370 Aging Quotes

I have always had plenty of friends, and now at age sixty, I face four walls as a common prisoner.

I think that's what makes life interesting - the evolution of getting older, and it's kinda fascinating to me, the whole process.

The deep, personal material of the latter half of your life is your children. You can write about your parents when they're gone, but your children are still going to be here, and you're going to want them to come and visit you in the nursing home.

It may almost be a question whether such wisdom as many of us have in our mature years has not come from the dying out of the power of temptation, rather than as the results of thought and resolution.

Dance on, dance on, we see, we see Youth goes, alack, and with it glee, A boy the old man ne'er can be; Maternal thirty scarce can find The sweet sixteen long left behind.

This is serious: some of the things that are supposed to last the rest of my life are already wearing out.

I don't think of myself as a character actress - that's become a phrase which means you've had it.

Men become much more attractive when they start looking older. But it doesn't do much for women, though we do have an advantage: make-up.

I'm so old they've cancelled my blood type.

Middle age is when your age starts to show around your middle.

Every man has to settle down eventually. You know why you gotta settle down eventually? Because you don't want to be the old guy in the club. You know what I'm talking about. Every club you go into, there's always some old guy. He ain't really old, just a little too old to be in the club.

Men don't get smarter when they grow older. They just lose their hair.

What I look forward to is continued immaturity followed by death.

I now realize that the small hills you see on ski slopes are formed around the bodies of forty-seven-year-olds who tried to learn snowboarding.

The infant runs toward it with its eyes closed, the adult is stationary, the old man approaches it with his back turned.

Middle age is the time when a man is always thinking that in a week or two he will feel as good as ever.

The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven't changed in seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don't change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion.

For the last third of life there remains only work. It alone is always stimulating, rejuvenating, exciting and satisfying.

We see time's furrows on another's brow, And death intrench'd, preparing his assault; How few themselves in that just mirror see!

Like our shadows, Our wishes lengthen as our sun declines.

My grandmother started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She's ninety-seven now, and we don't know where the hell she is.

Old age equalizes - we are aware that what is happening to us has happened to untold numbers from the beginning of time. When we are young we act as if we were the first young people in the world.

There's nothing sadder in this world than to awake Christmas morning and not be a child.

When you look like your passport photo, it's time to go home.

I have lived carefully, sheltered myself from the cold winds, eaten moderately of what was in season, drunk fine claret, slept in my own sheets; I shall live long.

Wives are young men's mistresses, companions for middle age, and old men's nurses.

The longer I live the more beautiful life becomes. If you foolishly ignore beauty, you will soon find yourself without it. Your life will be impoverished. But if you invest in beauty, it will remain with you all the days of your life.

Youth is happy because it has the ability to see beauty. Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.

Every man over forty is a scoundrel.

One great thing about getting old is that you can get out of all sorts of social obligations just by saying you're too tired.

It kills me to be time's eunuch and never to beget.

One does not get better but different and older and that is always a pleasure.

Old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternative.

When I started this song I was still thirty-three The age that Mozart died and sweet Jesus was set free Keats and Shelley too soon finished, Charley Parker would be And I fantasized some tragedy'd be soon curtailing me Well just today I had my birthday I made it thirty-four Mere mortal, not immortal, not star-crossed anymore I've got this problem with my aging I no longer can ignore A tame and toothless tabby can't produce a lion's roar

'Do you know how long a year takes when it's going away?' Dunbar repeated to Clevinger. 'This long.' He snapped his fingers. 'A second ago you were stepping into college with your lungs full of fresh air. Today you're an old man.' 'Old?' asked Clevinger with surprise. 'What are you talking about?' 'Old.' 'I'm not old.' 'You're inches away from death every time you go on a mission. How much older can you be at your age? A half minute before that you were stepping into high school, and an unhooked brassiere was as close as you ever hoped to get to Paradise. Only a fifth of a second before that you were a small kid with a ten-week summer vacation that lasted a hundred thousand years and still ended too soon. Zip! They go rocketing by so fast. How the hell else are you ever going to slow down?' Dunbar was almost angry when he finished. 'Well, maybe it is true,' Clevinger conceded unwillingly in a subdued tone. 'Maybe a long life does have to be filled with many unpleasant conditions if it's to seem long. But in that event, who wants one?' 'I do,' Dunbar told him. 'Why?' Clevinger asked. 'What else is there?'

Time still, as he flies, brings increase to her truth, And gives to her mind what he steals from her youth.

Oh, to be seventy again!

Already I am no longer looked at with lechery or love...(sex).

With my sunglasses on , I'm Jack Nicholson.Without them I'm Fat and 60.

When I behold this I sighed, and said within myself, 'Surely mortal man is a broomstick!' Nature sent him into the world strong and lusty, in a thriving condition, wearing his own hair on his head, the proper branches of this reasoning vegetable, till the axe of intemperance has lopped off his green boughs, and left him a withered trunk; he then flies to art, and puts on a periwig, valuing himself upon an unnatural bundle of hairs, all covered with powder, that never grew on his head; but now should this our broomstick pretend to enter the scene, proud of those birchen spoils it never bore, and all covered with dust, through the sweepings of the finest lady's chamber, we should be apt to ridicule and despise its vanity. Partial judges that we are of our own excellencies, and other men's defaults!

Every man desires to live long, but no man would be old.

I want to grow old without face-lifts ... I want to have the courage to be loyal to the face I have made. Sometimes, I think it would be easier to avoid old age, to die young, but you'd never complete your life, would you? You'd never wholly know yourself.

Yes, thou art gone! and round me too the night In ever-nearing circle weaves her shade. I see her veil draw soft across the day, I feel her slowly chilling breath invade The cheek grown thin, the brown hair sprent with grey; I feel her finger light Laid pausefully upon life's headlong train; - The foot less prompt to meet the morning dew, The heart less bounding at emotion new, And hope, once crush'd, less quick to spring again.

A man walks down the street He says why am I soft in the middle now Why am I soft in the middle The rest of my life is so hard I need a photo opportunity I want a shot at redemption Don't want to end up a cartoon In a cartoon graveyard.

'You are old, Father William.' the young man cried, 'The few locks which are left you are grey; You are hale, Father William-a hearty old man: Now tell me the reason, I pray.'

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms Which I gaze on so fondly to-day, Were to change by to-morrow and fleet in my arms, Like fairy gifts fading away. Thou wouldst still be adored as this moment thou art, Let thy loveliness fade as it will, And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart, Would entwine itself verdantly still.

I heard the old, old men say, 'Everything alters, And one by one we drop away.' They had hands like claws, and their knees Were twisted like the old thorn-trees By the waters. I heard the old, old men say, 'All that's beautiful drifts away Like the waters.'

The years between thirty-five and sixty-five revolve before the passive mind as one unexplained, confusing merry-go-round. True, they are a merry-go-round of ill-gaited and wind-broken horses, painted first in pastel colors, then in dull grays and browns, but perplexing and intolerably dizzy the thing is, as never were the merry-go-rounds of childhood or adolescence; as never, surely, were the certain-coursed, dynamic roller-coasters of youth. For most men and women these thirty years are taken up with a gradual withdrawal from life, a retreat first from a front with many shelters, those myriad amusements and curiosities of youth, to a line with less, when we peel down our ambitions to one ambition, our recreations to one recreation, our friends to a few to whom we are anaesthetic; ending up at last in a solitary, desolate strong point that is not strong, where the shells now whistle abominably, now are but half-heard as, by turns frightened and tired, we sit waiting for death.

Invention is the talent of youth, and judgment of age:

That old man eloquent.

We outgrow love, like other things And put it in the Drawer - Till it an Antique fashion shows - Like Costumes Grandsires wore.

If my life is to be prolonged now, I know that I must live out my old age, seeing worse, hearing less, learning with more difficulty, and forgetting more and more of what I have learned. If I see myself growing worse and reproach myself for it, tell me, how could I continue to live pleasantly? Perhaps even the god in his kindness is offering to end my life not only at the right time, but also in the easiest way possible...

I like gettin' old

When your mother has grown older, When her dear, faithful eyes No longer see life as they once did, When her feet, grown tired, No longer want to carry her as she walks, Then lend her your arm in support, escort her with happy pleasure- the hour will come when, weeping, you must accompany her on her final walk. And if she asks you something, then give her an answer. And if she asks again, then speak! And if she asks yet again, respond to her, not impatiently, but with gentle calm. And if she cannot understand you properly, explain all to her happily. The hour will come, the bitter hour, when her mouth asks for nothing more.

Never, tho' my mortal summers to such length of years should come As the many-winter'd crow that leads the clanging rookery home.

O, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty part, With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a daughter's heart.

Strange that the vanity which accompanies beauty- excusable, perhaps, when there is such great beauty, or at any rate understandable- should persist after the beauty was gone.

Three years ago I was forty... forty! Four-oh! That slipped out. Now I suddenly feel as if I've taken all my clothes off.

Qui sait si cette autre moitie de la vie ou nous pensons veiller n'est pas un autre sommeil un peu different du premier.

The older Keaton got, the more one could see eternity in his look.

'Regrets,' said Martin, 'are the natural property of grey hairs; and I enjoy, in common with all other men, at least my share of such inheritance.'

Being in a band is really great when you're 20. When you're 30, it's kind of 'Spinal Tap,' and when you're 40, it's just pathetic.

First you are young; then you are middle-aged; then you are old; then you are wonderful.

How awful it is not being able to see clearly any more! I have had to give up drawing and painting and for years now content myself with sculpture ... But if my eyesight continues to dim I won't even be able to model any more. What will I do with my days then?

'While he sings in a lower voice than ever -and what I liked about the early records was that beautifully vulnerable high voice-, he opened his Boston concert (1971) with 'That's Alright Mama' (1954), singing it with enough verve to scare the unsuspecting. It was his very first record, and although it doesn't sound quite the same as when he did it 17 years ago at the Sun studios in Memphis, I was moved by the fact that he was doing it at all. It was a tour de force of theatrics, professionalism, and, happily, music. (In fact), he sings so well, the audience hesitates to press him for more, his purpose being to please himself by pleasing them, never to please them by pleasing himself.'

I'm trying very hard to understand this generation. They have adjusted the timetable for childbearing so that menopause and teaching a sixteen-year-old how to drive a car will occur in the same week.

Memory deficiency got so bad with me, I forgot to repeat a piece of gossip I swore on my Grandmother's Grave never to divulge.

'Lament for an Aging Politician'

I'm just an old slag who gets up every morning, scratches his head and wonders what he wants to fuck.

I have had my share of vanity; for as a young man I was admired by women; and as a statue I am praised by art critics.

It was his enormous curiosity that kept him alive so long. He had an enormous interest in the world, and I remember, even toward the end, he would get so angry at the paper, angry at the TV.

I do [like being a redhead] . . . I do . . . because lighter is better as you get older . . . It's nice . . . I can't be a blonde. I'm definitely not a blonde . . . So, that doesn't leave too many other colors available.

The way I see it, you're either a year older or you're dead.

I used to be able to summon up scenes at will, but now aging memory is so busy weeding its own garden that, promiscuously, it pulls up roses as well as crabgrass.

In the Odyssey one may liken Homer to the setting sun, of which the grandeur remains without the intensity.

Il n'y a que des enfants aimants et aimes qui puissent consoler une femme de la perte de sa beaute.

He must be a born leader or misleader of men, or must have been sent into the world unfurnished with that modulating and restraining balance - wheel which we call a sense of humor, who, in old age, has as strong a confidence in his opinions and in the necessity of bringing the universe into conformity with them as he had in youth. In a world the very condition of whose being is that it should be in perpetual flux, where all seems mirage, and the one abiding thing is the effort to distinguish realities from appearances, the elderly man must be indeed of a singularly tough and valid fibre who is certain that he has any clarified residuum of experience, any assured verdict of reflection, that deserves to be called an opinion, or who, even if he had, feels that he is justified in holding mankind by the button while he is expounding it.

'If I can reach 50 without growing up then I don't have to.'

Fay: What will you do when you're old? Hal: I shall die. Fay: I see you're determined to run the gamut of all experience.

Time, they say, must the best of us capture, And travel and battle and gems and gold No more can kindle the ancient rapture, For even the youngest of hearts grows old.

For I could tell you a story which is true; I know a lady with a terrible tongue, Blear eyes fallen from blue, All her perfections tarnished-and yet it is not long Since she was lovelier than any of you.

We are getting to be of an age when it is difficult to grow new friends; we haven't the energy, the time to cultivate; each one gone is a permanent impoverishment.

Why am I laughing? I don't know... it's incipient madness, that's what it is. I'm quite looking forward to that actually, as I drift into an unattractive middle-age. I quite like the idea of waking up one morning quite plainly mad, I mean not dangerously mad, but just mad enough to be sent off somewhere where I can just sit and watch television and eat Indian meals for the rest of my life. I should be entirely happy doing that. You know, just waking up one morning imagining that you're something like an umbrella stand or something like that, and I find it quite an attractive prospect, I must say.

One of the highpoints of my weekend in Berlin was the Atonal-Festival, and we weren't there for very long, it was just a lot of people shrieking really, banging instruments in a rather random fashion... But a young woman there did seem to show some kind of vague sexual interest in me, and like twenty years ago I should've been most gratified by this and probably tried to do something about it. But of course when you've deteriorated to the point that I've deteriorated to, you become a little uneasy. And I wondered, like, is she a dedicated sociologist who is prepared to stop at nothing to support some half-baked theory she has, or is she smashed out of her head, or is she just plain mad. And I rather suspect that she was smashed out of her head, because trying to get off with me is roughly equivalent to eating all of your meals out of wastebins.

People say, Well, he wore that body out. Well, maybe I did. But it was to a good purpose. They should be thankful that I wore it out to the purpose I wore it out and that was writing and recording and touring and doing concerts. Everywhere I could possibly do them that I thought I might enjoy them. I thought people might enjoy me.

In my middle years, I have exchanged the position of the fetus for the position of a corpse.

How dispiriting I find it, even after all my personal triumphs, that we must grow up and grow sad, that we must age, weaken, and in time go home to our long home in the ground, and that even golden lads and girls all must, as chimney sweepers, come to dust.

The last thing any sensible human being should want is immortality. As it is, life lasts too long for most of us.

It seems to me that I may be living too long. Indeed: my nearest relations have all died, and so have some of my best friends, and even some of my best pupils. However, I do not have a reason to complain. I am grateful and happy to be alive, and still be able to continue with my work, if only just. My work seems to me more important than ever.

And I can hear my mother saying 'Every old sock meets an old shoe' Isn't that a great saying?

She has always freely admitted being like a little girl in many ways, and furthermore, happily presumes she'll still be that way in her dotage. It's certainly still a factor on Aerial , both in the track 'Bertie' itself and in the memories and reminiscences that cobweb some other songs. But compared to the darker corners of the mind sometimes mined in earlier songs, the new album seems a much sunnier affair: an enduring image I took away from it - not necessarily a lyric, though it might have been - was of windows flung wide open, their curtains billowing out in the breeze, a room's long-dormant dust stirred into life again.

Not long ago, I was playing golf, and I said to my partner, 'Let those old geezers tee off first.' And my partner says, 'Kirk, those old geezers are fifteen years younger than you.'