Being Sixty: A Preface

 

Now

 

 

                                                                             Then

Some two years ago I posted my reveries about being at the edge of thirty years old, as now I do about teetering on sixty, precisely thirty years hence. I have lived a second half of existence since committing those thoughts to paper.

I was always very cognizant of the breath that life is, and it is no surprise that I reflected a bit on it, and the inevitability of its end just before I turned thirty.  I had been doing that since I was a teenager reading "Thanatopsis" by William Cullen Bryant.

But there is a difference now. I do not say it to be morbid and I do not feel the morbidity I felt, as it happens, as a teenager. No matter what adults said, no matter what I knew intellectually then, and now, the speed of the days going by is an emotional whirl that produces a tad of fright about how much time I have wasted, and an anxiety about the fact I probably will waste a significant bit of what is left, despite my best efforts. On the other hand, I am not sure sitting on my couch in my comfortable little rooms, surrounded by my pets is an entire waste of time. It could be considered meditative, and meditation, secularly or in religious circles is a sought after "activity" of inactivity.

I have, I admit, found myself looking at the statistics of what time I have left. My mother died at 48; my father at 90. Women, as a general matter, have a life span of 78, although I know of a lot of women in their mid-to-late eighties and at least one 90.  If I am gifted with the maximum (in which case I might well be writing the third of these entries, "Being 90:  a Preface"--now there's a thought). More, or less, of a future, my comment about becoming thirty--the need to resolve things--is more urgent than it was. And I was right then that the things to resolve are not the same now as they were then.

Certain ships have sailed in an earthly sense of achievement--children did not happen and the reasons wherefore were a combination of nature, nurture, and self-fulfilling prophecy. Fortunately, though, I have had others' children in my life and that has been an enormous compensation. Where I had a career before me in my 1984-ish writing--I had been licensed and my name appeared on a door-- that career, as an attorney was had and I have set it aside with a bit of an unceremonious push by political demi-gods. Sometimes I wonder whether they see that they face the same existential realities as the rest of us. What was it that Rose (Cher) said to Cosmo Castorini (Danny Aiello) in "Moonstruck"?  "I just want you to know no matter what you do, you're going to die, just like everybody else."

It was time, though, for me to leave the arena of law when I did, and I have been happier. Has "retirement" been a panacea?  No. Naturally, and I knew it would be so, there are other challenges. One is never free to do exactly what one wants. From a Christian point of view, and that is the point of view I practice (emphasis on the "practice" part) one is supposed to let go of the I in favor of the other, and the Other, He who relentlessly invites us to follow the path of His act of love. I keep digressing. Well, maybe it isn't a digression. It is the point.

I am thinking, yes, yes, I am, seems silly to say it, but it is true, eschatologically. In terms of final, ultimate things. What is the person I have become, and if given the chance, will become?  And whoever I become it will be without the same supports I had during the previous thirty years. My dad has been gone nearly six years. Several good friends have passed on, some at a good age, and others much too young, not given the years I already have been.

I know this. Although the core of who I am seems to have remained with me, some of the concerns surrounding the core have changed radically. The things that obsessed me when I was younger, things that pained me in ways I thought were irrevocable, no longer do. I wonder now why I gave them so much importance. Some large piece of me got left behind.  I shed unnecessary or burdensome, outer layers.

On the other hand, some old bête noirs still follow me around--I have come to understand that I have to befriend them. Or at least tolerate them without whining.  Or tolerate them, with just a little whining! 

My faith. My faith. I am no holy roller, but I do believe, in my deepest self, that there indeed is the pearl of great price, just like it says in the Good Book. I won't stand on the pulpit right now. Too much.  But when I sit before the Blessed Sacrament, I have flashes of certainty about Him, really, truly, present as if He were sitting next to me saying, "Don't be afraid".

I have come to believe that if I am given and accept the Spirit and I lose the fear, that not only will I find what I am supposed to be doing in the last (I hope) third of my life, but I will also be at peace for the rest of my days.