14 Clues That You’re Reaching Some Kind of Age – and What to Do About It

There comes a time in everyone’s life when you realize you’ve reached Some Kind of Age. It’s not old age, but you’re clearly not young anymore (the beer pong fools no one). You’re not precisely middle-aged, but you’re also not not middle-aged. It’s not a clearcut milestone like 21, 30, or 50. It crept up on you all of a sudden, but it also feels like you’ve been this way all along.

You may have received your first invitation from the AARP but you haven’t had a colonoscopy yet. Actually, you still have to double-check your spelling of colonoscopy. 

You enjoy doing your taxes. You also enjoy video games and baseball cards.

You’re willing to pay money to attend a niece or nephew’s track meet, sitting in the sun for three hours for 30 seconds of action. And you like it. 

You research recipes calling for baby spinach. On purpose. You also go to Warhammer conventions. 

Call it early-onset post-pre-middle age, perhaps. Symptoms include thinking college freshmen seem like babies and an increasing interest in granola and oatmeal as breakfast items. 

How to prepare for this transitional phrase? Well, first you should recognize the signs that early-onset post-pre-middle age is on the way.

The warning signs of some kind of age.

1. You start measuring your age by the number of prescription bottles on your nightstand, like counting the rings on a redwood tree. 
2. Your body is so devoted to self-maintenance that it wakes you up 3-5 times per night for restroom visits. It wants to make sure you can still wake up, what with that thunderous sleep apnea you’ve got going on.
3. You try to avoid direct eye contact with Mirror You. You learned that lesson the hard way when you found yourself shocked into three weeks of salad, rice, and lentil soup.
4. You need different glasses for watching TV or reading. This is awkward when you’re trying to read during ad breaks. 
5. You develop and rely on a verbal checklist of motivational phrases in order to get out of a chair. “Allllll right. Okay.  Here we go.”
6. You snap, crackle and pop so much you might be a breakfast cereal. 
7. You and your friends from college have open and emotionally honest conversations while sober.
8. Your wife compliments Alan Ritchson’s biceps, and you agree. They are remarkable biceps.
9. Jigsaw puzzles intrigue you. Again.
10. You think your baseball card collection might finally have some value. 
11. You find yourself fascinated with the old men holding court at the coffee shop every morning. What do they talk about? 
12. You’re impressed by airport renovations enough to mention them in casual conversation, especially if they include an outpost of a craft brewery.
13. You lose your glasses on your own head. More than once. 
14. You decide you aren’t fat—you’re spherically abundant.

What to do about it.

Nothing. It’s happening. There’s nothing you can do unless you convince an unfortunate young portrait artist to paint your picture, with which you will enter a Faustian bargain to stem the ravages of age until consequences catch up to you. 

But this is not a long-term solution. Plus, you’ll need an attic for this. 

What you can do in the meantime. 

Enjoy the freedom. If you can’t do anything about it, well, you don’t have to do anything at all.

Hold off on buying a convertible Corvette. You’re not in mid-life crisis yet, and inflation has driven interest rates up. Wait at least until the next model year is ready to come out, then look for a deal on this year’s model. 

Go watch The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Nothing cures insecurity about the aging process like watching a bunch of Nazis get mowed down by Superman and Jack Reacher. 

Start meal-planning and calorie-counting. Plan that colonoscopy.  Also a vasectomy. Look up the definition of endoscopy to see if you should include that one too (answer: it depends). Buy sturdy new walking shoes. Take a walk, especially if it’s raining.

Then come to terms with the fact that everyone goes through this. You’re just in the same boat as millions of others, traversing the same uncertain seas of aging. So be nice to other people. Except for the Nazis. 

Never be nice to Nazis. That’s the real lesson here. And it’s surprisingly relevant.