Opportunities in Old Age (The Terminational Years)

Opportunities in Old Age (The Terminational Years)

I suppose most people dread the terminational years (defined here as the years after retirement or after 65 years of age). There are ample things to fear in this post ‘rat race’ portion of our lives. Death is not one of them. Death came with the package of birth and is non negotiable. The fear of what we might be forced to go through during the dying process is a different matter. It probably won’t be too far off when we can all legally exercise our own right to control our own dying process without any government or religious organization dictating how we must die. With modern medical advances, current dying can be a long torturous process with some of our cells kept alive for years and decades, and thus we remain clinically alive. Maybe we don’t really need so many cemeteries any more, just some glass containers where we can view Grandpa’s still remaining functioning cells. I suppose this would cut down on funeral expenses (after twenty years since Grandpa had any coherent thoughts who would still be around to go to any funeral?  The other glass containers would have no way to get to the funeral). 

This musing starts with two premises: we need decent health in our terminational years, and we need be able to comfortably feed and house ourselves.  Maybe personal security could be added here. 

Change is one of the few constants in all our lives. Change, change, change—to the extent if we don’t die from something else, we might die from dizziness. All our lives we either have to change or suffer potential consequences.  Our terminational years are no different. Some of us are determined not to change and often pay the consequences. We may have been running the family for years, and although the children are adults now, we may choose to be a major player in their lives. We will live for them, whether they want us to or not.  And if they want us to be very involved, that is a sad sign. They are still not independent—financially, socially, or lifestyle-wise.  They prefer the comfort of old safe cocoon parental oversight. No one ever seems to become overly happy with that situation.  Not that some elderly grandparents don’t try: they buy their adult kids endless meals, trot over endlessly with gifts for the grandchildren, take the grandchildren and adult children on trips, give/loan them money, and of course, hold out the carrot of an inheritance.  And in the end, most times, the elderly parents feel their kids and grandchildren (once they hit their teens) just don’t really appreciate all the time, money, and effort the elderly parents have expended on the whole scene. And the adult offspring often wonder what life would be like if the the parents weren’t alway hovering about. Most of the time, “distance leads enchantment to the view”, thus making the relationship even more meaningful.

The closeness of parent to child need never change. That is what holidays and special occasion are for, to renew the closeness of yesterdays and reassure that the specialness of the relationship is still intact. Texting multiple times a day sort of eliminates any special relationship and reduces it to drollness. The terminational years are not about still trying to be a parent, or holding on to power over others, at home or anywhere else. The terminational years are not about piling ‘stuff’ higher and higher past  basic needs.   The terminational years are not about leading any causes, no matter how worthy. At best we are followers. The terminational years are not about exercising our manipulative skills to outsmart anyone. The terminational years are not about doing endless things you really don’t want to do. The terminational years are not about putting ourselves in stressful situations or doing endless things just to please others. On the other hand, the terminational years are also not about others being obligated to entertain, amuse, or hover over us as in some sort of ‘death watch’. 

If freedom ever really comes our way, it usually will be in our terminational years. The race of our productive years is over---for better or worse, we have crossed the finish line, and we do not get a second chance to run the race over, starting with our youth. The next generation is in charge now, and that is a really a good and appropriate thing. We are in the grandstands and the world is all theatre now. 

The goal for most of the elderly is to be able, each day, to do that day whatever we have the will and means to do. It is our last chance for a clean slate. Health problems will come soon enough, and our choices for each day become more limited. What any of us will choose to do with ourselves for amusement or enrichment will vary. Lurking around us as a danger, what with all the gadgets available to us, is that we will become the old fashioned couch potato, now more a gadget potato. Not much satisfaction is ever achieved by doing essentially nothing all day but lie around and be bombarded with TV shows, inane telephone chatter or tweeting, and so on. 

Many older people become slaves of their homes, acreage, or adult offspring. Every day becomes filled with repairs, yard work, entertaining, and endless other tasks that once were challenging and motivational, but over time become daily drudgery That happened to me, and I just sold the place and moved into a condo building where every day is basically free for me to do things other than maintenance chores around the house or place. There is little doubt that many parents really do enjoy being very involved grandparents. It is difficult to predict how many find it as much frustrating as rewarding. The stress involved can be measurable, and over time draining and disappointing, especially when the kids become teenagers and dread having doting grandparents. If we like feeling out of it, becoming a hovering grandparent, wedging ourselves into every offspring family decision, will do the trick. 

The healthiest thing mentally for most people in their terminational years is to accept and really understand that those in their productive years need space and time to live their own lives, let them have the opportunity to achieve things on their own—that is, after all, the whole goal of parenting, not to have a second goal of parenting all over again with grandchildren. The best environment for most children is not one in which the whole interaction with others is a ‘family values’, circle the wagons sort of mentality. For most kids to end up doing well in life they need to learn how to relate to diverse others of all sorts. 

However much of the above is true, and much of it may not, let us focus here on how to enjoy our terminational years to the maximum. It probably starts with a clear understanding of our own nature. That is where it starts. Next we need understand that ‘enough is enough’ of just about everything. If we do not actively guard against addictions, which are really compulsive behaviors, we will just end up being a compulsive something or other rather than a contented terminationalist. Since health is required for this period, proper eating and exercise must fit into the equation. Pay attention to calories, saturated fats, trans fats, cholesterol, and fiber for a basic start. Once you attain a healthy weight, cut back on calories as soon as you gain 3 pounds. Never let the body ‘fat thermostat’ get reset or you will have a hard time losing the gained weight. There may be all sorts of nebulous digestive tract motility and digestive quirks, so try to solve them, and first without spending a fortune on anecdotal medicine pushers.  They are all over the place and most could not pass a basic physiology test, let alone treat pathophysiological conditions. Fortunately they rarely hurt anyone, just waste patients time while making money off them. I guess that is ok.  We need jobs for people badly. 

Never miss a chance to walk more.  Walking and more walking is one of the best exercises for older people. Power walks and weight lifting, long runs, etc are not really the best exercises for terminationalists.  And don’t overdo stressing your joints. No need to rush joint replacements.  

There are mental adjustments to be made also. If you finished the race and are in good financial and physical health there is only gratitude to serve as your basic emotional outlook on further life. Be ever grateful for such good luck and then let your ethical nature be directed toward those less fortunate in life. Ethics is essentially a duty, an inherent part of human nature, and is best described by the Golden Rule. Don’t get too wrapped up in yourself or some inherited religion. There is only one way for the least advantaged in life to reach some contentment and that is when others, more fortunate, both individually and collectively, help level the playing field for these people. For many practical reasons it is natural for all of us to spend a great deal of time on our own careers and family.  Name one prophet of any major religion who spent time, as an adult, in any self serving ‘family values’ environment. Once retired we certainly have the time and/or money to help the least fortunate. As a rule a thumb, for every dollar we spend on ourselves past basic needs, we ought to spend an equal dollar (or time) on the least fortunate. With this simple little priority we can at the end of each day have enjoyed, in a selfish way, things we like to do, and feel proud that we helped the least fortunate. Duty done is contentment gained.

Contentment does not arise to any real extent from always being a taker in life, some sort of Donald Trump extraordinaire. It is always best to understand that others count as much as ourselves and act accordingly, and the others here are always the less fortunate, not some sort of genetic cabal. Almost all the conflicts across the globe are precisely because people are too wrapped up in their own selves and their own families, actually believing through some sort of faith based inherited religion that they and their offspring are special to a God they created in their own image. That is pretty self serving and with no basis whatsoever. It is perfectly ok to be selfish in old age as long as others less fortunate receive equal attention via money or time. 

There is a practical aspect to being so independent in old age, and not being dependent on others to amuse us. Many of these others, including spouses, friends, former co-workers, and so on, are going to die along the way unless we die first. If we haven’t learned to amuse ourselves, and care for ourselves then we are likely to be left helpless as these others die. What we will have left is bitterness, loneliness, and boredom. And our offspring, especially these days, are likely to be spread around the country or globe. You can, of course tag along, sitting in a strange and distant corner, interjecting mumble-jumble now and then to prove you are still alive. It is always sad to see some older person dutifully following their offspring around like some sort of ball and chain, to varying degrees out of it, whatever the scene might be. 

Don’t try to be the life of the party, we are not. Don’t try to offer endless suggestions about anything, no one is interested. Don’t try to make things go our way a lot, we will learn just how powerless we really are. Don’t try to look or act young and fashionable, we are not. We can dress young and fashionable but we will achieve only a weird wax-museum-like caricature of silliness. Limit our group appearances to situations where our presence will be valued. That will certainly leave plenty of time to amuse ourselves.  After all, how many times do we need be reminded that we are old? 

Spend time on leisurely nature walks or city neighborhood walks (with appropriate discretion), and you will begin, in the quietude of nature and the bustle of a city neighborhood, to see the forest of life instead of the individual trees. You will gain an appreciation for the vastness of it all, a better appreciation for just how long this evolutionary process has been going on, the amazing diversity, the complexity and interrelationships with which God’s laws (wherever there is a gift there is a gift giver) keep progress going—not on Human Time but on Evolutionary Time. We like to say Time flies, but the reality is that Time stays—WE go. In all this surreal quietude, with the many memories of so many people and experiences that meant so much to us, we can attain a less shallow, more meaningful grasp of the life and times we have lived. There is no need to fade away in loneliness, fear of death, cranky, bitter, endlessly trying to swim back upstream in our lives. It is best to go gently down the stream, cocooned in gratitude that we lived well, long, and found ways to help those less fortunate. All in all, we have no bitch. “A million million spermatozoa, / All of them alive: / Out of their cataclysm but one poor Noah / Dare hope to survive. / And among that billion minus one / Might have chanced to be / Shakespeare, another Newton, a new Donne -/ But the One was Me.” We hit the jackpot a long time ago.

Applicable Quotations:

“It matters not how a man dies, but how he lives. The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a time.” Samuel Johnson (British Lexicographer)

“No one can walk backward into the future.” Hoseph Hergesheimer (American writer)

“The wise man looks at death with honesty, dignity and calm, recognizing that the tragedy it brings is inherent in the great gift of life.” Corless Lamont (American philosopher)

“A man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong--acting the part of a good man or a bad....for the fear of death is indeed the pretense of wisdom, and not real wisdom, but a pretense of knowing the unknown; and no one knows whether death, which men in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good.” Socrates (Greek general, philosopher)

“I wouldn’t live forever,
I wouldn’t if I could;
But I needn’t fret about it.
For I couldn’t if I would.” Unknown

“Man’s life’s a vapor,
And full of woes;
He cuts a caper,
And down he goes.” Unknown

“Once I wasn’t
Then I was
Now I ain’t again” Unknown

“The principles now implanted in thy bosom will grow, and one day reach maturity; and in that maturity thou wilt find thy Heaven or thy Hell.” D. Thomas (American Agricultural writer)

“I have to live with myself, and so
I want to be fit for myself to know;
I want to be able as days go by,
Always to look myself straight in the eye.” Edgar A. Guest (English born American poet)

“He does not possess wealth; it possesses him.” Benjamin Franklin (American author, printer, politician, scientist)

“Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing: Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness:
So on the oceans of life we pass and speak one another,
Only a look and a voice; then darkness again and a silence.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (U.S.poet)

“You can’t go back home to your family---
to a young man’s dream of fame and glory
to the country cottage away from strife and conflict
to the father you have lost
to the old forms and systems of things which seemed everlasting but are changing at the time.”
Thomas Wolfe (American novelist)

The way to be happy is to make others so.” Robert G. Ingersoll (Civil War Veteran, political leader and orator)

“God gave us memories so that we might have roses in December.” J.M. Barrie (Scottish author and dramatist)

“Bring me all your flowers now
I would rather have a single rose From the garden of a friend
Than have the choicest flowers, When my stay on Earth must end.
I would rather have the kindest words Which may now be said to me,
Than flattered when my heart is still--- And this life has ceased to be.
I would rather have a loving smile From the friends I know are true, 

Than tears shed round my casket,
When this world I’ve bade adieu!
Bring me all your flowers,
Whether pink, or white or red.
I’d rather have one blossom now
Than a truckload when I’m dead.” R. D. Richards (poet)

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” Ralph Waldo Emerson (American essayist and poet)

“About all you can do in life is be who you are. Some people will love your you. Most will love you for what you can do for them,and some won’t like you at all.” Rita Mae Brown (American writer)

“It’s not that I am afraid to die. I just don’t want to be there when it happens.” Woody Allen (U.S. film producer and actor)

“Thus that which is the most awful of evils, death, is nothing to us, since when we exist there is no death, and when there is death we do not exist.” Epictetus (Greek philosopher)

“Those who believe strongly that death must come without physician assistance are free to follow that creed, be they doctors or patients. They are not free, however, to force their views, their religious convictions, or their philosophies on all the other mem- bers of democratic society, and to compel those whose values differ with theirs to die painful, protracted, and agonizing deaths.” Justice Stephen Reinhardt. (American judge)

“Resolve to be thyself: and know, that he
Who finds himself, loses his misery.” Matthew Arnold (British poet and critic)

“Sit down before a fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion. Follow humbly wherever and to what- ever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.” Thomas Henry Huxley (British Biologist, writer)

“Don’t compromise yourself. You’re all you’ve got.” Janis Joplin (American singer)

“Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.” Ralph Waldo Emerson (American essayist and poet)

“There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. One of these is roots; the other wings.” Hodding Carter (American journalist and author)

“I would as soon leave my son a curse as the almighty dollar.” Andrew Carnegie (Scottish-American Industrialist)