Roses in January — The Aging Adventure

My mother hallucinates.  She isn’t aware at the time that she’s hallucinating but knows that she does.  Recently she persisted in talking about two young men she had seen sitting on her sofa.  The last time she brought it up I said, “Mom, there really weren’t two guys sitting on your couch.”  She looked at me and said so seriously, “Yes, I guess I know that.”  I was visiting in her apartment at the Retirement Home this week.  My cousin was also there and mom pointed at the couch and asked who that woman was sitting on the couch.  We both looked and mom started laughing.  Gotcha!  Some times she hallucinates an unknown man; many times she sees my dad, her husband of 68 years.  He left this dimension seven years ago this month at age 94 years.  A good man.

The veil grows thinner.

Roses in January — the Aging Adventure

WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD ARE YOU DOING?  (Part 4)   I AM reading elder tales by Allan Chinen, sequels to our youthful fairy tales.  How did your fairy tale turn out?  I AM thinking that “happily ever after” requires us to let go of the fantasy but not the magic.  Instead, we find magic in different places.  I AM, for example, transfixed by hummingbirds at our feeder.  Makes me wish I was a poet; that I could capture in words the magic of those whirring wings and flashing red throat.

Every smile I see is magic; generates a smile inside of me and that feels good.  I’ve found that when I initiate a smile on the street at a stranger, it usually results in a smile back.  As an older woman there’s little danger of my smile being misinterpreted as a come on by some hormonal boy or man.  I remember reading some time back that the children of Poland conferred the Order of the Smile on Steven Spielberg.  I love that.  I smile at young people but they rarely smile back.  I think they’ve been taught to be cautious with their smiles around strangers.  If a smile feels good, there’s pure magic in laughter.  Hafiz, the 4th century Persian poet and spiritual teacher, asked “What is laughter?” and tells us that “It is God waking up.”  I think we touch the divine when we laugh with another.

It seems to me, then, that the challenge of this Third Age is not to grow old but to grow up without losing the magic.

Roses in January — The Aging Adventure

WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD ARE YOU DOING (Part 3)   What am I doing?  I AM growing old/older.  The significant word here is “growing.”  I AM changing rather than disengaging, once the prevalent theory of Aging.  I AM changing because I grew beyond, grew out of the well-worn activities, beliefs, just as a child outgrows his/her clothes.  Aging requires us to let go and move out of our comfort zone and into the unknown.

In this youth-oriented culture we white-hairs are often invisible or ignored.  I had that experience at Dulles Airport.  I was in line at a Starbucks waiting to be helped while the barista took the orders of the businessmen behind me, one after the other.  I finally spoke up and asked directly why she wasn’t taking my order.  The men apologized thinking I had been helped.  The barista didn’t apologize or even acknowledge me.

It’s probably an ego thing.  Being ignored certainly bruises the ego.  The question is, do we find new ways of feeding the ego as we age or do we transcend the ego?  And if it’s the latter, how do we do that?

Roses in January — the Aging Adventure

WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD ARE YOU DOING   (Part 2)                                            Aging belongs to the interfaith denomination.  People of all faiths or no faith grow old and share similar concerns as they ponder Fulghum’s Mother Questions; the great spiritual questions.  (See posting of April 16, 2012.)  Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi sees elders as “agents of evolution.”  He created the Spiritual Eldering Institute.  This is a perfect fit with more recent concepts in gero-psychology that identifies Spirituality as the meaning and purpose of living long.  My mother, at age 99 years, often questions why she is living far longer than any other member of her family.  She says that she’s not ready to die as she “might miss something.”  She was never a regular church goer, was baptized at the insistence of her mother and against her will as a youth in the cold Spokane river, and when asked what she believes can only say, “I believe in God.”  My younger brother and I attended the church that was closest to home, a Congregational church.  It was at my request that I was baptized at age 13 years.  No dunking; just sprinkles of water.  Today I attend assorted churches and find spiritual nurturance in Interfaith.  My beloved teachers, the Interfaith Amigos, represent the three Abrahamic faiths; Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.  You can check them out on Youtube if you like.

We don’t have to study up on how to be a spiritual elder.  We just are.  We’ve passed the tests and survived.  It’s the lessons learned along the way that are our qualifications.  Maybe I should replace the RN after my name with SpE for Spiritual Elder.  Hmmm.

Roses In January — the Aging Adventure

So, WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD will I do next?  Thanks to Diana, one of the “Good Enough Girls,” who suggested I write a blog (huh?), I AM.  Thanks to those of you who have left supportive comments.  I AM not technically operant so the learning curve is steep.  So many changes to adapt to; so much to learn just to keep up.  Back in the early 70’s, I reviewed a book for a women’s group, Alvin Toffler’s Future Shock.  We were told then that University education had a half-life of five years.  What’s the half-life today?  30 minutes?  Maybe that’s why everyone seems to be in such a hurry.  Just calling the doctor can be such a hassle when the young receptionist answers speaking 90 mph and your hearing functions at 30 mph.  Notice the speed with which return phone numbers are spit out on the answering machine; sometimes takes three rewinds to capture it on paper.

Because therre’s so much to adapt to, so much to learn just to keep current, it’s easy to forget how much we elders have to contribute.  Spiritual Eldering is one way and I will write about that next time.  Meanwhile, I’ve decided to renew my RN-ship one more year.  I’m not ready to let go just yet. 

Roses in January — The Aging Adventure

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?  (Part 3)  That’s the question if I do not renew my RN license.  RN’s work and study hard for those initials behind their name and some 40 years after graduation I have the experience to back it up.  The State is correct in requiring active nurses to show evidence of their work and continuing education.  It’s a demanding profession.  It’s also a part of my identity and I’m finding it hard to let go.  That’s the real issue, letting go, because of course I AM still a nurse just as I AM still a parent althought my sons left the nest decades ago.  Watching your children grow and take their place in society is a bittersweet experience; a combination of loving pride and the sadness of seeing them leave, of letting go.

When the President goes out of office he’s still addressed as Mr. President.  Those four or eight years in office create an identity that remains his for life and he continues to wield powerful influence without the stress of the office.  His obituary will identify him as President.  And so my obituary will identify me as a RN and mother and wife.  It’s WHAT I DID ON EARTH.  It’s my history and part of me for all time.

But, we are more than what we have done.  So, WHO ARE WE?  And, WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD will we do after we let go of our middle year’s identity? 

Roses in January — the Aging Adventure

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?  (Part 2)

So much of our identity is connected to the roles we’ve taken on in our young and middle years.  Elder years are not meant to be a continuation of those roles so it’s not uncommon to experience an identity crisis as we move into the January of our life.  It’s a “letting go” process.  I’ve carried the RN initials after my name now for almost forty years.  Although I retired from active acute care nursing ten years ago, I continued to renew my license.  Due to new requirements for renewal, I am now struggling with the decision to let go of my RN license.  Without the State issued renewal of my RN-ship, am I still a nurse?  And if I am not a nurse, who am I?

Notice how many of our sentences are predicated by “I AM;” the name with which God identified him/herself to Moses.  What will follow I AM if I don’t renew my RN license?  WHO DO I THINK I AM?  The question remains.