Althouse: The itemization of what it's like to be old.

December 14, 2009

The itemization of what it's like to be old.

How hard is it, really, to live and love when you are 57+ years old?

7 comments:

Bissage said...: One of the things I like about aging is the hair growing out of my ears pretty much keeps me from scraping along the hallway.; 12/14/09, 9:31 AM
Richard Lawrence Cohen said...: Those old people are very smart not to sleep with someone unless they're in love.; 12/14/09, 10:13 AM
Joan said...: How could they extract all that data and not link to the original study? Oh, wait, it's the NYT.

I'd like to know more about the sample size and selection criteria.

Gotta love those old guys, with so few willing to say that sex is not important. Also, the skew between the female and male responses to the "partner nags" statement was good for a laugh, too.; 12/14/09, 10:15 AM
veni vidi vici said...: ask that silly bore who wrote the cringe-inducing NYT magazine story about her "companionate" ("chimpanzionate"?) marriage last week, wherein she divulged altogether way too much personal/private info about her spouse to give her a chance to rebuild/restore anything.

wv: "amwzvr" -- my level of interest in the subject of the aforementioned story from the NYT mag.; 12/14/09, 10:16 AM
Kylos said...: Something I can't figure out from the chart on sexuality is that for both men and women the 65-74 age group shows more homosexual behavior than either the 57-64 75-85 age group, with an overall decrease between the 57-64 and 75-85 age groups.

This does not seem to be evidence of a decreased homosexual life-expectancy, since there is a significant jump in individuals with homosexual partners in the 65-74 age group.

I doubt that we are seeing a sudden urge for experimentation between ages 65-74. Even if that were the case, one would not expect such a significant decline in the 75-85 age group (is there a good source on homosexual life expectancy? Cameron seems to have relied on a pretty weak sampling method).

To me it seems to be an indication of greater experimentation in the 60's, during which decade the 65-74 age group would be between 15-34 years of age.

Anyone else have any ideas about this?; 12/14/09, 10:18 AM
Unknown said...: Someone has been singing "September Song".

Richard Lawrence Cohen said...

Those old people are very smart not to sleep with someone unless they're in love.

Too bad it's not the case. There's a real problem with AIDS among older people.; 12/14/09, 11:25 AM
Anonymous said...: Kylos -

That was an astute observation.

If you can't be with the one you love, honey, love the one you're with.; 12/14/09, 1:02 PM