Aging (Gracefully?), Part One
It’s dark outside, and rain has been pouring down for a few hours now. Much-needed rain for West Texas. Thunder crashes and lightning flashes, intensifying the thrill of the storm. I’ve always loved thunderstorms, but lately their sacred nature has become more profound. Water is life, and we too rarely get it here anymore. The doves scurry around my driveway in the rain, picking up mulberries that have fallen from the tree, completely unimpeded by the storm.
The dogs, however, are definitely impeded. They refuse to go out to do their business, even with me running around in the rain cheering them on. Later, I suppose. I come back in the house, close the door, and sit in front of the French doors to write while watching the storm, lights still off in the room and laptop screen dimmed. The dogs go back to sleep.
I received several e-mail responses to my last post, specifically the part relating to aging. I’m not sure this is going to be the post I wanted to write about it, but I have many thoughts, and I think they’re all coming from the same general place.
Monday marked my four-year anniversary of becoming self-employed. I submitted my resignation at the university in early January 2018 and my last day was to be May 31, but I had some vacation time to use, so I turned in my keys on May 23. “Tif’s Liberation Day,” as one of my friends like to call it. We celebrate it every year as if it’s a national holiday.
The decision to quit had been building for some time. In fact, I remember the exact moment I knew I had to leave. I didn’t leave until over a year later, and I now realize that my hesitation came less from practical considerations (money, retirement, etc.) and more from knowing what/who I would lose. There is loss in every choice, even if it’s the right one.
Sometimes the right choice seems crazy to others, and it’s difficult to explain to those who don’t understand. Some might say I’m stubborn (I use this word myself often). When you’re a kid from BFE with as much ambition as I had, but no money or resources, you either become stubborn-as-hell to go after your dreams or you die a slow death (metaphorically or literally). In other words, I’m grateful for my stubbornness.
But it would be misleading to say that I’m not tired, and I think this plays into my broader thoughts about aging and continuing to stay active, continuing to dream. In so many ways my tiredness has changed the way I think about dreams and goals. There’s a flexibility to them now that I didn’t have before. An openness, if you will.
At this point in my life I’ve watched so many doors close and have pushed open enough new ones that I often forget there was once an I who was so desperately attached to a singular concept of Self. Is this what aging gives us? The gradual revelation that all of the effort and struggle involved in attaining or maintaining a solid identity—a concept of hero in our story—can actually cause us and others around us as much harm as good? That life is a lot less binary? “Do or do not?” Yoda was wrong. I mean, I get the overall motivational intent, but I think it’s flawed. Can we just admit that without a try, do is impossible? Give ourselves permission to be human again instead of terrifying ourselves (and each other) into a prolonged freeze response because we’re afraid to make a mistake? Yes, Yoda, there is a try. It’s what we humans do every fucking day. Get over yourself.
And really that’s it. We have to get over ourselves. Get over each other. Get up. Try again. Close a door. Open a door. Close a door. Open. Try. But let go of whatever it is that we—or others—think needs to happen as a result of our valiant efforts.
During the pandemic my practice was that of letting go. Letting loose of expectations and allowing space for other, new possibilities. Becoming comfortable again with silence and stillness. Remembering how incredibly significant both were to the resiliency of my youth, and realizing that the absence of both was very likely why I felt my resiliency declining in more recent years. I’m not sure I had truly experienced silence or stillness in decades, certainly not at the level brought on by the pandemic. So I embraced it. I deleted social media accounts, which was not easy. I’ve been “clean” for almost two years now, and it feels great. I no longer reach for my phone to document everything as it happens. I just experience it. Instead of thinking of the most clever ways to post about moments, I just sit with them. And perhaps most importantly, I no longer waste hours scrolling through cacophonous noise in search of a signal — something to indicate we’re going in the right direction, that we’re not all just loud, angry monsters hell-bent on destroying each other. Instead, I keep it simple. Live my life. Try not to become a monster.
Honestly, I feel like I aged at least ten years during the pandemic, physically. In addition to the obvious stress, I stopped running in order to recover from Plantar Fasciitis, and boy can I feel it. I look at myself in the mirror and see more loose skin, more wrinkles, a bit less glow. Maybe it’s the lighting in my house. But seriously, I feel like I’m figuring lots of things out on the inside but starting to fall apart on the outside, and isn’t that just swell. In response to my previous post when I mentioned “aging gracefully,” someone emailed me and added, “whatever that means.” Good point. Does it mean that we accept a growing list of physical limitations? That we accept others’ increasing underestimation of us? Does it mean that we have to work harder to keep doing what we love, making adjustments along the way? What does “making adjustments” look like when what you love is walking hundreds of miles across high mountains carrying everything you need to survive on your back and with two large dogs in tow? There’s definitely a part of me that childishly retorts, “But I’m finally figuring it out! Don’t put me on the bench yet!” That doesn’t feel particularly graceful. But it does feel real.
Maybe aging gracefully means that we believe in ourselves and trust that what we love will sustain us, even if we come to express that love in different ways. Maybe the ways in which we adapt to experiencing and expressing love is the wisdom we claim to gain as we age.
I’m not sure.
[to be continued…]
