Dear LPG,

I have one thing in common with most LPG readers and that is that I am getting on as they say, and I often think that this gives us elders the perfect excuse to get away with quite a lot of things.

There is a section of British elders who think that acting ‘old’ gives them advantages and I have no doubt that I am guilty of using my age to get away with a few things.  

I am learning from my Mum who, over the past 30 years, has used the phrase “when you get to my age you will understand” as an answer as soon as we have a conversation that gets too complicated for her. The problem is that she has been telling me this for so long that I am now well past the age that she was referring to all those years ago.

We can get away with saying things to the younger members of our families that we would never say if we were young and I bet that, like me, others have exaggerated the pain in some part of their body to get someone younger to do something that they really could have done with a little effort.

Some of us feel that we do not need to swipe our freedom pass when we get on a bus, or we will cross the road at the most dangerous points.  We know that traffic will stop for us because we are older.  It is the latter thing that really worries me.  I often see people try to cross the road near Catford Town Hall, at its widest point between the Nat West bank and Santander on the opposite side.  I know that young people do it as well, but we have to be really careful, especially when our knees are not too good.

Please give that one a miss!

EN, Catford