I really thought we’d have grown out of this by now, but apparently not. It seems to me that everyone, regardless of age (within reason), is always clamoring to secretly figure out how old everyone else is.

I assume this is so they can feel better about being younger (or older, in some cases??) than other people.

On Monday, Joey (my faithful pal) and I went to a barbecue. We knew one couple that was going to be there and other four couples were just acquaintances. Seems everyone was that way, knowing one or two couples and not the others, because there was a lot of this age guessing thing going on.

First I must say that it was odd to be at this barbecue and have a women’s table and a men’s table. I did not see much of Joey the entire 3 hours we were there, except if I peeked around the corner, but I definitely heard a lot of him. (He was regaling the guys with the “cross-examining the cop” story.)

So it was me and five other ladies/girls/women. (What ARE we supposed to be called?!)

We talked about weddings for awhile, since everyone has either been in or been to about six weddings so far this year, and then someone’s traumatic 28th birthday came up and the conversation degenerated.

The moment everyone had been waiting for: “So, how many years until your 10 year reunion?” Asked the particularly perky blonde.

It was disturbing.

Everyone perked up and put in their two cents; “Mine is in 2 years”, or “We just had mine”, or some such nonsense. I could tell that every single person at that table was quickly doing the math to figure out how old every other person was.

I found out that three of the girls graduated at the same time as me, which I suppose ought to give me a sense of camaraderie with them.

This just goes to show that people always want to know how old everyone else is, even though most of the time they deny it. Someone told me a long time ago (probably 6 years) that when you get to college “nobody cares how old anyone is”, but I’ve always thought that was about as false as false.

People are universally tricksy and seem to want to know if they’re superior or inferior to others’ ages. For some reason, it seems to matter.

No further questions.