For those flutherites out there who have had the privilege to live a long and full life, does the world look different through your eyes?

Hear, see, smell…that’s pretty much the same. It’s my outlook on life & how I view things that’s changed.

Well, I’m in my 40s, and my vision and tastes have changed. And as an Audiologist, I can tell you that many people hear and see differently in their later years. However, having familiarity with certain things can decieve you into thinking that your perception has not changed, since it is so gradual in most cases.

Not quite 60, but I can tell you that about every 10 years a break through a Plateau of understanding. I go, “Ah, now I get it, Why did that seem so difficult to comprehend before?”

I’m 60, and I feel pretty much like the same person I was when I was 17. The difference is that I don’t make lousy decisions nearly as often, and things that I used to think were terribly important have resumed their normal size.

Oh, and my criteria for companionship is different. I could give a shit if someone is pretty or not – what I want to know is are they funny, smart and knowledgeable

Lastly, you accumulate a lot of random knowledge, which is why I answer a lot of questions on here with some degree of confidence..

Finally! A question in Fluther I am too young to answer!! WHOOPEEE!! :D

To answer the question, things do seem different now ( early 50’s). Things that used to taste great seem blander. It’s more difficult to read small print, and I can’t smell things as easily as I could when I was younger. It’s also becoming more difficult to learn new things. You can teach an old dog new tricks, it just takes longer, ha ha!

I was just telling my daughter yesterday that when I was a teen, I remember saying I would never change the way I thought about things. I found out that was very wrong. I see things totally different now.

I was just peeking to see what this was all about. But @Judi I call myself a dummy about every 2 weeks. I’m growing/changing at a pretty constant rate.

I agree with @pdworkin about the way I feel inside. I feel the same as I did at 16. I still have a touch of Don Quixote, trying to right wrongs but these days I am smarter about my methods and targets. I’ve always had pretty good judgement and if I made a mistake I could usually correct before things went to far. These days mistakes don’t sneak up behind me, I see them coming and get out of the way.

My physical self has taken quite a beating. I regret not appreciating my strength and taking my abilities for granted. I can see but without the clarity at a distance and there is that slightly double vision on the keyboard. I can’t hear as well as I could 20 years ago. My sense of taste and smell are still sharp-a lot of good it does me when my digestive system can’t handle anything delicious

Things I used to find funny, I just find silly and things that used to be silly I now think of as stuoid. I love teaching but it means getting up at 5:30 every morning and hours of prep and grading and I’m so over that.

I will retire this year and teach a class or volunteer and read more and do more of what I want-things that used to make me feel guilty but that has changed too.

@galileogirl My hearing took a beating at the Filmore Theater in San Francisco in 1967 and 1968 at the hands of Janis Joplin, Jimmy Hendrix, Gracie Slick, et al. It may not have been such a terrible trade-off.

It has become apparent that I grew up in a rather protected environment, a brand new suburb of Denver, in the 1950’s, surrounded by extended family, since all my Father’s brothers bought houses within blocks of each other, and my Mother’s family all lived within driving distance. We had schools, libraries, parks, shopping centers all near by and the kids could walk freely to any of them.

The world I see around me has turned very dirty and unfriendly, neighbors who don’t even know each other’s names, streets and air that are filthy, food that can’t be trusted. We can’t let our children out of our sight.

My biggest change is the ability to be a lot more patient than I used to be, and a lot more tolerant. What used to seem so important no longer matters all that much.

I will be 65 in a couple of months. I just recently realized that if I die at the same age my mother did, my new dog will probably outlive me. I have a sense of my own mortality that I didn’t have when I was younger.

I am living in a different part of the world than I did for my first 50 couple years so all smells, sights and lots of tastes are different. But I love that, I have learned and experienced so much more by the move. My horizons have truly expanded.

I am blessed with good health, I run easy or bike hard practically everyday. I hike some dramatic and lethal terrain every day. I still work 7 days a week. Every couple of weeks make the 500k round trip to the “city” for supplies.

I think I am probably less tolerant than I was when I was young and more idealistic, but I like me a lot more!

I’m not even very old at all and I see the world so much differently. I mean, that I see the change it’s went through. Even in the past twenty years, it’s changed pretty radically. It seems like all the magic’s been taken out of everything. Tons of little subtleties that made me kinda happy as a kid are gone. Hell, I remember when Wal-Mart greeters used to give little smiley face stickers to everyone. Not anymore. It’s hard to tell, alot of the of time, whether it’s the WORLD that has changed so drastically, or if it’s mainly just us. To me, everything just seems so much less laid back. Busier. More convoluted.