Re: Re: Does Age Matter

As we grow older, age matters less. Because of the ethical and personal reasons involving individual growth, pursuing relationships with those who are a great deal older than us while we are still fairly young and not yet emotionally or physically mature, is greatly frowned upon in our society. The subsequent age gap is less signifcant as we gain more experience and maturity. For instance, in one of my classes, I have a lab partner who is nearly a decade older than me. Nevertheless, we hardly acknowledge it. True, we have our own moments when I would make fun of her for being "old" and she would tease me about being really young, but other than that, we treat each other pretty normally. The sizeable age gap did not cause any weird awkward moments between us . I enjoy my friendship with her, and I especially appreciate it when she imparts her own knowledge from life experiences with me. But there are times when she'd nostalgically sigh and say, "When I was your age I was able to..." The weird thing is, I feel I could relate to her more than to one of my TAs, who is closer to my age. But then again, maybe it was his position of authority that caused this social awkwardness.


Compare an image of Spencer Breslin and his younger sister of four years age difference, Abigail Breslin. They seem to be much farther apart in age than that of Topher Grace and Scarlett Johansson (who, by the way, are not dating, I just used this picture of them to compare) who are six years apart. Grace and Johansson appear closer in age, when, quantitatively, they are actually further apart. Some of the most successful Hollywood marriages are between couples with significant age differences. For instance, Julie Andrews and her husband, Blake Edwards, are 13 years apart, and have been married for nearly 40 years.

One of my friends told me of a formula about calculating the maximum appropriate age difference between couples. It was meant to be a joke, but there is also some truth behind it.

For girls: {(age of girl)-7}2 = age appropriate for a guy
For guys: {(age of guy)/2}+7 = appropriate age for a girl

You would notice that the acceptable age difference increases as we grow older. Interestingly enough, if you enter an age less than 14, the formula would make it out so that the girl would be older and the guy would be younger. This tells you a lot about our society's belief system. When you enter 7, the calculated age would be 0, indicating that young children are not emotionally mature enough to partake in a relationship.

Men are naturally attracted to women who are younger, and women are customarily drawn toward older men . But in Humbert's case, his unnatural fascination with young "nymphets"indicates his mental instability, especially since he would have no problem pursuing a relationship with a woman his own age. While I watched the 1997 film adapted version of Lolita, I was struck by Lolita's immaturity and wondered how a sophisticated man like Humbert could be drawn to her. The visible discrepancy between their maturity levels make it hard to believe whether there was anything that their relationship could build on.