Help, my mother's wearing my knickers!

I actually wrote this ages ago, but it resonates still, probably more actually! Anyone feeling their years will understand. It goes like this...

YOU KNOW YOU'RE GETTING OLD WHEN...

You discover your mother is wearing your knickers - possibly on her head and I don't know which is worse.

Policemen look so young, you feel like their great-aunt.

You can’t remember your best friend’s name.

You’re more worried about the twinge in your knee than a bad hair day.

Half your nieces and nephews have turned thirty-something.

The latest pop music makes you want to jump off the planet.

You have serious thoughts about a Saga holiday.

A bunch of harmless kids on the pavement makes you twitch and clutch the railings.

The word “orgasmic” applies only to chocolate.

You contemplate a country walk with a jaundiced eye.

You sit up and listen when anybody talks about pensions.

Sheltered housing starts to look interesting.

Someone offers you a seat on the train.

Wrinklies sound like those things you look at in the mirror every day.

You wear some of your aunt’s unwanted clothing instead of sending it to a charity shop.

You’re ogling a dishy film star and realise you could be his grandmother.

The sight of a high-heeled shoe has the same effect on your nerves as a scorpion.

It doesn’t matter any more if your clothes aren’t colour co-ordinated, as long as they’re comfortable.

Blobby bits around the body have become a way of life.

Your breast squashes comfortably between the glass plates when they do your mammogram.

Programmes about cosmetic surgery add new meaning to your pipe dreams.

Time has become a concertina and there’s never enough of it.

You have to make lists all the time in case you forget something.

A telephone directory is gibberish even when you’re wearing your reading glasses.

Working a mobile phone is like studying something by Einstein.

Instructions on an ordinary household appliance appear to have been written by a defective chimpanzee.

Any seven year old can do more with a computer than you’ll ever be able to understand.

Words like bluetooth and ipod make you feel like a bewildered alien.

You walk into a room and can’t remember what you came for.

You know you’re going to rattle if you add another vitamin to the daily pile, but your health magazine says you’ve got to have it.

Energy is something that comes through a wire, if you could only plug it into a body.

You’ve started counting the days to retirement.

A visitor of the opposite sex is irrelevant, unless they’ve come to mend the washing machine.

You can’t remember when you last got a valentine card.

AND NOW...

Well, these days I'm so used to it all, I don't much remember what it like when it was different. Policemen are about 12, half my nieces and nephews are now in their forties, my memory has gone AWOL and my sight is so lousy I can't even see the wrinkles in the mirror any more.

Do I care? Not a jot. I accepted the passing years long ago, which means I can just relax and enjoy.

But talk to me in another ten and I'll probably be wearing my knickers on my own head!