A young male writer turned 60 recently and complained about getting old. Please, I thought, I’ve unwound nine-tenths of my mortal coil, don’t tell me about getting old, young whippersnapper.
One glaring difference in the two decades that stand between us is underlined by the fact a 60-year-old male probably hasn’t experienced ageism yet. A fit man at that age is not far off his social and cultural peak; dress him in a suit and he could be a minister of the crown or a hot-shot CEO. A woman – and in most cases, a man nearing his 80s – is more than likely just the furniture of the street; only her peer group really sees her as an equal.
Although we might rail against being the wallpaper of the modern age and whinge about being patronised, younger members of society should still feel free to give up that bus seat or let us jump the queue. Chances are our legs aren’t too strong any more.
These things are as nothing compared with the horror Proust evokes when describing the impact the “chemistry of time” has had on his own idiosyncratic and once-vital characters. His descriptions of decrepitude send one rushing to the mirror. It becomes best not to dwell on the way body fat coalesces into a soccer-ball stomach almost overnight; nor to notice how cheeks have travelled down to swell a turkey neck; nor how cement, not fairy dust, seems to have been sprinkled on wrinkles.
But etched in the aged faces and bodies of my friends are lifetimes of experience and wisdom, and when they smile and laugh, the cliche comes alive – I see the carefree young people they were. They grew in the lace-curtained middle of the last century, some with fathers who had been to war. All lived through what some think was the golden age of Australia and also through times of accelerating social change.
I think especially of the women riding the wave of their ninth decade now – what a generation of women this was and is. We were formed by key social events of the times – the advent of TV, the swinging 60s, the pill, the Vietnam war, Vatican II, second-wave feminism … and that just takes us to the beginning of the 80s.
I think of our parents’ generation which faced greater challenges – world wars, the depression – and I think of the struggles of my ancestors, of the brave matriarchy that preceded me.
Like many, what I do know is that the centrepiece of life is family, the one anchor that has kept me afloat in often challenging seas. To watch one’s children grow and then their children – as one generation gives away to another – fulfils a deep primal need. Between the joy and the tears is the contentment of love.
After a rollercoaster ride through life, now as I get older, it is the quiet in a noisy world that I find peaceful. A house that was once a chaotic pit stop for a hard-working single mother and kids is now an ordered haven of stillness. I rode the rollercoaster too often and now like the feeling of my feet on the ground. I no longer really love talking to strangers, for to talk to strange people may be to talk to dull people. Sure, behind everyone is a story but some of them I no longer have time to read. Many people live lives dominated by the metronome of habit. When Proust speaks of the “torpor of habit” surely he is warning us that the constant daily wheel of repetition has rendered some constrained.
A standout gift of ageing is time – time to be still, to notice the shapes and colours of the world, to remember, to understand our failures so that we might empathise with others. My memory bank is like Jack Horner’s plum pudding, only a fabled magic one. I put in my thumb and pull out some long-forgotten joy or near miss and they keep on coming, too fast to catalogue.
Being in the late evening of life we learn to reflect, to meditate on things lost and things gained, to contemplate a society alien to the one we knew as children. We still miss old dead mates, so many of them now that I keep a digital roll call of the dead who coloured my life. Some of those who are left have become impatient and cranky, best enjoyed in small doses. These are the ones who’ve had enough, waiting to go, melancholy masked by mannerisms.
Being on the cusp of one’s ninth decade does not mean that engagement in the world is less. There is yin yoga, exercise, daily coffee with local friends. Importantly, keeping the grey matter active there is intellectual, cultural and political talk with engaged mates discussing the frailties of today’s world and perhaps even gossiping about a former tall poppy or two. Currently there is the weekly flag-waving march through the city in opposition to this dreadful war on Gaza. A trip to ancient Greece and probably my farewell visit to Florence and Rome are in the planning.
As I slide towards my ninth decade there are many things I regret. I regret that I did not stop and breathe more often; that I was not kinder more often; that I sometimes suffered fools for too long. I regret not knowing the constellations of the night sky, comparative mythology, how to speak Italian and Arabic fluently, how to ride a motorbike, play mahjong and dance tango. Then there are all the books I have not read – many of which sit beside my bed. Some days this list seems endless.
The young 60-year-old writer has rich times ahead of him. Family, friends, knowledge, wisdom – the rich tapestry of life to enjoy. One day he will join those of us on the very slippery slope, rising unsteadily from the cafe chair, an hour of life measured out in Prufrock’s coffee spoons, souls on the edge of transit, revelling in the kaleidoscope of memories and in plans for the next exciting feasible adventure. Until then he is welcome to smile at all the ninth- and even tenth-decade souls he passes.
