that being said.... WHEN DID WE ALL GET SO OLD?!
Like most things that happen over the course of numerous years, we tend to be blind to the gradual changes that occur. Maybe you used to be able to run 1 kilometre without stopping, and then you can only run 900 metres but you think it's fine, and then you can only run 700 metres and you think it's only a little less, and so on. You're 21, and that's just past your teenage years, you can still wear those ankle-length pants with sneakers and a hoodie. At 22, well, that's only a year older than 21, and at 23, you're only a year older than 22, until eventually you walk the streets and some snot-faced brat points at you and snickers.
"Lookit that old fogey! That's so cringe." His friends roar with laughter. You look over your shoulder to see if there's some other old fogey there, but you see no one.
You hurry home, the boy's words echoing in your head. When you close the door behind you, the soft thrumming of his words have become a thunderous drumming, crowding out all other thought.
You look in the mirror, and you realise.
You're
old and cringe. Ashamed, you take off the hoodie and grab the pullover your estranged aunt bought you for Christmas twenty years ago.
You're forty.