Age is a relative phenomenon as well as an absolute one. What does it mean to say that A is older than B? What is the significance of age for the relationship between two people? If A is chronologically older than B, can B be older than A in other ways? Well, regarding that last question, I remember at the age of 21 being the proud owner of a second-hand Austin A30 and being taught to drive by my younger brother who, unlike me, had passed his driving test first time: an example of how the teacher-pupil relationship does not necessarily reflect differences based on chronology.

Parents and children

The parent–child relationship, possibly more than anything else, socialises us as children into a social order that incorporates age. It is probably fair to say that relative age first impinges upon our consciousness when we absorb as fact that our parents are not just taller, heavier and stronger, but also older than us. They’re ‘grown up’, adults; we’re just ‘kids’. The distinction could hardly be starker.

Birthdays are numbered and when we learn to count, perhaps around our third birthday, we realise that thirty-something (or however old our parents might be) is an awful lot older than three. Moreover, our fourth birthday seems a long way off, never mind our 34th. So we quickly learn that interpersonal age differences can be indicated by number and by generation.

Childhood birthdays are complicated events. The fact that on that day you are a ‘special person’ creates various tensions and anxieties, and some of these may survive well into later life. Here is how one Mass Observation (MO) writer described her childhood birthdays: