When I was younger, I wondered whether older men and women
viewed fellow 60/70 year-olds as sensationally hot and attractive, just as I
viewed a 21-year-old hotty when I was around that age. Does the 70-year-old
granny walk past the pub and all the old guys’ heads turn with a cheeky whistle
or two? I like to think that I was a bright kid, but I was certainly prone to
getting sucked into some ridiculous misconceptions. There were others. I used
to think gravy came from graveyards and Vicks Vapor Rub was made by Vicars. It
took some time to live those down too.
Age, growing up and getting old is a funny old thing. I spent
two weeks in the UK in May, mainly in Leeds doing a coaching course. The early
stages of the course are based around youth football. There are certainly
important technical lessons that I learned, but the overriding factor for me
were the social aspects of coaching, and how you should treat the players. My
favourite coaches or teachers were the ones who created the most enjoyable
working environment and that got the best out of me - I generally believe that
to be the case regardless of whether you’re a 11-year-old kid chasing a ball
around a park, or a 40-year-old office worker.
Spending time with my family over those two weeks was a
pleasure as always. I get as much satisfaction from spending time with my
ridiculously adorable 6-year-old niece Mia and feisty ‘destined-for-the-UFC'
nephew Max, as I do with the older folks in the Leeds crew. Time ticks by but
the people are the same. I noted another myth while at home when my Mum said
that time goes by too fast – the days, weeks and months just fly by….and
nothing gets done. Well Mum, time ticks by the same as it always did, there are
still sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, 24 hours in a day.
And more importantly, you fill your days, weeks and months constantly. It is
far better than sitting at home all day counting the hours. The days go so much
slower when you look at the clock, or have nothing to do. Sometimes when I wonder
where the time has gone, I think about what I have achieved, places I have
been, and people I have seen, and I realise that is where the time went.
During those two weeks in Leeds, the experiences we all have
at different stages of our lives, and how we interact with people of different
ages was on my mind in a combination of random thoughts. I have heard a few
people say that your 30’s are the best years of your life. That may have just
been somebody feeling sympathetic towards me when I hit the 30 mark. So, ever
the analytical mind, I decided to take a look at the various decades of one’s
life and the general characteristics and experiences that you go through to try
work out which decade was actually the most enjoyable.
The Noughties
You spend a fair amount of this time having absolutely no
idea what you should do, but you just get on with it. You don’t care what
others think, you poo and pee all over and start to say things that make older
people squirm….somehow you’re still loved and adored by all. You will never
learn and absorb as much in a decade as you will in this one.
The Teens
You still have no idea what you should do, but you know what
you do not want to do – and that is more or less anything your parents or
teachers want you to do. You care what everybody else thinks, but you don’t
want to show it or let people know that you have developed those things called
feelings. Somewhere just before the middle of this decade you wake up one
morning and realise the same or opposite sex are quite appealing after being in
denial for years, but you have no real idea how to deal with that until later
in the decade. The decade of ‘trial and error’.
The Twenties
The harsh reality of work has almost certainly kicked in and
it is ‘find your way in life’ decade. You realise that having your own money to
spend is amazing, but actually, with all the responsibility that goes with it
and all the people wanting their share of it, you recognise that being a
student was not so bad after all. If you’re lucky, you’ll get to travel,
probably to put off the work issue, escape it for a while, or buy some time to
work out what you actually want to do for a job. You don’t realise that most
other people in life do not love their jobs and have just fallen into
something. You just know that you don’t know what it is exactly that you want
to do for the next 40 years. Retirement sounds like a distant dream.
The Thirties
The decade of the ‘ticking clock’. If marriage and kids have
not happened yet, everybody in your family is likely to be wondering if you are
gay or have the cojones to ask the question. There is a different pressure in
this decade, and that realisation comes when you find yourself submersed by
students in a bar one night, and realise the hotty in the corner has more
chance of being your child than your lover. Once you realised that, you can
relax, be confident in yourself and get on with enjoying life. You’ve got some
great relationships, many of which will be keepers as you realise that if you
are friends with people as this point of your life, it is because you want to
be friends with them.
The Middle Ages
Another type of pressure in this decade, and that
realisation comes when you find yourself submersed by students in a bar one
night, and realise the hotty in the corner is your child and there is a smooth
guy chatting to her, and he is bigger than you. You are however happier going
to the old pub that does not have televisions or music for a good old chat
rather than a dance. Everything becomes that fraction bit harder physically,
but you are still as sharp mentally. The youngsters of today are keeping you
young, if you cannot match them physically any more, you are darn sure you’ll
imprint your wisdom on them. You still don’t really know what you want to be
when you grow up, but you would like a career change or to work for yourself. You’re
at the halfway mark of your working life which is a grim thought. The decade of
‘painful realisations’.
The Fickities
At this point you are counting the days to retirement and
thinking about all those amazing trips that you would love to do….and you
realise they are pretty similar dreams to those you had when you were a Teen,
but children, work, mortgages always got in the way. There is still some time
to go however work-wise, but ambitions are a fraction lower, and you are in
survival mode in what is possibly the only real time in your life where you are
wishing that time went faster. The decade of ‘The Final Countdown’….and if you
are that old, you’ll know the song too.
The Sixties et al
All those thoughts and dreams that you have been weighing up
in the last decade can now become a reality. Or can they? Income is possibly
reduced and you do not have the earning power, and you are reluctant to spend as
although you cannot take it with you, you do not want to run out. While you
should in fact be selling your house, move into rented accommodation and blow
all your savings in a methodical manner, you are thinking of legacy and what
you can leave for the kids. The kids who are actually big bad adults themselves
now – let them look after you a little now. You have worked for some forty
years, and now you should be enjoying life. The decade of ‘Nike – Just Do It’.
The End (of the blog)
