The process of maturing is an art to be learned, an effort to be sustained. By the age of fifty you have made yourself what you are, and if it is good, it is better than your youth. ~ Marya Mannes, More in Anger, 1958
The great thing about getting older is that you don’t lose all the other ages you’ve been. ~ Madeleine L’Engle
Theodore Roszak’s genius in The Making of a Counter Culture is certain once again to revolutionize our understanding in his new book, The Making of an Elder Culture.
His latest insightful treat offers one of the more salutary visions of what may be possible as the “saging” demographic continues to swell in numbers. As he says in his foreword, “Every institution in our society will be transformed as its population drifts further and further from competitive individualism, military–industrial bravado, and the careerist rat race. It is as if the freeways of the world will one day soon begin to close down, starting with the fast lane and finally turning into pastures and meadows.”
The link below will take you to an excerpt and the opportunity to purchase the book. I plan on reading it and am certain you will want to do so as well!
It’s taken me over half a century to to recognize that busyness is an addiction. Every once in awhile I think about retirement and how surely that will be when I can commit myself to meditation, to stillness, to doing nothing. But if I’m really honest with myself, I could make those commitments now. The problem is that I’m addicted to doing.
Tara Brach’s four-minute video is the antidote for me. As she so beautifully reminds us in this video, in Chinese the word for busy is the same word for heart-killing. Taking four minutes each day as a “sacred pause” could arguably be one of the easiest routes to “saging.”
Reb Zalman was among the first to offer insights into reconceptualizing the aging process, drawing on many religions and traditions and emphasizing the increasing importance of making meditation, exercise, and spiritual healing a part of the second half of life.
In his efforts to “revitalize” Judaism he has been committed to interfaith dialogue, feminism, the Gaia hypothesis, and the rights of LGBTs. His entire life is a tribute to the power of self-growth and community service to effect change in the world. His book, From Age-ing to Sage-ing, is one of the many insightful guides we can find for making the transition from a youth-dominated mentality and culture to a deepened wisdom and maturity.
I’m nowhere near 80, but I love imagining that to be there and beyond is to nonetheless still be full of passion and vitality. Canobie Films at www.canobiefilms.org offers three independent documentaries on extraordinary women over the age of, shall we say, spring chicken. By a few decades.
Throwing Curves, for instance, tells the fascinating story of Eva Zeisel, a 102-year-old ceramic artist who has had the kind of life that, well, movies are made from. Born in Hungary, imprisoned in a Soviet camp, escaping the Nazis, establishing herself as a successful and renowned artist in New York City, Ms. Zeisal is an example of a life well-lived in ways we can all learn from.
Hats Off, on the other hand, tells the hilarious and quirky story of Mimi Waddell, an irrepressible force of nature voted as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in New York – at the age of 90.
Yes, I wrote 90. As in, years old.
Finally, there’s the charming tale of Martha and Ethel, exploring the complicated and poignant ”dynamic family relationships set against the backdrop of changing American attitudes toward parenting styles, [and] the role of women in society, race and class,” as Canobie Films describes.
Each of us has the capacity to use the palette of our ongoing lives to make a work of art out of our years to come. I read a lovely Guatemalan proverb, “Everyone is the age of their heart.” Perhaps that’s the secret of “eternal” youth.
Good Housekeeping and the Carter Burden Center for the Aging in the Big Apple have identified their top choices for home safety products for the saging demographic.
Smoke Alarms for the Hearing Impaired
Some smoke alarms have strobes or vibrate, which can be useful for the hard of hearing. The First Alert SA100B ($140, 800-323-9005) has an 85-decibel alarm and a strobe. It can be connected to other units; if one sounds, they all do. Plus you have all the other delightful advantages of a small device that vibrates. Hook the Kidde Interconnectable Strobe Light ($77, 800-880-6788) to another Kidde, and it emits a steady light for smoke and flashes for carbon monoxide.
Shower Heads That Prevent Burns
The HotStop Shower Head ($25, 877-531-7470) and Antiscald ScaldShield Shower Device ($35, 718-268-7126) prevent scalding by slowing the shower flow once the water temperature gets too hot. The flow restarts when water gets cooler. While the HotStop replaces a regular showerhead, the ScaldShield is placed between the showerhead and the pipe (not the one being smoked).
Avoid Burns in the Kitchen
The Lamson & Goodnow HotSpot Honeycomb Silicone Pot Holder ($7, 800-872-6564) is a good alternative to a standard pot holder that’s made of cotton, which could ignite if left near a lit stove. Institute testers were able to hold a hot pan or lit roach for more than a minute with these very flexible holders. And the elderly consumers gave the pot holder high marks, too.
Manage Medications
The E-pill Cadex 12 Alarm Medication Reminder Watch and Medical ID ($80, 800-549-0095) was easy to program, and its alarm reminds users to take medications available at far cheaper prices in Canada up to 12 times a day. The face even notes the name of each pill to take. The watch stores medical information like allergies, blood type, and phone numbers for health insurance and doctors.
Medication Storage
The Borin-Halbich Home Care Pill Box ($3.94 per strip, 800-441-9779) is a seven-day pill dispenser with snap-down lids and labeled compartments for each day. In the Institute’s evaluations inside the lab and with older users at the senior center, this pillbox was a breeze to open and close. The large, raised lettering is a plus for those who are sight-impaired or who have forgotten the days of the week.
Avoid Falls
Moen SecureMount Anchors ($37.50, 800-882-0116) let you install grab bars anywhere in the house — they can even be used in between the studs in bathroom walls or to thwack that annoying partner of yours. The bar attaches to an anchor inserted into the wall, so the device securely supports weight, giving seniors the extra support they need.
Reach High-Up Items
The Ettore Grip ’n Grab ($26.15, 800-438-8673) extends a person’s reach, so your folks won’t have to use a stool to get things that are high in their home. This grabber has a pivoting rubberized head, the latter of which can provide a fine alternative to the pleasures of your vibrating smoke alarm if its battery runs out or it can nab something on the floor if bending down is difficult.
You may not need these devices yet, but you probably know someone who does!
Government’s “rabbit” waste is a gripe for many a disgruntled citizen, but it’s reassuring to know that our taxes are often put to good use. The website below is a great example of such a benefit. It provides a comprehensive listing of all the Senior Citizens’ Resources available on both the federal and state levels. Everything from housing to health, from taxes to travel, from consumer protection to caregivers, has its own separate link.
We’ve earned these benefits; let’s use them. As the French would say, it’s a “bonne idée.”
(You did catch that, didn’t you? Bunny Day? Which is what I recall my tenth grade French teacher saying was also French for Easter. He was quite a card, that fellow. Wish I could remember his name.)
Click on the above to witness a demonstration of ageless talent. This woman is purportedly in her 80’s. Here’s to living our passions!
I can’t, in all honesty, say I’ve tried every skin creme known to woman. I (fairly) arbitrarily draw the line at $95.00 per product, and even on the rare occasion when I’ve spent that much (I think twice. Okay, no more than twelve.) I’ve felt indulgent and wasteful. Plus I’ve got a veritable treasure trove of abandoned cosmetics, booty I can guarantee you no self-respecting pirate is ploughing the oceans wide (or whatever they do on the high seas) to lay claim to.
Then there’s the fact that I’ve increasingly limited myself to organic products, the theory being that there is probably a Malcolm Gladwell-kind of tipping point where toxins and our bodies are concerned, and accumulating them past half a century might well be pushing the proverbial (and metaphor-mixing) envelope.
But the real reason I don’t spend that money? The fact is, no mere face cream ever really makes a difference, or at least the kind of difference that would justify spending more than $20.00 a pop. No matter what cosmetic I use, the lines, and wrinkles, and assorted crow’s feet mostly just keep on truckin’.
As, thankfully, do I.
So where do we find something effective, inexpensive, and organic? Burt’s Bees Naturally Ageless Day Lotion does it for me. As far as I can tell it contains no ingredient that is directly implicated in contaminating the delicate ecosystem that is my saging body (no, I did NOT leave out a “g” there), and the ingredient that is in it – the one that seems to instantly tighten my face, gently but firmly – is, hands down, more effective than any other of the many products I’ve thrown good money away on.
Plus, it’s available just about anywhere. You can even buy it where you do your grocery shopping (assuming, that is, you don’t shop at the corner gas station for your culinary needs). Sure, it’s $25.00 per 2 oz. bottle, but (as our pirate pals might say) what price booty?
It seems to me that up to this past decade I was far too busy raising kids and maintaining a professional identity to pay a whole lot of attention to my personal “style” (it sounds vaguely preposterous to even suggest it as a consideration), but I’ve found myself hoping in a sort of compensatory way to correct that as I “sage.” My rationale is that 1) a bit of attention to style might divert attention from some of the less-amenable features of my mature(ing) body, and 2) if there was ever a moment that I wouldn’t have to worry I’d be construed as being an “attention ho,” as my children refer to their affection-craving canine sibling, it would be when I was long past the spring chicken phase of my sartorial persona.
Well, when I need inspiration in that regard, I go no further than www.advancedstyle.blogspot.com. The contributors for that blog have an eye for taste as well as that je ne sais quoi (maybe I’m thinking here of élan) which inspires me to make revamping my image my number one priority (right after finishing the yard work I haven’t done since last summer).
Maybe at last I’ll find a good use for my Marguerite Rubel (of San Francisco!) 40s orange velvet evening coat, other than as a wall decoration.
