Column: Aging and Adapting: Elders’ quest for relevance
“Why are people afraid of getting older? You feel wiser. You feel more mature. You feel like you know yourself better. You would trade that for softer skin? Not me!” – Anna Kournikova
“When we age, we shed many skins: ego, arrogance, dominance, pessimism, rudeness, selfishness, uncaring … Wow, it’s good to be old!” – Stephen Richards
We’re still here and we’re still serviceable
This column has been inspired by the following words from a cousin, in a recent email.
“When I am closer to death, I will likely abandon the outer world to take stock of what has been and what is, rather than what is emerging. Whether I like it or not, I am engaging the world through Zoom calls and hen-pecking messages as are you.”
My cousin, G., is a few years older than I. His remark about being closer to death, before he will ‘abandon the outer world’ in order to look at the past and the present, has enormous resonance for me.
As an historian, I never stop ‘taking stock of what has been and what is’, in order to make sense of the present by my understanding of the past. And still, like my cousin, I observe ‘what is emerging’ all the time, and I too engage the world. [But – I never use Zoom, on principle.]
Age is not optional, but discontent is
Can we help our progeny? Can we help society? Are we “past it” and “ready for pasture”?
It is by no means easy to assert one’s certainty of worthiness in the outer world when one feels unraveled, and clearly not so acutely talented as we were in our prime. But in age we have qualities we lacked until now.
As an Elder myself, I am quite aware of voices from my age-peers wondering about their (our) value, their roles, and their contributions to the outer world where younger people – in particular the young whom we particularly love, our children and grandchildren – are still engaged in daily struggle to live well and be of use to their society.
There is an appropriate place for Elders. Humility is mandatory for us when we consider that place. Know thyself, and adapt that self to one’s surroundings. You have strengths. Assert them.
Retirement is not withdrawal
Some of us, indeed, still receive a paycheque for our labours; we refuse to retire.
I have an intuition that, when we stay on, secure atop the employment pyramid after the usual retirement age, we are resented by younger people waiting for a promotion. We are at the top of pay grades also. Would it not be better if we retired and made room? Just a thought.
But one has to know one can still live happily without employment, and clearly many of my age peers are not sure they can.
Frailty, incapacity, and newly-found talents
Recently I sent out an email to a large number of friends and relatives telling them we still matter and we still make contributions to society that are important — and we should assert that. Yet there is no denying that our aging bodies and minds, and our emotions too, are powerfully affected by the passage of time and the change in qualities of body, mind, and heart.
We are not in our prime. But we do matter, and we will engage the world. We just have to do it in specific and novel ways – different from when we were younger, employed, striving on a career path, or being the best parents we knew how to be.
G. and I assume we can still apply our intelligence to topics where and when we identify a focus. With humility, we can still assert some valuable commentary.
But Elders have to accept that their mind, and their body, is not of the same quality as once we claimed. When we were being paid in our professions, we were in our prime. A prime has a best-before date, and that is why humility is essential.
New Learnings: lost friendship; lost Arc
Here is something Elders should hold to in their time of changing their place in the social and cultural landscape: new things will keep happening to you and keep you interested in the mystery of unknowing. The future is unknown… and that is to me a very good thing, a great blessing for age.
This is the wonderful fact: You’re not finished with new lessons. For example, in only the past few months, I have had two experiences that convince me that being an Elder contains surprises and novel insights, and this is not going to stop.
First: I’ve had a friend, whom I have known – and known well – since 1988, just terminate our friendship. It is painful but also completely understandable in our circumstances. I own my role in the reasons; I cannot see another path for us than this. It’s almost like I knew Fate meant this one.
Second: after publishing 195 editions of The Arc, column #196 was “disappeared” – taken off the pages after a brief appearance, for the first time ever. The learning curve is steep, not only the discovery of what motivates editors to do this, but also to discover that public reaction to a published piece, in letters to the editor, can so swiftly result in the letter-writers achieving what they wanted. I ventured into a topic – Israel and its neighbours – where angels and fools know better than to essay an opinion. I will not do that again…
For more on these two losses and sudden new learnings, see my Appendix.
Conclusion
There is no better-phrased advice to humans as we age, than this line from The Desiderata: “Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.”
Everything human has a season when fullest potency is assured; the season of being an elder is upon me and my peers, and with good fortune and some effort, we are learning that we possess potent qualities that until now were not ripened.
Appendix: new learning for an old dog
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Friendship
Can I let you in on a secret about friendships in adulthood?
Sometimes they are really freaking hard.
Like, really freaking hard.
But so often the friends we have in our adult years are the only thing saving us from hitting rock bottom.
The truth is that even the strongest friendship bonds are not forged in stone. No, just as life is ever changing, friendships will always ebb and flow.
People change; you change.
Change makes differences; differences unravel friendships.
Sometimes your closest friends fade away into the background of your life.
Sometimes background friends somehow become part of your inner circle.
Sometimes brand new people enter your life and become the friends you never knew you needed.
Sometimes your heart aches because it misses the friendships that used to be but are no more.
No matter where you are in your adult friendship journey,
don’t over-think it and don’t dwell in the past.
Instead, hold on tight and ride the friendship wave.
Welcome the ones that find their way to you.
Send peace to the ones who fade away.
Love the friends that are there right now.
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On the perils of being an opinion columnist {opinion is ubiquitous}
https://humanityjournal.org/blog/reflections-on-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict/
Editor’s note: the above link leads to a lengthy (ten-page+) blog post by Talal Asad, a Saudi cultural anthropologist now living in the US. For the views of one Israeli woman, also now living (mostly) in the US, read the book by Noa Tishby: “Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth.” It is worth noting that the opinions of Jewish people in the US on the conflict vary a great deal – for information on how much they vary, according to various cohorts,try this link:
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