The Senior Citizen and Intimations of Mortality
Recently, while riding a crowded shuttle train from Times Square to Grand Central, I was profoundly shocked when some MIDDLE AGED woman offered me her seat !!! I, the agile, sophisticated, suave New Yorker ! While I am 81.5 years of age with creaky arthritic joints, am very bald, have one deaf ear, , shaky gait and occasional Karsacoff-like forgetfulness, I hardly see myself as a doddering old goat who can’t stand for one stop on a subway train. And- - - - how I bristle when some one refers to me as “ Old Timer.”
But it happened again on the #57 Bus going Cross town . Some young woman smiled sweetly at me and asked if I would like her seat !!! What is going on ? While it is true that I prefer Tony Bennett, Perry Como and maybe Nelson Eddy to Puffy Combs, Willie Nelson and Rap music, and that I am more at home in my nostalgia about Jack Dempsey, Babe Ruth and Bill Tilden than trying to understand the behavior of Andre Agassi and OJ Simpson, I feel very much HERE ! So what if I like WWII movies and think Patton and Mac Arthur were ego ideals ! Bother it! Sure I like the Duke, John Wayne, and his patriotic movies ! But- - - - hey - - -
I’M NOT old ! But why am I vigorously denying my aging? Why am I rationalizing so creatively? Really I’m NOT old !!!!
Or am I ?
Is the Holy Spirit nudging me to admit that I can’t keep up with these young hot shots ? Is He ( with pardon to inclusivists ) hinting to me that I have had my fling at life and my chance ?
Is it time to move over and leave the field to the “ new” ones who can use computers with ease and who can bounce up and down the staircase without gripping the banister ?
Is He telling me that oldsters, too, can offer something unique with wisdom and seasoning and perspective? Or am I fearful that others might simply not want to hear my views? Am I fearful of becoming a non-person? To be non-relevant? To be some kind of laughable or forgettable Neanderthal? I recall the very sad episode in the movie “About Schmitt” when the retired insurance man, Warren Schmitt, sees his carefully amassed files thrown into the garbage area. He no longer counted now that he was retired. He was now too old to mean anything. Do I fear non-relevance? Or am I really struggling to come to terms with my own death?
Recently, one of my colleagues who weighs in at 84 years of age remarked as he struggled up the front staircase and came in from the cold, bundled up to his nose and hanging on to his ever present cane, “.. and they call these the Golden years.” Is it that we are angry with our own physical constrictions and envious of those hated younger ones who move with smoothness and ease? Are we piqued by all the pills we have to take to keep us going? So, what is this abstract thing the gerontologists call “graceful aging”?
I doze off in the Common Room after Lunch as I pretend to be focused on the Newspapers or TV gossip. I am slow to catch on to the ongoing conversations around me. I can’t walk across town as I used to do. I can see only two or three people a day in my counseling practice when I used to see six a day….. but wait a minute ! What am I saying?
President Reagan in one his many brilliant and incisive presentations ( which some call Reality Orientation) used the metaphor of the HALF FILLED glass ! If I , the oldster, can take a God given moment let me reflect that I can read. I can walk. I can speak. I can see and “ look around me.” I can drive a car. I can swim for twenty uninterrupted minutes without any negative effect. I can enoy a good meal. I can savor a Pinot Grigio expertly. I can enjoy good friends. I can breathe God’s sweet air. I can offer appropriate affection and love to family and close friends. I can articulate my views and be unafraid of disapproval - - - - since age like rank has some privileges. I can pray daily and be close to my God and to the dazzling array of Saints my Church offers me. I say “ Oh yes” when I hear the old spiritual “ Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” since every day I am present when His crucifixion is Re- presented in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
Shades of Thomas More and his response to the ambitious weasel Master Rich who sought political power plus riches over the joys of teaching ! Thomas tells him that a teacher’s audience is God and his students and himself ! More opines “…not a bad audience that… be a teacher.” What does it take to satisfy a reasonable man? Who has EVERYTHING he wants? Who is totally happy in this “ Vale of tears”? Or, using Ronnie’s notion, how does one focus on the half FILLED glass as compared to the half empty one?
It probably means that the rare commodity- - - - - the happy man - - -is one who can concentrate on his present. On his immediate moment! It might be paraphrased into 12 step language as ONE DAY AT A TIME . It seems to me that Jesus did suggest that the evil for the day is sufficient thereof ! It also seems to me that He, Who is God Himself, clearly taught that we should learn from the birds of the air and the lilies of the field which do not worry or spin but who are cared for by the Lord. And are we not worth much more than the birds and the lilies ? If young men see visions and old men dream dreams, the senior is one who should be cautious about his “ looking back” since his proximity to eternity might discolor the negatives of his history.
It is a NOW attitude which is recommended ( certainly not the Patricia Ireland notion of N.O.W. ) since, with God , all is present, at this moment, past and future. Obsession with the negative past with its shames, guilts, regrets and angers is the enemy of peace and growth. Can anyone deny this? However, on the other hand, many have found that enjoyment of the lovely things God provided for us, in the past , brings the inestimable virtue of gratitude which is so essential for living joyfully.
The truly NOW attitude refers also to the unknown future.
One might also become obsessed with those “ things” which MIGHT happen ! One might fear the future and become paralyzed with “ how will I cope with possible future difficulties?” How will I cope with my own death? Will it be painful? Terrorizing? What happens after death ? Such obsessive worry seriously interferes with appreciating the wonder of life.
The two fundamental existential questions deep in all human beings refer first to the Existence of God and secondly to the mystery of after-life !!! I think that the senior is usually aware of his own fragility and concerned about Death’s imminence and perhaps, under all kinds of masks, so is everyone else !
Ever hear poor Larry King on CNN voice his fears and near panic when death is introduced? Once, in interviewing the great Dr. Billy Graham, he asked Billy if he believed in life after death. When Billy replied with a beautiful, positive faith filled response, Larry sighed - - - with great pathos - - - that he wished he could believe that way also. This is sad !
Remember Shakespeare’s incisive observation that “ the coward dies a thousand times, the brave man only once”? I remember my own beautiful Jewish father who was irreligious but not anti-religious and who struggled fearfully with the idea of survival after physical death. As a know it all adenoidal young punk I would bait him with the old Wager of Pascal. If there is life after death, I win because I enter eternal happiness with God and the saints and my family. This pre-supposes that I live the life of virtue and Faith. If there is no life after death, I still win because I can enjoy my time on earth believing in “heaven” and can escape the fear, panic and anxiety of those without Faith- - - - - -like Larry King.
The storyline of the woe be gone Warren Schmitt never even hinted at any kind of spiritual meaning which might have given some encouragement to a man who felt that he was a NOTHING, that he meant nothing to anyone and that his life was, in effect, hard, brutal and short !!!! The Faith consolation to the Senior can never be over estimated. Belief in a loving God and a waiting eternal happiness can be a huge support system to some one on the “Back Nine” of life. Then whether someone gives me a seat on a crowded bus or whether someone listens to my “ pearls of wisdom” is totally irrelevant if I understand the NOW concept and the trust concept that God loves us with an implacable and eternal love.
So, it is O.K. that I am old ! It is OK for me to enjoy anything good that God sends me. I can accept His gifts without apology or guilt or hesitation. It also means that my arthritis and fatigue and the inevitable negatives are part of the package. But most of all, I can resign myself to a limit to my life span. As Malcolm Muggeridge stated: “ I am an old man. Soon I shall die and be with God.” That is reality and quite acceptable as long as I understand that my Father in Heaven waits lovingly for me and wants me to know that, in the meantime, LIFE IS MEANT TO BE ENJOYED.
Finally, my mortality!!!
Basil Cardinal Hume used to say that he prepared his people who were dying in this manner:
“ Soon after you die, we don’t know how long—but not long—you will be in the Presence of the Most Beautiful Love you have ever known. And since love has been the most beautiful thing in your life------you will be embraced by it-- and i will last forever.”
Causa finita est !!!