I get it. What a difference a day makes

Definitely vain here. Certainly in my younger than now days and enjoyed taking it all for granted. Framed well. Fit, well spoken, well dressed, well manicured, well travelled. And always in excellent taste. I made it look good

I stopped looking in the mirror a while ago. Happened a couple of years after my father died. I can see myself in there somewhere, but that ain't what folks in the wild see. I didn't waste my youth and spent plenty of time outdoors and active and have scars and flaws from all that, but I got great smile lines

That said, I used to make my bikes look good. Now they're prettier than I am. Seriously. Some days I'll take a stealth bike rather than a crowd pleaser because I don't want the attention

But hey there's cycling content in there... See how I did that?

This must have been taken during winter when you take down all the framed art and mount tapestries on the castle walls

- Or -

You've fallen and can't get up!

The chicks have been calling me Sir for a while now.

Getting old stinks, but it still beats the alternatives.

About ten years ago when I was a young geezer in my mid sixties, I noticed how youthful and healthy I looked holding a beer. Hence the avatar picture my wife took at left. That's what I recommend for you velogeezers--beer, preferably a Heady Topper, deemed the best beer in the world by the Beer Advocate. It's hard to find unless you go to the brewery in Stowe, Vermont.

Getting old observation = I'm old enough to know the best beer in the World is not sold in a can.

You can fool some of the people all of the time.
You can fool all of the people some of the time.
Butt, ....You can't fool 50+ about best beer, .... in a can.


edit: to OP, @datlas - either stop looking in the mirror, - or drink a pint of strong beer before looking, .

It happened to me twice in a week, that's how I know I look old (83). I was at the gym and said good morning to a middle age member, and he replied "good morning sir". My wife and I were riding our favorite loop and stopped at the boat launch to use the bathroom. A 20 year old said "you have a really nice bike sir".

Nah, getting old is fine. Getting decrepit, on the other hand...

I'm 55. I look pretty old to myself from just about every angle, on any medium. I feel old, too. :shrug:

Ive never been sane or stable. Hazards of my job.

There's a reason that saying customarily ends with "it still beats the alternative." (There's only one.)

i would like to reincarnate as myself - it has been a good ride - but i could maybe do better a second time around.

Oldsters need a mantra to stay relevant.
(even when it is not true - or only in our mind)

Because I'm good enough, I'm smart enough,
and dog-gone-it people like me.

I don't think I look old in the mirror - I look pretty young for my age. About to turn 65 and I still have nearly all my hair and it's only maybe 10 or 15% gray. Even my beard is less than half gray. I know from experience that people who don't know me think I'm in my early 50s or so.
My standard joke is that I'm aging from the inside - all the things wrong with me that come with age - I hate them - but they don't show on the outside.

BUT, when I see a picture of me from 10 or 15 years ago, yeah, it reminds me that I've aged.

At 58 I don’t feel old but when I see a picture of myself on my MTB at 28 I’m like . I was at a Styx, REO Speedwagon, Loverboy concert not my favorite but still cool enough lol. Anyway I was like damn everybody here is old! Then it hit Me. So am I. I guess I will just go with the flow what else can you do.

I do wonder the responses - if this Forum were mostly women!

Has there been a face cream or skin tightener recommended yet? For that smooth, 'healthy look'.
It's only page 2.

If crepitus is the first stage of becoming decrepit = I'm well on my way.

Crepitus = Grating, crackling or popping sounds and sensations experienced under the skin and joints.

A woman slightly older than I am remarked to me that I look younger than my age. She said be sure to use face moisturizer, so I do that twice a day. I use CeraVe because what do I know, probably all of them are equally good. I think moisurizer makes a difference not because of the one you chose but because you use it frequently.

Well, if we are on to a discussion about skin, nothing will age your skin quite so much as the sun. Use sunscreen folks. And not just because of vanity.

I've never been too hung up on my looks but I do see my dad looking back at me in the mirror more and more every day. And looking at old photos of my dad, he was at one time a handsome feller and I guess I must have been too as I didn't seem to have trouble with the girls back in the day. And while I was not feeling that old, a couple of years ago I noticed that youngsters started holding doors open for me so to them I was appealing to be a senior citizen.

My aging issues these days have less to do with looks as they do with health. When I did my first halt marathon, there was someone there with a shirt that said "there will be a day I can no longer do this, but today is not that day". That day seemed to have come for me while training for a half last fall. I felt that my half and full marathons and the cycling I enjoy were keeping me off of medications. then all at one it seems I was taking a blood thinner, beta blocker and trying blood pressure meds to see which one worked the best for me. I have a nuclear stress test coming up at the end of the month and I'm trying to remember at what ages dad got stents, a quadruple bypass and pacemaker.

wow, so many comments
i'll add mine
remove mirrors, go for a ride...

I really like to have a mirror on my bikes when riding, I am definitely not removing them.

I started "crowning" as I hit 40, and I have lost most of my top-of-head hair. My elder son went bald in his late 20s, about the same as both of his grandfathers, but his younger brother still has a good head of hair at 37 (but then, so did I).
Re: your "aging on the inside" comment, my paternal grandmother loved to tell about sitting with my cousins at the dinner table, and when the subject of all of the bald heads in the family tree came up, my middle cousin (and fellow cycling enthusiast) said of his little brother, "The problem with Jim is that his head is bald on the INSIDE."

As long as people still think I'm 10 years younger than my actual age I don't what I look like in the mirror. Of course they are probably just trying to make me feel better.