Book review: The Invisible Woman – Taking on the Vintage Years

“Middle age is not the problem – how we think about it is”.
There’s this weird thing that happens when you’re on Twitter. You follow someone because it looks as if you’ve got things in common, maybe even chat now and again, and then you find out they’re someone. Which, in my world, means they write for a proper newspaper or have a book out (both of which I aspire to).
The Invisible Woman felt like a friend before I realised she had a Guardian column (The Vintage Years) and she feels even more like one now that I’ve read her book.

Melancholy and middle-age

One of my Twitter friends asked recently: “Is everything slightly melancholy after you reach a certain age?”

Most of the people who replied said yes.

The M word

When I was 50 I found out why couples who’ve been together a long time end up in separate beds. It’s not about falling out of love. It’s not about stopping having sex. It’s about night sweats.

No-one tells you about this stuff. You have to find out for yourself.

Jane Hill has written a great article in Standard Issue magazine (the mag’s worth checking out, by the way), called The Fleece of Despair. (Yeah, we’ve all got one.) And her cry of “Why had nobody told me?” is so true.

Book review: In Your Prime by India Knight

Have you seen those adverts that say they can tell you how not be poor when you retire? Then you read the small print, and the trick is to have £250,000 to start with.

I've just read a book that's a bit like that.

Life after life

It's that time when you get those 'books of the year' articles in the papers, and it's reminded me about  Kate Atkinson's Life after Life.

I'm a big fan of Kate Atkinson, but when I first read the book I wasn't sure what to make of it. Now, though, I'm starting to get it. It's stayed on my mind, and it's chimed with so much else I've been pondering on.

The present is a foreign country

'The past is a foreign country' is a) one of the best first lines of a book ever, b) a bit of a cliché.

But it feels to me much more nowadays that it is the present that is a foreign country.

Yes, they do things differently there. Much of the time, I feel like a stranger. I just don't understand the habits and conventions of daily life any more.

Why job interviews are a waste of time (and interviewers are a waste of space)

The stupidest question I was ever asked in a job interview was ‘What do you expect to be doing in five years’ time?’ I know it’s a standard HR-type question. But the interview was for a temporary job.

The weirdest thing said to me in a job interview was ‘We don’t employ people with punk rock haircuts here.’ This was in the early 80s when, like most young women at the time, I had short spiky hair. I should have walked out then but I smiled politely, finished the interview, went home and waited for the rejection letter.

We're so pretty, oh so pretty... ancient. And we don't care.

When your baby sister turns 50 you know you are getting old. My little sister was 50 a few weeks ago and it was definitely one of those 'how the hell did that happen?' moments. (I'm sure it was for her, too.)

Some are born middle aged, some achieve middle age, and some have middle age thrust upon them

There's a card going round at work for someone who is having his 50th birthday soon. I was surprised. I thought he was already 50.

Fifty-plus? Recognize yourself? Thought not.

I saw this poster in a local shop window. It said:

“Autumn Leaves 50+

Our object is to provide entertainment and social activities for older members of the local community and is now open to all over-50's. We hold monthly Bingo sessions and have coach trips most months of the year as well as Summer Tea and Christmas lunch. New members are always welcome.”

Just kill me now.

Another Punk Britannia review, and some middle-aged angst

I've been thinking and writing a lot about punk lately. And I don't know if I want to think and write  about it any more. It's very easy when a lot of your thinking and writing is done online to find yourself trapped inside the same conversation. But I never wanted to be defined by my past.

The seven ages of woman. Or, why I'm not having a happy birthday.

It's my birthday today. Apart from the cake, I'm not particularly happy about this. (Cue compulsory 'at least I'm still here', blah blah, disclaimer.)

Lots of people today have wished me happy birthday. People younger than me.

50 is the new 70

Down the road from my house there's a billboard advertising sheltered housing. 'Independent Living For The Over 55s' it says, alongside a photo of a smiling, middle-class 55-year-old woman and an almost identical smiling, middle-class 85-year-old woman. It's not clear which one of them is plotting to put the other one away.

Don't ask me questions

I've been having arguments about the census with Husband. He's not happy because the information is being collected by an American arm of the military-industrial complex. I'm not bothered because there's nothing there I wouldn't put on Twitter.

But I did find some of the questions difficult. And that's apart from the enigmatic Question 17. (It turns out the reason it's blank is actually quite boring.) What troubled me were the questions about health and disability.

Most of the time I feel about 46. Sometimes I feel 16.

Most of the time I feel about 46. Sometimes I feel 16. And that's not a good thing.

I decided recently, and deliberately, that I felt 46. I thought I ought to choose something - because I don't feel my real age, which has a 5 in front of it - so I chose something realistic. I think I can actually get away with this one, for a while at least.

Book review: The stranger in the mirror

I remember the first time I heard a friend describe herself as 'a middle-aged woman'. I was shocked. She's a year younger than me.

A few years later, at the age of 50-something and officially menopausal, I can't deny it any more. So I could not resist buying a book called The Stranger in the Mirror: A Memoir of Middle Age.

Don’t ask me questions

It’s always tempting when you get to middle age to say that things were better in the old days. But in the case of the BBC, it’s got to be true. If Robin Day had been chairing Question Time, the BBC would never have shot themselves in the foot the way they did on Thursday. But now, thanks to a publicity stunt that misfired, the nastiest politician in the country has won the sympathy vote.

Yes, N*** G****** was scary. But so was the programme. Impartiality? I don’t think so.

Question Time in the 1980s was probably the greatest influence on my political education: brain food, not showbusiness. Question Time this week was really about entertainment, if you like that sort of thing. And I’ve never liked circuses. I recently complained that you could no longer have that ‘did you see’ conversation about last night’s TV. This was the exception: everyone seemed to have watched it, and to have an opinion. It was event television. But it wasn’t Question Time. There was just one thing that made me feel a bit better. The two people on the panel who talked the most sense were, it has to be said, the women.

Don’t throw your love away: frugal is now fashionable

Being a frugal type, I like freebies so I was happy this morning to find the council giving away free recipe books. It's all about their campaign to get us to stop throwing away food.

Sadly, it turned out to be one of those things where the bureaucrats talk to us as if we were children. Or stupid. Well, maybe we are stupid. Apparently, ‘we’ throw away 700,000 unopened packets of sweets and chocolates a day. Now, that really is a waste.

All the same, I found my ‘guide to using up leftovers’ just a little bit Janet and John. (And yes, I know I am showing my age by not saying ‘Peter and Jane’). Actually, I do already know how to get four meals out of a roast chicken. Doesn’t everyone? As I was thinking along these lines, I came across the bit that said ‘A long time ago, we used to know how to turn leftovers into new meals. Ask an older relative for help.’

Damn. I think they mean me.

Later

Quiet night in front of the TV with Husband. A rare occurrence. It’s time for Later with Jools Holland. The perfect therapy for grumpy middle-aged people.

Ordinary people with annoying daily lives – that’s most of us, then – need an outlet for some of that frustration; someone to hate. Some people go to football matches. We do heckling the telly. Husband doesn’t like football, which is one of the reasons he’s my husband.

We are united in our dislike of pointless sport. And our hatred of bad pop. Next big thing? Flavour of the month? Bring them on. We’ll demolish them in a few well-chosen words. One of them being ‘shite’. We don’t necessarily agree about everything. I find derivative art-school incompetence less annoying than dull jazz musicians who ‘can play’… Then Newsnight comes on and we remember who the real enemy is.

Smoke gets in your eyes

Or should that be 'smoke and mirrors'? Which magazine has found out that ‘anti-ageing’ eye creams don’t work. Surprise. At no cost to you, the reader, here are the top three ways not to get wrinkles: 1. don’t smoke 2. don’t sunbathe 3. be a bit overweight. What does ‘look visibly younger’ mean anyway?