Older Folks

At the Darien Post Office on Heights Road, I overheard some friendly banter between a middle aged woman and an elderly man.  It seemed that they knew each other, though I would later learn that they did not. 

The flow of the conversation was easy and warm.  “I am ninety!” the man cheerfully offered at one point.  He shared some details about himself and his schedule that day. 

A split second after he left, another woman entered the Post Office.  This time, it was someone the first woman knew. 

“You wouldn’t believe this guy who kept talking to me!” she cried.  “He went on and ON!”  I suppose she is right if she considers three minutes going on and on - the same time it took for me to address, stamp, and lick three envelopes.  She reenacted part of the conversation to her friend in a deep mocking voice, “I am ninety!” 

Was it really that much of a sacrifice of her time and attention?  The conversation was a bit one-sided – he was the sharer, she more the listener – but he was a nice man who at ninety was fit enough to be out and about, had activities to talk about, and was courageous enough to approach others socially.  If only we all are so lucky!

A memoir writer in the Darien Community Association Writer’s Workshop recently commented: “one aspect of getting older is that young people stop talking to you.”  Her tone is not bitter, merely wistful.  I wonder if this is because when one crosses that invisible line from being middle aged to being elderly, one’s identity is suddenly wrapped up more in age than in anything else.  People see that someone is old.  That is all they see.

Last year my children and I accompanied the Kids’ Care Club of Ox Ridge School to a nursing home in New Canaan to engage with the residents.  The children had prepared “interview questions” to use with the residents.  “What is your favorite color?”  “Who is your favorite friend?”  They were excellent interviewers and listeners, and filled the room with chatter.  The resident at my table started “interviewing” me about the ages of my children and told me about her family and former life in Rowayton.  Suddenly she was no longer just the “elderly woman.”  She was the mother, grandmother, teacher, and all of the multiple layers that make up a person throughout a life.  Once you get past the age thing, you find ways to relate.  Things to talk about.

A friend jokingly said that she doesn’t like to see herself in photos anymore because the person she sees is not who she feels she is.  Inside people feel young.  I know I sometimes feel like the ten year old gymnast who used to do wickedly fast cartwheels and twists every which way on a mat.  But the reality today is I cannot do a somersault without seeing stars and yoga I do but with painstaking care so as not to aggravate trouble spots.  We are the same people in our heads but our bodies age.

The lady at the post office was not a monster.  She did not reject the older gentleman to his face, and was actually quite engaged during the exchange.  But she had turned their kind shared moment into mean-spirited gossip in seconds, and for what purpose?

None. 

And it’s the utter pointlessness of it all that is driving me crazy as I write this.  At the very least, ridiculing the elderly is mean.  At worst, it creates a society that no one would want to grow old in.  And we all get old.