"The minute you're born, you're getting older"
About this Quote
As an actress best known for playing a mother who weaponized common sense, Roberts’ delivery is baked into the line even on the page. The humor isn’t in the idea (everyone knows it); it’s in the timing and the refusal to dress it up. “The minute” collapses nostalgia into a single beat. “Getting older” is a passive construction that makes aging sound less like a choice than a condition you’re drafted into, whether you’re ready or not.
The subtext is a quiet critique of the culture industry around youth: all the anti-aging creams, reinvention narratives, and self-help slogans that pretend time is negotiable if you optimize hard enough. Roberts doesn’t moralize; she shrugs. That shrug is its own kind of authority, the perspective of someone who’s lived through decades of changing standards for women’s bodies and public relevance, and who’s still standing.
In context, it reads like a comic coping mechanism with teeth. Laugh, because the premise is absurdly obvious. Wince, because it’s also a reminder that every “someday” is already underway.
Quote Details
| Topic | Aging |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite | Cite this Quote |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Roberts, Doris. (n.d.). The minute you're born, you're getting older. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-minute-youre-born-youre-getting-older-117294/
Chicago Style
Roberts, Doris. "The minute you're born, you're getting older." FixQuotes. Accessed February 3, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-minute-youre-born-youre-getting-older-117294/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"The minute you're born, you're getting older." FixQuotes, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/the-minute-youre-born-youre-getting-older-117294/. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.








