"Observations on Women and men and aging." By Greg Hernandez

I remember growing up as a young boy, my next door neighbor used to refer to me as "Hombre grande."

I never thought much of it back then, but now I realize it meant a lot.

This is a post of what I have merely observed through Facebook posts, word of mouth and my own personal life experiences on age. Women and men loathe the natural process that is aging. In fact, some begin to either detest it at an early age, starting around their late teens. It's all natural. There are several stages in life, check points if you will, that slow down life for all of us a bit. For example: graduating from grade school, high school, college, grad school, beginning your career etc. The mind does reach its cognitive peak at twenty-seven. That's young, or old, depending on your perspective of things.

Now, on Facebook I see female friends and relatives between the ages of 20 to 25 bemoaning the fact that they are old. Not getting old...OLD! I see statements such as, "I cannot party like I used to anymore, I'm too old for this shit." Or "I was around a bunch of 2nd graders and I felt old." I'm probably taking this whole thing too far. Women and men are known for their vanity, but saying the word old when you're in your twenties does not quite resonate with me on a personal level. I find myself thinking, but wait, doesn't old kick in 5 decades from now? I thought "getting old" arrived in our late 30s? I could be wrong.

I, for one will admit that I have jokingly used the word, "old" toward my younger peers who are still in college. We all do it. I guess we all use it warmly in that sense, because we have reached certain plateaus in life before they have because we're merely born 2-4 years ahead of them. I honestly believe that usage of the phrase in its given context is alright.  Now, compare that context to I feel old because I'm twenty-five and either have nothing to look forward to or am discontent with the progress I have made so far in my life, and we have a different narrative.

I get it. Life is scary because it is the longest thing we will ever do, yet it goes by so fast. Our mortality is a scary reminder to us all that we are all the same decaying organic matter. "The marathon sprint," as one friend of mine affectionately calls it. But, I see women use the word "old" in a far more serious way. It makes me curious - this is the point of the entire post really, curious observations - that women do not like aging, yet are so prone to lording their age and experience over others, namely their peers and well, let's face it younger women. Of course men do this as well. Men and women in my estimation are pretty much the same. We do the same things, for the same and different reasons. I remember drinking at a bar with a friend of mine on his twenty-fifth birthday. When captioning a picture titled, "King Richard the IV." He said, "More like twenty-five, I'm old!" It struck me as odd.

A couple of women from my graduating class at Binghamton (2013) recently made statuses regarding the 2014 graduating class; for example posts like, "I'm so proud of my Binghamton babies," or "Literally choking up at all the Binghamton graduation pictures. Congrats kiddies." Wait a minute, referring to the graduating class that immediately followed yours as "babies" and "kiddes" is quite hilarious to me. 

During my junior year in college, my RA (a female) once referred to me and my suite mates as her "babies," which at the time I laughed off because although she was a senior, she was only twenty days older than me. However the case may be, I understand that this is only a figure of speech, it is not alarming to me when I see or hear women saying these things, but it does strike me as very curious. The mother in them all comes out. During my senior year I too, was a RA. I called some of my freshmen and sophomores "my babies," some responded to it with a laugh, others looked at me like I was trying too hard. Perhaps it only makes sense when women do it?


A derogatory words toward women are: Bitch, hoe, Jezebel, cunt, whore, etc.
I discovered a new while in college.

It is a word that women use toward each other. It is a dismissive and insulting phrase which derives of age and experience. The word is "Hun" or "honey." The age context is prevalent. One must be older and more experienced, while the other must be some little naive creature.

A woman calls another woman hun or honey, there is potential for some animosity.
A similar event is when a man calls another man "slick" or "kid." 

Both examples are unique, yet I cannot help but feel they are vastly different. We all have had past rivals of the same sex. We all have dealt with it differently.

Once again, men do this as well. Men call other men a shorty and son (even though the person is not their child). Still, there is no draw back to their own age. An old gunslinger will shoot it out with an upstart young gun. The old gunslinger knows that he is old, because he is in fact OLD. 

A young woman will call or view herself as old because...I have no clue.

This leads me to my final point: Could my observations above stem from the fact that women have that biological clock and men don't? The best biological age for women to give birth is their late teens and early twenties. That's when "oocytes" are fresh and the body's reproductive and other systems are at a youthful peak. The "best" sociological age would be mid-to-late twenties or early thirties. It all depends on your circumstances, where you are in the world, your culture and your life. Is it the maternal instinct coming to the surface? Or is it the beauty is only skin deep reason?

From what I've seen on social media and in my life, a medium exists. It is a feeling of being sage and respected, coinciding with that awesome feeling of still being carded at a bar. Women want it both ways, but then again who doesn't really?

Why do women feel old at twenty or twenty-five? I don't know...
Do men feel the same way? Probably...I know someone dear to me who hates it when he sees grey hairs sprout.

Why is it when you're out with friends and decide to go to a bar and someone says they are not 21 yet, we all go, awww you baby? Do women realize that when they call someone who is a little younger than they are a baby, they sound like a grandma?

It seems to me that there are at least two different types of "old" for women. One, where you're a senile decrepit hag and the other where you're simply in your twenties.

No matter how old we get, we're still young. Tell someone you're out of college, they will call you a baby, because they're 5 or 6 years your senior.

It seems to me that some people prefer to be calling the other person a baby, than being called a baby themselves. I guess this is merely a cyclical phenomenon in society that will never cease.