Vikki Claflin
Spending much of my adult life in retail, I’ve come to the conclusion that many women don’t know when it’s time to let go of an era and move gracefully to the next chapter. (And I’m not throwing stones. I recently bequeathed a few clothing favorites to my DIL, after viewing the unfortunate photos from last summer’s family bbq, that I apparently should have passed on years ago.) I’ve seen 40-year-olds wearing their daughter’s low-rise skinny jeans and 50-year-olds wearing inexplicably short skirts and knee-high boots.
Let’s face it. We all struggle with aging and the inevitable visible signs of the permanent passage of our youth. But ultimately, we need to accept that what’s hot when you’re 20 can make you look like a cougar at 30, a MILF at 40, and an aging hooker at 50.
So to help clear this up for the 50+ crowd, I’ve compiled a list of signs that it might be time to consider passing the baton to the next generation of MILFs and start rocking your middle-aged years.
1. You know that look on a man’s face when he meets you for the first time and you know he’s thinking “Hmmm…Maybe”? Yeah, that look. You haven’t seen that on any guy under 70 since 2012.
2. Your son’s friends no longer tell him how hot his mother is. They refer to you as ma’am, and they help carry your groceries not because they’re trying to impress you, but because they’re afraid you’ll fall and hurt yourself.
3. Your plastic surgeon asks, “Why did you wait so long??” and offers a complimentary lipo procedure with your tummy tuck because, well, he cares about you.
4. The 12-year-old at the cosmetics counter starts recommending expensive creams for those “nasty age spots” and lines around your eyes.
5. Waiters and store clerks no longer ask you for your ID, even as a flirty joke. And if you suggest it, they just look confused.
6. You buy your bras at Bra World rather than Victoria’s Secret, with underwires, side panels, and wide straps, to hoist those tired Beanie Babies up and out. This is no longer about foreplay. This is war. Us against gravity. Guess who wins?
7. You own at least six different styles of Spanx, including the full-body seaweed wrap, but you rarely wear them because, quite frankly, it’s just not that important anymore.
8. Makeup now needs new techniques that often require professional instruction. Skip it altogether, and five decades of questionable lifestyle choices (baby oil tanning, too much alcohol and too little exercise, bad food choices, stressful careers, and shared parenting with your ex-husband, The Douche, and his 26-year-old wife, Porn Star Barbie) are imprinted on our faces for all the world to see. Spackle it on in an attempt to cover any possible signs of aging and we become real-life Cruella de Ville, with foundation falling into our lines, lipstick bleeding into the crevices around our lips, and eyeshadow glittering like a child’s school craft project.
9. We still work out, but the parts we used to skip (the warm-up, the cool-down, and the stretching) are now the reason we’re there. Yesterday’s spinning class is now Tai Chi, followed by a nap. It’s less about achieving peach-pit butts (who are we kidding?) than about being able to bend over far enough to put on our socks without breaking a sweat.
10. Every story you tell about anything that happened before 1990 ends with “Can youbelieve that was 25 years ago?? It seems like yesterday!”
11. Sales clerks stopped asking years ago if you and your adult daughter are sisters, and everyone assumes any child with you under 15 is your grandchild.
12. Sex is still great, but you’ve taken down the trapeze and the stripper pole. When the body parts swing one way and the support structures swing another, it’s time to explore new options. Preferably ones that don’t require gymnastics-level flexibility, thong underwear, more than one glass of wine, or participation after 10 p.m.
13. People see old photos of you and exclaim, “You look so young here! When was this taken??”
14. You go to your high school reunion and everybody looks so old. Then you realize they’re the same age as you.
15. Your online dating profile gets double the hits after you add “Previous senior caregiving” to the Experience field.
16. Any attempt to flirt with the 20-something hot checker at the local supermarket makes you look less like a cougar and more like a crazy cat lady.
17. The pretty pink flower you had tattooed right above your left butt cheek has grown with your hips over the years, and now resembles a weird, drooping gladiola painted on your ass.
18. Your Kegal exercises are less about improving your sex life and more about controlling bladder leakage every time you laugh.
19. Your metabolism has slowed to the point where you have to choose between wine and carbohydrates to avoid looking like a Puffer fish. You haven’t had a bagel in two years.
20. When your man asks you for a “back rub,” that’s really all he wants.
21. When you lament the passage of your youth, you’re talking about your 40s.
22. You and your best shopping buddy now spend more time at Carter’s for (Grand)Kids than at Nordstrom.
23. Dinner with another couple is spent talking about bodily ailments, upcoming surgeries, grandkids, and retirement plans. And you’re all home by 9.
24. For your anniversary, Hubs gives you a day at the spa, which essentially means you’re spending the day alone. And you’re thrilled.
25. Your kids turn 50. ‘Nuf said.
Last weekend, Hubs and I were sitting with a group of friends at a local winery, swapping raucous stories about misspent youth and the hilarious hardships of aging. As one grizzly older gentleman, who shall remain nameless, was recounting an enthusiastic, entertaining tale about getting older in a society that worships youth, sending all of us into fits of laughter, he looked over at me with a broad smile and shouted over the crowd, “Well, you know what I mean, right?!”
And there’s my sign.