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Here's a question I've been dying to ask. How can you tell by your cat's physical appearance that he is getting old???

You see I asked my mother and she said their fur goes white. To which I replied but he's mostly white already. Anyways, I was grooming my kitty and noticed these white hairs peppered all over him even his white fur area had it. I could tell them apart from the other white fur hairs because they were very course hairs and wirey. They where not soft like his fur. So stupid me i gently tugged on one of them to which I got a response of "MEOW!!!" Which I interpreted as meaning: " hey what the heck do you think your doing, that stings!!! " So I gently tugged on his regular fur. And he just kept on purring and just put his head up slightly as if he wanted to look at what I was doing, but NO big loud MEOW!!! This time. So I experimented a little more to make sure it's not a fluke and every time I tugged on the course hair I would get the big dissatisfied MEOW!!!

Now, he's almost 14 years old and recently had surgery to remove one of his legs because it had a huge malignant cancer tumor in it. And it seems that the area where they shaved off his fur for the surgery is where most of those hairs are located, but they are not limited to that area.

So now I'm wondering is that him just getting old or is it something else?
And, are there other physical signs besides gray hair that could be interpreted as them just getting old?

I tried looking on the net I found a ton of articles but all the ones I have found only go up to adulthood, None mentioned old age.

Wow, Anlina, you always have such great answers. There's still so much I don't know.

So I'm assuming when that back area was shaved for the surgery those hairs must have grown in first and that's why they where more noticable to me.

Thanks. I couldn't find an answer to that question anywhere.