Looking Older Happens To Everyone

Andy Rooney Ponders The Passing Of Time

(CBS)  The following is a weekly 60 Minutes commentary by CBS News correspondent Andy Rooney.

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Have you ever been on television? The money is good but I hate it. It's sort of weird, too. I think we all have some idea of what we look like but if we see ourselves on television, it turns out we don't look like that at all.

I know I don't look like what I think I look like. I usually watch myself Sunday night and I don't look the same every week either. I told you a couple of weeks ago I've done about a thousand pieces here on 60 Minutes. I looked at some of them recently.

I used to look a lot younger than I do now. I don't know why that is. Sometimes I don't look younger, I just look funnier. Maybe I looked worse in 1978 than I do now. I hope so.

Hair makes the most difference in what a person looks like.

It's a depressing thought but all of us probably look our best at 21. Looking older happens to everyone of course.

There are two women on television I know who get better looking all the time, Diane Sawyer and Lesley Stahl. Diane has changed some over the years but she's still not what you'd call a homely woman. I see Lesley almost every day and she's as attractive and well got up around the office as she is on camera. Lesley was good-looking 20 years ago. She's better-looking now.

Women on television won’t let their hair alone of course. Lesley has had a wide range of hair styles over the years. She probably spends more on her hair than on her clothes.

I spend a lot on my clothes, but not very often. I haven't bought a new suit in eleven years or had a haircut in five weeks. Women have their hair "done." Men have theirs cut. "Done" costs more.

[sandsave72]

Hey Andy,

You look real. Face lifts can make your face look tighter than a snare drum.

[marbleann-2009]

Mr Rooney is right on spot about how Ms Stahl and Ms Sawyer look great. And how one even looks even better she did years ago. Well unlike men, women on tv have to perform magic acts and had have portrait up in the attic like Dorian Gray. Because if they were allowed to grow old like Mr Rooney and the rest of us he would never be able to comment how they look bcause they would of been fired years ago.

[pleiku1]

Hello Andy,
I'm a Big Fan of yours. I've always enjoyed your comments. In this age of PC commentators, pols, and ones on the other spectrum, your opinions and comments come to me like a draft of cool fresh sea breeze in a smoke filled pub. I suspect we share the same views. I hope to see you for a long long time.

[dag725]

Watch your show most of the time and enjoyed your show about aging...I would love to see you do a show with you getting your hair and eyebrows DONE, NOT CUT, IN A SALON LIKE YOUR GOOD LOOKING WOMEN NEWSLADIES DO just to see if it would help you look better or not...and it could be easier on your viewers eyes to look at you more..It might even get more women viewers to watch..

[rod77pete]

As always, you have touched what many of us question every day, "Where has the time gone and why do I have to move with it so fast?" Thinking of this, I have to look at the options, what can be done? So to the celebrities we gaze. Do I want the appeal of Jerry Jones? Or Kenny Rogers or Wayne Newton? Even though their decisions have done them well, I believe I had earned every line that appears on me. Maybe I won't think that in a few more years but then again, I'll re-look at those options then. Thank you for mentioning those wonderful ladies, they are so beautiful and it makes me happy that age could be directed at me instead of them. And one last thought, at least I can still worry about needing to have my hair "cut" ocassionally!

[bayareasaid]

Andy is quite right about "image conciousness" as we grow older. I can only imagine what you folks in the spotlight go through in the dressing room. Don't worry about a new suit from Bloomingdale's Andy, they are all overpriced; Bloomingdale's just opened up in San Francisco, Barney's to follow this fall.
I tend to agree with you and my mother that Leslie Stahl is quite a fashionable woman and a good looking member of the 60 minutes gang.
If Andy looked like a handsome Mitt Romney (whatever), I think that would detract from the classic Andy that we all know and admire.
You have a cult following here in the San Francisco Bay Area Andy, keep it up!

[bayareasaid]

Andy Rooney is quite right about "image conciousness" as we grow older. We all look in the mirror everyday, I can only imagine what you folks in the spotlight go through in the dressing room.
My mother and I are also an admirer of Leslie Stahl's style. She's quite a looker Andy.
I personally think Andy looks more respectable and credible as an older man. Hence the eyebrows are convincing as well.
I'd hate to think if he looks like the handsome Mitt Romney (whatever), that his classic Andy Rooney demeanor would suffer. So look your age Andy, us Bay Area types in San Francisco would not have you any other way.

[previn2]

It's me again...Just so you know, I didn't use a cuss word in describing Mr. Rooney in my previous comment--Sorry, that word blocked-out was just another word used for "passing-gas" and nothing more.--(just so you know...)

[redstripe11]

To: previn2

Rest assured, your worries are justified.

it is all downhill from there! (21)

[angelwhalo]

I have noticed that Some People who are in the entertainment world stay young looking for a long time and then all of the sudden they look old, really old! I guess that's what you call age sneaking up on you. Anyway I agree with matancero Andy should have his eyebrows done he would look younger!

[genesauto]

I've been watching Mr. Rooney off and on for many years. He never fails to make me feel better about the current affair.
I was wondering if anyone has ever noticed in the last several years how much he has started to resemble the last Pope? At least we can still understand Andy, though.
Keep your eyebrows as they are, Andy. It's a signature for you. Hang in there.

[previn2]

That Andy Rooney sure comes off as a fiesty ol' ***! I love him and appreciate anything and everything he says each week...Sometime I don't even watch the show, but I try and catch it in time to see his piece each week. Let's all enjoy these fellas while we can, folks. --They just don't make 'em like that anymore!

[rprime23]

***, I turned 21 just last month. I hope it isn't downhill from here.

[cfin5]

I enjoy reading articles from my elders. They are so much more interesting to listen to. Their grin making veiled humor makes my day. I,m more happy now older and wiser( I hope) than young and foolish. I really dont care what I look like anymore either. I seem to be getting more patient with lifes' contentions where as young I could not. And more stern with things that I would not before. In all of my ten fingers and two toes years of education, the best lessons I have learned are from my silver headed friends who have the time to talk.

[matancero-2009]

I really like Andy Rooney. He comes up with the darnest things. This week he talked about hair, and how it "makes the most difference in what a person looks like." and then sited a couple of example. Lesley Stahl was one, to be precise. On a side note I wish in email I could somehow sound like Andy's voice, it would make things a little more interesting. Anyhow Andy went on about looking funnier and so on and how women have their hair 'done' while men have theirs cut. Well Andy, perhaps you should consider having your eyebrows done at some point in time. My wife is always after me to 'cut' my eyebrows. Maybe both of us should go together and have our eyebrows 'done', what do you say?.
:-) all in good jest...
Joe