More On Aging – Emotional Issues

A woman who graduated from Sarah Lawrence College with me has edited a book called “In The Fullness of Time: 32 Women On Life After 50”.  Since I’ve been having a hard time accepting or understanding that I am truly at the end of my life (I could live another twenty years; but I am over 70, and that has been daunting for me), I thought it might be interesting to order the book and see what other women, famous and not,  had to say about their response to life transitions, even if 50 is long behind me. Reading it has been fascinating, uplifting, distressing, and supportive, especially realizing how difficult this period has been for so many of these women.  Claire Bloom mentioned that no heads turn when she enters a room anymore.  She is one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen (in NYC at  a play, years ago), and still looks beautiful for me:  it has be be a question of age.  Right?  I remember a stunning friend of mine saying the same thing quite a few years ago. She resembled Catherine Deneuve, and still does.  Another woman talked about the ‘old’ women she has known throughout the years and the different ways they faced the last third of life.  Even that phrase sticks in my craw.  Why?  Two remained vital, engaged, curious, interested in everything going on around them.  They walked, met friends for tea, had folks to the house for dinner, read widely – in short, remained engaged in their own lives and the lives of others.  Her own mother, on the other hand, took to her bed, where she languished for years.  Had she gotten up and out, there was so much happening outside her door, but her fear and anguish  kept her from experiencing any of it.  Most shocking to me was the essay by the writer Gail Godwin, whom I have been reading for years.  She became depressed, and had a hard time getting up in the morning.  What was the point, she seemed to think.  She did come out of it, and even wrote a novel of over 500 pages while she was feeling this way, the only activity, perhaps, that kept her from completely diving down that black hole.  She was so much more successful with her writing career than I, and yet, she felt even worse.  Wow!  Accepting the fact that one’s life is finite, even though we have known that fact forever, is quite a different animal than facing that reality when we pass a particular landmark – for me, reaching my seventh decade.  I’m quite sure that is why I have been blogging about it as much as I have. …  And here I sit.  I thought about staying in bed reading and watching movies today, but I got up, knowing I had this blog to write, email to read, swimming to do at 11 to help my body stay healthy and limber.  I guess I”m not ready to ‘give up the ghost, even though I sometimes just want to sink under my covers and say “I quit’. Bottom line, I’m too curious, engaged, loved – yes, loved – to just sink into a slough of my own despair. After all, I’m certainly not alone.  By reading this book I  am discovering there are a multitude  of women dealing with this reality in ways similar, different, healthy and not.  I am certainly not alone. I wonder what my mother thought about her deteriorating body, which was in much worse shape than my own at the same age.  No one in her generation talked about it, at least with me.  I doubt they did with one another, which is why this book is doing well and has such resonance.  I hope you will bear with me as I write about my fear on the Monday’s when it feels significant, or I’ve learned something new in this adjustment I am trying to make.  It may seem odd, but some mornings I count out years, relieved that I will likely see my grandsons move into their twenties, and have some idea of where their lives are headed before I depart.  Although I have no idea why, this thought gives me comfort.  They are so lively; may their lights never dim.  I could say the same for me, I suppose.