Sixty isn’t the “New” Anything
TweetSixty isn’t the “New” Anything
BLOGGER: RENEE FISHER
I’m venting. I’m seriously so tired of hearing people say things like “Sixty is the new fifty.” Or forty. Or even thirty. This morning, on one of the talk shows, I caught about 30 seconds of the guest going on and on about how sixty-year olds should go mountain climbing and have pajama parties and join Facebook and meet people on Match.com, whatever they want. OK, I thought, I like the general concept. But then the host asked, “So sixty is the new forty?” I froze. The guest chirpily answered, “No, sixty is the new twenty!!!”
OK, folks, here’s the deal. Sixty isn’t anything other than sixty. Got it? If you are twenty, and you like to jump up and down on a bed and have pillow fights, does that make twenty the new five?” If you are twenty, you are twenty. If you are sixty, you are sixty. Sorry, but the iPad doesn’t, to my knowledge, include a time machine.
I know what people are trying to say, but I’d like it said in a different way, a meaningful way: Sixty-year olds are redefining what it means to be sixty. We aren’t any age other than what we are. We are simply giving a new definition of what that is. My sixty three isn’t twenty (A quick check of my body parts will confirm that). But, my sixty three is vastly different than my parents’ sixty three.
Sixty year olds now have access to all the wonders medical science can provide, including replacing or repairing a lot of internal and external body parts. Medications and nutrition keep us alive longer. Gyms are on every street corner. And the internet allows up to connect with each other in a way that our parents’ generation couldn’t have conceived of (I met my Now Husband Dan on Match.com).
So, please, give us the respect we deserve. I’ve worked hard to get to where I am today. I wouldn’t change that for anything. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t like to magically change some things (two, for example). It just means I like me and I like me at sixty three. I’m not the “new twenty.” I’m the “new sixty three.”
I’m finished now.
Renee Fisher is a Realtor and writer who lives in the Washington, DC area. She is the co-author of two award-winning books about life after 50 www.invisiblenomore.com and is the DC Boomer Humor columnist for examiner.com DC-Boomer-Humor-Examiner.
To receive updates from ImagineAge, enter your email in the “subscribe” box on the left side of the screen. Your email will NOT be sold!
To become a Fan of ImagineAge on Facebook, click here!
To join the ImagineAge Group on Facebook, click here!
If you enjoyed this, click the button below to share it with others!
Tags: 60, aging, baby boomer, boomer, boomers, funny, humor, imagineage, midlife, renee fisher, sixty
Loved your blog. Lewis Black the comedian has a routine on 60 being the new 40 or whatever that is really funny. He says 60 is 60 and 40 is 40. That’s why they’re different numbers. Now you said it too. Maybe this stuff will stop and people will like being 60 for being 60. (I’m about to turn 60 by the way.)
Have you seen Sunset Daze, a reality show on WE. Watching that you’d think 60 really is the new 20 or even 16. I guess people have to keep dialing back the age numbers because of the ominous reality that not many of us last to 100+. Fear of old age and death is something that we all have to wrestle with, I guess. But as my 91 year old father always says, “Consider the alternative.”
Hi – Terrific site! Have you seen “50 Is the New Fifty” by Suzanne Braun Levine…She agrees with you…and Sixty is the new sixty, 70 the new seventy. We are huge demographic group. We are empowered and finding this stage to be exhilerating.
I’m so glad that others feel as I do. Real power is to take ownership of our age and to set the best example of what that age represents. Like Gloria Steinem responded when told by someone how “young” she looked for 65, “This is what 65 looks like.”
Hi Renee. Great post. I agree with you wholeheartedly. It’s a glorious thing to age and have learned to be comfortable in your own skin. It’s a glorious thing to get to an age where it’s no longer vital to fulfill the dreams others have for your life. It’s a joy to feel the freedom of expression without the concerns of what someone else may think. Crass though that may sound, with age comes wisdom (if you’re fortunate), and that wisdom allows you to inform people that their impressions, opinions and judgments simply don’t matter to you. And by then you’ve also learned how to gently, easily steer them into comfortable submission so you’re able to move on with your intention without their drama. No anger, no ill feelings. It just is what it is and if you accept me, then accept also that this is how I am at 62 and I’ve earned the right!