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A recent geriatric report categorized old people, dividing them neatly into "young-old [65 to 75], medium-old [75 to 85], and old-old [over 85]." I don't think anyone asked us. And I'll bet those geriatricians are, every last one of them, under 65, not yet retired. Many of us who have been dumped into old-old without our permission may feel the old-old designation must surely be reserved for the centenarians. We old ones tend to think that anyone under 80 is practically an infant. And you don't get to be old-old until you are into three digits. But we know our lives are changing rapidly.
We don't want our brains to disintegrate (like poor Iris Murdoch). Or do we? At least then we won't know who we are/were. We are dreading what we will be aware of: I don't want to seem stupid, to seem ignorant because I don't remember things or because my cultural references are out of date. Who knows or cares who Helen Hayes was? Or that Haile Selassie was emperor of Ethiopia and beloved messiah of the Rastafarians? Or that someone new now has my Steve McQueen's name? And yet, I feel something like ignorance when I don't really know or care who Jay Z is. Or know all I need to know about a Kardashian, which I recently heard made into a verb on a morning talk show. Time is fleeting, and mine has flit.
It has been a struggle to write this in the first-person singular. I feel the need to generalize – I'd like to say this is happening to us. I have had to resist doing that, resist generalizing, detaching myself. It would have been easier for me to write this in the plural, because I think it's not just about me. It's what I believe is happening to most people who are in that category called "the old-old." But I have no right to speak for them, only for myself.
I now recognize the way my mother sometimes seemed to withdraw her attention from a social situation, didn't continue to follow the conversation. She'd look away, look out the window, around the room. I try not to do this, but I'm afraid it will come. It's not simply my level of hearing that has changed, but the speed with which my brain can absorb meaning. And possibly the speed with which people speak, and even the words they use.
I'm aware when one of my daughters repeats something that I haven't quite "caught," aware of her awareness and patience. She knows I am not stupid or inattentive. I'm also aware of it when she says, "Yes, you told me that before." Even I know I have told that story before, so why can't I stop myself?
And so, all in all, it is much easier to become merely an observer, a listener. Easier, yes, but it carries with it some sorrow. And I am aware I mustn't let my loss of focused attention become known. I must always look as though I am present and know what is being discussed. (Note to self: Don't look out the window. Don't look away from the situation. Smile, look alert, even if you don't know what's going on.)
Bruce Mau, a contemporary guru, talks about the creative life; forget about a "good" life – that's an artificial construct, he says. Think about the kind of life you want to have, fill in the blanks, make it your own. Above all, he says, don't fall back on what you know, on how not to fail. Failure is something to develop from, he says. Well, yes, but I wonder how that works as you age, when "failure" lives in common everyday existence, when I find myself saying a sad sort of farewell to the person I used to be.
The idea of "designing the life you want" is interesting, though. My current downsizing fits neatly into this idea of designing a life, I think, as does my recent decision to live half the year in Mexico. Those decisions are part of designing the life I want.
Although I like my relative solitude, I want not to be alone all the time. Therefore, I keep up my social connections with family and friends, although I am guilty of doing this only minimally. And so I send out notes seeking coffee dates, the occasional lunch or movie. Once a week, maybe twice. Just to get myself out of the house, to hear the voice of another human being – one that doesn't come from the CBC.
The changes I feel in my life now, as I have become closer to 90 than to 80, are … well, I hate to say it, staggering. Perhaps I have begun, now, to become a person who is static – the kind of stasis that comes before the slide into a lesser state – whatever that will be. Perhaps that is what I am trying to understand: the state of lassitude, of surrender to time, to gravity, to age, to circumstance. Now, in age, I am not who I once was. The realization has come to me that I will never be anything more than, greater than, better than, the person I am now. When did that come upon me? I miss that feisty old friend, me. Perhaps I can dredge her up from time to time.
Laurie Lewis lives in Kingston.