, or even when I got married.  Or maybe I did feel it and it was just a continuation of those small pangs that quickly went while I was busy with life.

So why write about it now?  It has been on my mind for a couple of months.  Maybe it's because of our big travels coming up. 

So I started this back last summer, 2015, but didn't get any further than that.  I have been thinking about feeling older again, at the other end of our big travels, so thought it was time to continue the post and get it out there. And I have just been having a bit of a blog update session, looking at how posts are tagged etc.   I was very surprised to discover that I published 158 posts in 2010.  That seems like an awful lot to me!  There were quite a few titles that I didn't remember and am keen to read. I started at the beginning of 2010 with Bringing in 2010 and was interested to find the post about being an adult!  I thought it would be an interesting companion piece to this (yet to be completed) post and it was funny that I didn't really remember writing it.  I'm glad I did though :-)

So here are some of the ways I have been feeling old.

• friends with babies. The last year has been the real take off in terms of friends having babies. We went to five weddings the year we got married. The other four now either have babies or are pregnant. My oldest friend had a baby while we were in Uganda. That was definitely the strangest and hardest to comprehend for me. She is a mum! I got to see them a couple of weeks ago and they all seemed great together - lovely little family. 
• John and I have a shared history of more than 5 years! It's beginning to be hard to remember exactly when things happened. Like did we first go to Stornoway in 2013 or 2014? I take it has a good sign that we have shared more of our life together. Not long after we were married, we were chatting to a married couple. When we asked how long they'd been married their response was 'wow it's four years now, that sounds like quite a long time'. And we are nearly in the same position now! 
• grey hairs! So I have seen the odd grey hair for quite a few years now, since not long after I started teaching. But last summer they started to seem more numerous. I am definitely still in denial about when/whether I'll have to dye my hair. I'll keep putting it off for now! 
• LOKA bus. We went on a bus tour in Australia. And while I felt I seemed and looked (but who knows?) the same age as everyone else, I definitely wasn't a fan of the drinking games and needing to stop every one and a half hours for more booze! So although that made me think I might be 'old', I prefer to think of it as being sensible and more enjoyable! 
• meeting uni friends and it being almost 10 years since we left uni. We are definitely not in the 'just graduated' stage anymore. It was actually quite a long time ago that we left uni. A lot has happened since then. 
• 'middle age'. In a similar way, I realise we are creeping nearer 'middle age'. I didn't mind turning 30, that didn't seem so old for me, especially as John had done it the year before. But approaching 32 definitely feels quite a bit older. We are getting further along as we tick the age boxes on forms and in the Disneyland Unoffical Guide I realised we weren't in the 'Young Adults' category for ride enjoyment, but instead in the 'Over 30s'! 
• aching body...! Particularly in the last couple of weeks, my body seems to be aching whenever I stand up. That definitely seems the clearest indication of age to me. I've never really bothered a lot with stretches after exercise, but maybe I can't get away with that anymore. My shoulder was sore yesterday and still is today! I did manage to sit down cross legged and stand up without putting my hands down, which Angela Rippon apparently said was a sign of living long, but I stood up in an unconventional way so I fear I may be doing more harm than good!
• A sad one to put in, but one of my friend's mum died two weeks ago. It was quite out of the blue and she was definitely too young to die. It's horrible and shocking and again does make me think we are getting older. 
• 90s retrospective. John picked up a free magazine yesterday which had a special feature on the 90s. Now that they are flashing back to a decade I remember, I guess I must have been alive quite a while. 

I want to end with something Grandma G told me. I guess I was in my early twenties and was taking about being older but not feeling grown up. She said she has never felt old. That came as quite a surprise to me, because of course, my grandparents had always been old... I am so pleased that Grandma told me this. It has definitely stuck with me and has been a great encouragement. 

So I'm very pleased that I have finished this post. I hope it doesn't come across as sad or melancholy. I'm not really sad that I'm starting to feel older. I've only written this post to note that I'm feeling older. I'm sure the post will create quite a few laughs in years to come when I read and say 'I thought I felt old at 31!'. To my future self, I hope you're happy with your years. 😀