GROWING OLD….IT SURE BEATS THE ALTERNATIVE!

That growing old thing is one major stigma in our society. It’s rarely seen as a good thing and people do everything they can not to avoid it. The trouble is there is just no way to do that. Believe me, I’ve tried, and there is no getting around it. What people try to do instead is to not appear to be getting old. That’s the equivalent of a dog trying not to look like, well, a dog. It’s just the way it is, it’s the way you are. And the ageing only gets worse, or better, depending on your perspective. First, as the title suggests, the alternative to getting old is not youth, which is as fleeting as a politician’s commitment to a promise, but it is death. So here aretwo inevitable bits of life and yet we spend so much time, money and thought trying to avoid them. What is there in our way of thinking that we love the idea of youth so much that we live in a bubble of self-deceit that we can hold onto it? But before we look at all the reasons for that, let’s have a look at youth anyway, and see if it all that it’s cracked up to be.

“Youth is wasted on the young.” So said George Bernard Shaw.

I suppose the implication there is that people, when young, don’t appreciate all the advantages of being so. They have energy, a firm face, a taut body, etc. Whereas later they are blessed with a sagging face and body, tired spirits and a nostalgia for the way things used to be.  People just go about their youth taking it for granted and, perhaps, not entirely using their time wisely. Perhaps even using their time recklessly, damaging body and mind with pursuits that they will come to regret later when they see the ravaged face in the mirror and make the strangest sounds in the morning effort to simply get out of bed. For example, it isn’t, after all, until you are older that you get injured sleeping. You will rarely find someone under 30 who seems to be in some pain in the should or back or legs and when asked what happened, will say:

“I think I slept funny.”

Slept funny? Who could ever imagine doing that to the point of having a minor disability when your whole life lies before you! Have you ever heard a teen say:

“Ouch, I’ve got a crick in my neck.”

Nope, it’s only after the first blush of youth has passed, and youth becomes the crimson visage of stress and strain, usually a few days after your thirtieth birthday, that the machine starts to wind down, or creek down, rather. And not having used that time wisely people look back and mentally read through their litany of regrets:

“If only I had stayed in school, changed jobs, knew what I know now, hadn’t invested in Bit Coin so late, hadn’t proposed to that woman, hadn’t accepted that proposal from that guy…and so on”

Regrets are easy, as is the nostalgia for a time that was never as good as one imagines. “These are the good old days” the song says, and it is true. Even the immediate past often seems better than the future. In The Catcher in the Rye, the main character goes through a long, painful breakdown in New York City over a few days. A whole variety of depressing things happen to him, and he meets people that treat him in such a way as to confirm his bleak view of the world and himself. But after, in a rest home, recovering, as he looks back, he says he misses it all, even the monsters who treated him in a way that led him to where he is. There are lots of psychological reasons people do this, one being that the past is safe and can’t be changed. But the present, if you don’t like it, you can change, and if you don’t, you only have yourself to blame.  As a result, the past, our youth, is seen through those rose-colored glasses. But let’s take those glasses off and have a better look at our past and feel a lot better about the moment we have, even though we are older.

Being young is so wonderful, is it? Let’s start with childhood. One of the strongest features of childhood is that you are largely powerless. With time you feel proud to learn how to control your bodily functions at best, but you can’t control where you live, with whom you live, the rules you live under, the food on your plate, when your lights go out, well, you remember. Childhood is really just like being in the army. There is authority everywhere and freedom nowhere. The only difference is that in childhood you can start to flex more than just your physical muscles as you grow up. If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to spread your wings a bit and gain more responsibility. Try doing that in the army and you gain more court martial. Try deserting your family by running away and you’ll end up humiliated by slinking back a few hours later scared and hungry and wanting to play on your computer. Run away in the army and, on a good day, it’s jail, on a bad one, the firing squad. As time goes by you will be gifted by your family with more of that freedom and responsibility. But is that always good? Obviously not, or I wouldn’t have asked that question. Freedom implies responsibility and when you have more choice then you are responsible for the choices you make and the, here comes the dreaded word: consequences. The sword of freedom is a double-edged one with sharp bits on both ends so if you don’t wield it carefully, you end up wounded.

But when you eventually achieve that long desired status of adulthood then on comes the tsunami of tasks and obligations that you are meant to fulfill in order to make your life a success, and pave the way for your future. Even in our 20’s we have our eye on what is to come and not what is around us. You best get educated to get that good job, and then rise in that good job. You must have enough of whatever it is to get married and have kids and raise them in a decent home. And keep up the retirement plans and payments for when the kids are gone, and you can play endless golf and sit on the beach and do nothing until the big retirement plan of the next world kicks in when you least expect it. Standing on the 18^th green, symbolically and for real, and you drop dead. I have always maintained that golf has one of the highest attrition rates of any sport with the number of men dropping dead, and it’s mostly from boredom. Bing Crosby died on a golf course and his last words were:

“Well, boys, that’s about the best round of golf I ever played.”

And down he went, never to tee off again. Good thing he saved the best for last, but most of us don’t. We keep shuffling our focus to the future and forget about the only time we have, the one we are living. When I taught, I would hear endless complaints from students and colleagues about Mondays, and how Friday was so far off, as if Friday was going to give them anything that Monday couldn’t. I would tell them to imagine that they were on their death bed, and an angel popped down, or floated, I suppose, and spoke:

“My child, the end is near, but I am here to grant you another full day of life, when you are in perfect health to enjoy all that this world has to offer. The beauty, the love, the feel of grass beneath your feet or the cold touch of snow on your hands when you know there is a warm house nearby. You may have all this for 24 hours. This is your gift.”

I don’t imagine you’ll prop yourself up on your elbow and ask:

“It isn’t a Monday, is it. Because if it is, forget it!!”

The point being that life doesn’t begin on the weekend or the summer or in retirement. It begins the moment you decide to let it, when you open up yourself to this parade of joy.   But we often only look at that parade from an apartment window and never go down to take part in it. And that is not a knock against living in apartments. Wherever you live, truly live, is perfect if you decide it can be. And as time goes by and we collect wrinkles and anecdotes, we shouldn’t rail against them wishing to be young again, because when you were young you wanted something in the future. And so, we live our lives, as another poet said, having neither youth nor age, but instead only a drowsy sleep, remembering the one and dreading the other. And that is not life, that is merely existing. How sad to live looking backwards and forwards, but never around. And if we look around, truly, we will see our lives are blessed with choices and hope. But we have to stop looking behind and ahead. The hour is now, and the timing is always perfect.