Cameron Diaz has a new feature in Harper’s Bazaar which reads like an e-mail interview. She gives some decent quotes, so it’s worth covering. Cameron is still promoting her health and wellness book, The Longevity Book, and unlike her past interviews she sounds somewhat sensible here. She doesn’t make any grand pronouncements about health, aging, relationships or stress and she just speaks to her own experience. So when Cameron says she believes in dressing your age, she says it’s the age you feel not the age you are, which isn’t a bad way to look at it. She also gushes about her husband, Benji Madden, a little and calls marriage “awesome,” which she’s done before.

Do you believe in “dressing your age”?
I do, actually. But everybody’s age is different, and by that I mean that even when you’re a certain age, it’s all a matter of how you present yourself, how old your spirit is, and where you are in your life. Some 50-year-olds are still 35. It’s about expression and what they can pull off.

What’s something you refuse to wear at 43 (or ever)?
I’m definitely not doing tube tops. No way.

Who are some older women you most admire?
Gloria Steinem is one of the great feminist examples of a woman doing it her way. Jane Fonda has also always been somebody who puts herself out there in a very honest way. I appreciate that. We have so many great examples in Hollywood, from Meryl Streep to Helen Mirren. They walk such a fine line between giving everybody what they want and not sacrificing themselves for it.

What’s something new you’ve tried after 40 that you never thought you would?
I got married last year. That was the biggest thing I’ve done in my 40s, and it opened me up in different ways. It’s pretty awesome. I didn’t think it was something I’d do, and I don’t know if I’d have done it if I hadn’t met my husband [Benji Madden]. It was a surprise.

What is the biggest realization you’ve had about yourself after turning 40?
That as you get older, your body changes in so many little ways. It doesn’t react the same way that it used to. I don’t get the results that I used to as easily as I once did. Now I look at myself and I realize, “Oh, right. I’m in this time now in my life where I have to be thoughtful. If I slack off, things don’t come back so easily. I have to be committed.” In part that’s what my new book, The Longevity Book, is about. But just like everybody else, I’m more and less disciplined at various times based on what’s going on in my life.

Which trend has enjoyed too much longevity?
Social media is great for a lot of things but not as a substitute for actual human connection. We need more actual human contact with one another. And less screen time.

[From Harper’s Bazaar]

If someone asked you for an item of clothing you would never wear, what would you say? I would say short shorts, because I have seen way too many women walking around with their ass cheeks hanging out. It doesn’t matter if you can bounce quarters off your butt, I don’t want to see that. That’s the first thing that comes to mind, but I just recently saw Khloe Kardashian in extremely see-through tights, which I never knew were a thing, so I can add tights to my “will never wear out without something over it” list.

As for her thoughts on social media, I agree that it would be nice to have more human contact and less screen time. Sometimes it seems like people are doing things just to document them digitally, and I worry about that. I worry about how our phones are changing us and how we relate to each other. (And making people drive like distracted idiots.) On the other hand technology has connected us and helped our children learn in ways that we couldn’t have imagined. I think the good far outweighs the bad.

Photos credit: FameFlynet and WENN