Are you reminiscing over your youth? If so, you're thinking about your "salad days." This post unpacks the meaning and origin of this expression.
Meaning
The meaning of the expression "salad days" is to reminisce over the events of your youth when you were carefree and had no responsibilities in life. It can also refer to the act of enjoying your senior years after earning enough to remove these responsibilities and enjoy retirement.
In either scenario, you are thinking about when you had no commitments. There was more free time in your life to do what you wanted, without the pressure of money and other responsibilities.
Example Usage
"I miss the carefree salad days of my youth. We all would go out skateboarding and have fun all day. Now I live the life of a mid-level employee, I'm overweight, and I have responsibilities to my job and my family."
"The salad days of my retirement are great. All I do is take my boat out to the keys and fish every day. I caught a huge grouper yesterday, and I'll be having a salad with that too, I suppose."
"The gang laid back in silence, staring at the sky. It was clear the four of them were thinking about the salad days of their youth and how their friendship changed a lot over the last ten years."
"The four gents prepped the fishing boat and their gear as the excitement of the ocean adventure awaits them. These are what the salad days of life are all about."
Origin
The origin of the expression "salad days" goes back to the English playwright William Shakespeare. Shakespeare would coin the phrase by using it in his play, "The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra," from 1623.
In Act one, scene five, Cleopatra, desperately in love with Mark Antony, reflects on her affair with Julius Caesar:
"My salad days, when I was Greene in judgment, cold in blood."
The phrase would remain dormant in language for the next two centuries. Eventually, the expression would reappear in the 19th century. The earliest known use of the term in modern writings comes from The Camden Journal of August 1836.
The English poet and critic Samuel Taylor Coleridge coins the phrase as follows.
"but Fitzgig, like ourselves, in our "salad days," as Coleridge calls the time."
There is also another citation in the Oregon newspaper, "The Morning Oregonian," from June 1862, where it appears as follows.
"What fools men are in their salad days."
Phrases Similar to Salad Days
- Senior years.
- Early youth.
- Wonder years.
- Dotage.
Phrases Opposite to Salad Days
- Mid-life.
- Middle age.
- Twenties.
What is the Correct Saying?
- Salad days.
Ways People May Say Salad Days Incorrectly
Some people may use "salad days" to describe a diet they completed or a period where they were eating better and looking physically more attractive.
They may also use it to describe times when they lived a healthy lifestyle and were productive. However, the phrase has nothing to do with salads or losing weight on a diet.
Acceptable Ways to Phrase Salad Days
You can use the phrase "salad days" when talking about the early days of your youth as a child or a teen. Or you could use it to talk about your dotage or retirement years as life winds down. Both these phases of the life cycle see us take on less responsibility.
In our youth, we feel carefree as we've yet to experience the pressures of life. In our later years, we remove these responsibilities in life from our daily experiences. In both situations, we feel freer and less held back by the financial and social pressures in life as we enter our twenties and exit our 60s.