Are we elderly or middleaged.

Hello Dee
We have actually met at g.o.d.annual gatherings.
Last one I managed to get to was the Manchester one .
I hope to get to Southport this year.I'm a member of Cybergoddies.
I mentioned g.o.d on a recent thread and had a few enquiries .All were disappointed that there was no group
in their area.

(Mani)

Any advance to quads?
The idea of hordes of cloned gransnetters

That's three of us, are we triplets?

And I'm me, so are we the same person?

I don't want a label! I'm just ME!!

I"m all for getting rid of O A P I think it is awful, how could we go about it ? , I much prefer the term they use the states, which "senior" much nicer don"t you think and not sooo aging or is it only me.

At 63 I feel I still have the best of both worlds.
I've acquired some wisdom along the way, (mainly from making lots of mistakes but trying to learn from them) but I'm still fit and active enough to explore new ideas and interests.
I used to be a primary school teacher and always joke that I've taught 8 year olds who were middle aged whilst my older neighbour was still youthful in all the important ways at 98.
I belong to the 'growing old disgracefully' network for older women which was set up to counter the stereotypes about our generation. There's a website if you want to find out more.
When I retired I was a bit concerned about the aging process and how I would deal with it, but through g.o.d. I've met so many inspirational women who still get so much out of life, even though some of them are dealing with physical difficulties, that I no longer worry.

I have only just realised at the age of 49 that I am no longer a girl! so if I became a woman at 49, gawd knows when I will become middle aged

Age is another ism that shouldn't matter - we are all just people

Oh, sussexpoet, how I wish I could have written that! It's just right. Have you really got a purple butterfly tattoo? I'd love to think so.

Re the hated term OAP, the following is one of my most applauded poems (I'm a performance poet):

I've just been called an OAP!
Can this be happening to me?
Is this farewell to sex and booze,
to push-up bras and high-heeled shoes?
Hello to Ovaltine at night,
to vests and Bingo? Well, not quite.
For one weekend, when feeling rude,
I went and got myself tattooed.
And now beside my OA Peers
I greet the autumn of my years
with an Older Person's Travel Pass
and a purple butterfly on my arse.

Thanks very much girls for all your kind wishes, I had a lovely day and returned to son and DIL home where Grandson had helped make little fairy cakes for me!
Happy Birthday to Ariadne & kittylester and much appreciated comments from nannachrissy.

Thank you all especially nanachrissy Please have on me to help me celebrate?! xx

Ooohhh! How nice! Thank you! Xxxxxxxxx

Many happy returns, girls.

None of you girls look a day over 39, hope you all have great birthdays. xxx

Ooh! So many birthdays today. Have a very happy day all of you

Happy Birthday maggiep, kittylester and Ariadne. Hope you all have great birthdays.

Happy birthday maggiep from me too. And Ariadne for Saturday . I'm 63 on Thursday and I'd quite like someone to explain to me how that happened. I think I was about 29 not long ago.

Happy Birthday maggiep

I'll be 66 on Saturday, and, apart from the ** knee, I think I'm OK! I trave a lot, write, read, volunteer, give talks, run things (no, not RUN - I never took to that!)

But I remember my Grandmother who as long as I knew her, was a little round lady in a pinnie, until she got dressed up to go out in the evenings to her whist drives - always in black, with the hat with hatpins etc. She died when she was my age. So I must be recalling her in her fifties, but she wore the "uniform" of an old lady.

Well done Greatnan. Good to know I am not an oddity. Going back to the same Basecamp several times has allowed me to see the changes in the countryside around and realize the variety of work needed in managing woodlands in the different seasons. It has been a wonderful experience. One thing I learned was how to load a kiln to make charcoal. It took three of us, one a professional, a whole day to load it, with a couple of professionals sawing the wood to good lengths for us and they were going to light it, after we volunteers had finished for the day, and wait as long as it took through the night to ensure the burn went safely and correctly to produce the valuable charcoal. I am only sorry I did not know about this kind of holiday before.

I can't volunteer in England, Cyril, but I spent two weeks conversing in English with Spanish business people when I lived in the Pyrenees. In the evenings, we had to get in groups and put on little sketches, or give a talk, all in English. We did not get paid, but we got quite luxurious accommodation and excellent food and drink. Most of the volunteers were young Aussies or Kiwis doing the EE (European Experience) and there were some from Canada and the USA as well. I was the oldest person there and I threw myself into all the activities with gusto as I was determined to show those kids what we wrinklies are made of.

I was on a volunteering working holiday last year and after the evening meal on our last day there one of the volunteers said that she took one look at me when I arrived and thought that they would all be carrying me for the week. Nobody needed to carry me at all as I well knew or I would not have volunteered. What really surprised me about her comment is the gasps of dissent it raised from the others in the group, ranging in age from students doing Duke of Edinburgh award scheme work, through thirty, forty and fiftysomething years old people to me at well past seventy, is that it was one of the older members of the group who made the comment. I have been on these holidays several times before and have another booked for this year. Marvellous and cheap too.