I hope the person in this picture is as happy with her life as her daughter thinks she is. To me her expression looks somewhat doubtful sandwiched as she is between her obviously caring daughter’s heartfelt letter, and the too cutsie advertisement with the double entendre use of the word spirits.
Everything about this picture bothers me. It seems to epitomize what is wrong about those who are not old assuming they know all about how to be old. I certainly do not know, even though I am decidedly there. I am still figuring it out, and I am sure that my children, while they may have strongly held opinions about me, do not know either. Like one’s life, old age is a work in progress, and differs greatly from person to person.
Years ago I had an acquaintance who could no longer live in her apartment and needed to find a place where she would have more care. In helping her out, I found that in many of the places the rooms were tiny while the facility’s general lounge was very large. I was informed this was because it was best for seniors to get out of their apartments and watch TV and socialize with others. This woman had spent a lifetime making sure she did not socialize with anyone, and her idea of how to spend her time was sitting alone in her threadbare, wingback chair, chocolate bar at her side, glass of wine in her hand, thumbing through her extensive collection of art books which lay around her in great disarray. Just because she was now old, she was not going to want to sing songs, or play balloon volleyball with the others in her building. She was probably barely going to say hello to them. She was exactly the person she had always been, even though she was now old. There was no way she was going to adjust to some young person’s idea of how to be old.
Another delightfully spry older friend of mine described how she was taken to the department store by her very attentive daughter to get some new lingerie . Once in the store she suddenly realized that the clerk and her daughter were talking about her needs as if she was not there. She noted that while they were referring to her in the third person as if she could not speak on her own behalf, they were picking out plain white bras and underpants. Her wry sense of humor very much alive at 90, she noted that personally she was eyeing the black lace numbers. Then with a shrug she also noted that she walked out of the store with the unlaced white under things --- a concession to what two younger people thought was appropriate for a 90 year old.
None of us of a certain age planned on being wobbly, forgetful, slower, or diminished in any way. And inside we are still the people we have always been: flying up stairs, handling a demanding job, lifting heavy objects, and cooking for an army. That is what we feel we still are, and we are having to adjust to our new reality. Just give us room to work it out in our own particular way, and we will try to adjust as gracefully as we can to this work in progress. Maybe what our friend in the advertisement is expressing is resignation. She did not plan on being in assisted living, but now that she has been placed here, at least she can still lift a glass to her lips. And then maybe, just maybe, under it all she has on black lace lingerie.