Have you had yours today?

I've begun to think that coming of age is that moment when we realize the shortness of the years ahead, that moment when things begin to come together: a realistic appreciation for the world (and its craziness), the importance of rich friendships, the necessity for a greater focus on what we choose to do and the knowledge that providing advice and guidance to a younger generation is the value we can bring to the world. All of these things have become more important to me during these last several years. But the one item I've left out is having fun. That became clear this past weekend when we visited a friend in upstate Connecticut.

I don't know about you but my friends are more important to me now than ever. Sharing the experience of these later years brings us closer than before. We aren't distracted now by the raising of children and all the energy that needs to be spent doing that. This is a different time, a time that focuses far more on making oneself happy.

On Saturday my husband and I drove to Middletown, CT for a football game at Wesleyan University. One of our early dates over thirty years ago had been at the Wesleyan Homecoming game, and I found the nostalgia still palpable. But coming of age has changed the way my husband and I focused our time at the game. During the second half, for example, I wandered into the bookstore and spent the remainder of the game browsing and buying books, while he watched the second half. It was a great way to leave the cold and hard metal bleachers and to lose myself among the stacks. And it gave him the opportunity to take in the sport he loves. Perhaps we can call that accommodation but I tend to think of it as living parallel lives, each person getting the satisfaction they need and reconnecting at the next point.

From there we drove down to Essex where we met a dear friend of ours, a widow of three years now. Last time we visited, the loss of her husband still hung in the air. This time, her energy filled each room.

The first thing I noticed was a "good witch" sitting beside a sleek black pumpkin on her pristine kitchen counter. It was "just for fun" she said... a term I heard her use several times that afternoon. We talked a while and then traveled down to the main street in town where they were having a scarecrow contest. There were dozens of scarecrows, one on each of the lamp lights that lined the street: a telephone service man complete with tool belt climbing the spikes of the pole, a Madeleine with blue coat and yellow hat on a yellow ladder and on and on. It was splendid and we were simply charmed by the creativity of each one - about sixty in all.

We had dinner, talked about her latest painting projects and brought her up to date since we'd seen her last and, with a lighter heart, said goodbye.

On the way home I was exhilarated. This woman, eighty years of age, with the enthusiasm and spunk of a fifteen year old, had managed to show me that she was having fun, that the things she chose to do now were fun things, things which gave her enormous pleasure. You can do this, she had said, holding up one of her paintings, you'd be good at it. You don't have to be serious about it. Do it just for fun.

It was a true gift. I am a rather serious person, at least I go about doing serious projects and sometimes, when I find myself teetering on the edge of something that is fun, I pull away from it, uncomfortable that it might not be seen as something worthwhile. Fortunately, just by being who she is, my friend had changed my thinking.

The next morning, I used the stepladder to access a small closet above one of our fireplaces where I store seasonal decorations, and pulled out a very happy witch in a purple dress and black hat with orange trim. I hadn't taken out in years. I tied an orange ribbon around her waist and arranged her beside a black cat on a wide window sill. Last night my Granddaughter noticed it immediately and began to laugh. She understands fun.

Another day we'll talk about other aspects of aging, but today, it's all about fun. Have you had yours today?

Hope so.

Christina

"...the first step shall be to lose the way." Galway Kinnell

To those of you who read this blog, I apologize for not having written earlier. I have spent the last week trying to give up control.

As we age, things happen to our bodies and its our job, my job in this case, to deal with it. The knee that has troubled me for three years is finally going to be replaced this month. I know, I know...knees are replaced every day...not such a big deal. Well it is a big deal when its happening to you.

How does this relate to control? Because after an operation on the same knee in January, six injections and months of physical therapy, I realized there was no other option but another operation. That was when I began to wrestle with the facts:, older people are the majority of knee recipients (definitely puts me in that category) ; the rehabilitation is a prolonged one (ugh, more work); its very painful (meds glorious meds). Then, when the surgeon told me I had to enter a rehab facility after the surgery, I lost it. All I could think of was the hospital my Mother had been in for eighteen months: the smell, the food, everything about it disgusted me, but it was supposedly the best of the choices we had at the time. That memory didn't help me to accept the inevitable.

So I have spent the last week trying to adjust, crying, talking to myself, alienating a lot of people simply because I couldn't give up the illusion that I had control over my future and over my body which is beginning to show its years. Now I realize my future depends on the surgeon, the caregivers and how hard and constant I am in rehab (talk about handing over control!) I understand now that the only control I have is to enter this experience knowing I will work hard as anything in rehab, that I will give it my all.

So in finally moving forward, I am allowing myself to lose the way, to give that responsibility to others and to take upon myself only what I can manage.

I have never forgotten that line from Galway's poem. I guess in the end, it is all about surrender.

I would love to hear from you.

Christina

"When I Grow Up..."

One day I awoke to the realization that what I had playfully said all those years, tossed so lightly over my shoulder...I can't say anymore. That time is over and I am here at this very moment in the last quarter of my life. What an absolutely stunning thought!

I remember sitting on the beach in Southport with a good friend, talking about the years that would eventually come, about what we wanted to do. It was the early sixties. My friend and I were raising children and couldn't imagine managing a family and a job. "Oh, when I grow up I'll....." we tossed lightly into the air like a bridal bouquet. And brides we were. We talked about being able to go to Bloomingdales without the children and maybe having lunch. We talked about husbands and heartaches, movies and the children waking us up during the night protesting there were monsters under their beds. And we talked about therapy, the hot topic at that time: Jung and J.D.Laing.

I doubt if either one of us really had a plan for the future. It seemed so far away then. We didn't exactly feel grown up. Many women of our generation had married and had children because it was expected. Unless their parents had been savvy about opportunities out there in the world, the future was presented in a very narrow format: marriage, children....none of us really thought about the future. We thought far more about how to make ourselves happy in what we considered the fruitless job of homemaking, a job which wasn't respected. We loved our children but we felt incomplete and separated from the real world. The real world was where people went when they were grown up.

My friend and I talked for years about filling the creative need inside us. She did far better than I giving and taking dance class. I puttered, stripping furniture, applying my creativity to my home.

I had forgotten the phrase we used so much back then until one day just a few years ago, when I awoke to the reality that there was, in fact, no more time to grow up. I called my friend. We were simultaneously shocked, like young girls who hadn't understood the rules of the game. "So this is how it all turned out," my friend said "this is what happened to us."

My friend and I have a long history. We have celebrated together and suffered through every possible problem a friendship can face, but in the early morning she is the person I call. In the sixties we went to luncheons together and drank small lovely glasses of sherry. In the seventies she was the person who pressed me to go to a party where I met the man I subsequently married. When we finally faced the fact that the days of our lives were running down, we could have just given up and let our mouths droop at the corners, but we chose love and laughter instead.

Sometimes the slowing down of our bodies causes us to gripe, but that is only until one hears the complaint of the other; we listen and then move on with the day. It is so important to have that ear, that good friend to whom you can say those things. I believe that love and friendship, whether they be family members or not, get us through this time. Love sustains us and enables us to create.

One of the first things my friend and I discussed was the inherent desire to see certain friends and not others. We found ourselves becoming more selective about how we spent our time and with whom. Now that I am all grown up and as in charge of my life as any person can be, I want to spend time with the people I love and who love me. I want to disconnect from the people who used me in whatever form and to open my heart to new friendships that expand, broaden, are reciprocal. In that way, I'll be able to make each day count.


I hope you'll write and tell me about your experience.

All good wishes,

Christina

What Was That Noise?

I was at the physical therapist's the other day and she asked me to do a lunge in order to evaluate the progress of my knee. I did an abbreviated one and she asked: "What was that noise?" "My knee," I said. No demonstration could have given her a better idea of our lack of progress than that crunching sound. We laughed and then proceeded to design a one-month plan to do
everything possible to speed up my recovery. Kind of a one-month blast. Our optimism was so great that it cloaked the ache in my leg as I got into the car.

But this morning when I went to a lecture at my local nursery - "Planting a garden of Ferns" - I found myself standing for a long time as we watched a 60-slide presentation, then went into the plant area and identified fern samples. By the time I walked back to my car, tears were in my eyes. My knee had given up this false optimism and I was once again consumed by pain -- not a complaint just a statement of fact. On the way home, I put the car on cruise so I wouldn't have to engage that leg.

And then I reread Penny's comment -- a wonderful reminder that love and laughter are terrific tonics. So when my grandchild, Lucie, (age 5) called to tell me about her latest soccer achievement, I was relieved and delighted. She told me about kicking the ball and about what she was wearing to a lunchtime party. "Underpants," she said and laughed and laughed. I joined her because I know Luce: if she could go that way she would.

It was so good to laugh. Isn't timing everything?

AND THERE I WAS ON THE FLOOR AT TARGET

There are many things to be grateful "for" but, as I ripen into the season of my life, the many reasons blend into a sacred mystery.  And, most deeply, I realize that living gratefully is its own blessing.  -  Michael Mahoney

Yesterday at a Target checkout, my wallet fell open and the change dropped to the floor. Nickels, dimes, quarters, strewn in a half circle around me. My immediate reaction was to think through how I was going to do this.  OK, the change is down there, now all you have to do is be very careful bending your knee to get to it.

I very slowly dropped to one knee, and was managing to pick up the scattered change when I saw a pair of chubby brown hands beside mine. They were the hands of a lovely Mexican woman who looked at me with a slight smile. Together, we picked up the change and as I thanked her and began to move back to a standing position, I found that my bad leg wouldn't support me. She quickly put her arm around me and helped me to my feet. 

Within the few seconds it took for all of this to happen, my mind filled with negatives -- you're old, you're at "that" point and on and on. But the moment I became conscious of her arm around me, I was flooded with gratitude. What had begun as shame had become something entirely different. The woman looked at me kindly, nodded and went back to her shopping.  It was as though this was just part of her day.  I was humbled by her consideration and respect. And I thought, pass it on.  

What amazed me most was the internal change that I felt.  I had been humbled by my body failing, but her kindness opened my heart to a new and deeper sense of gratitude.  That evening, everything took on a different glow from the salad I prepared for dinner to watching the US Open. My sense of appreciation had swelled many times over and I was glad of it. Isn't it amazing what an act of kindness can do and isn't it equally amazing that as we grow to deal with our transitioning lives, the experience of true joy can come flooding in.

A final note:  at the very moment I sat down to write, my dear friend from the West Coast sent me the Michael Mahoney piece at the top of this blog.  Life and its timing can be truly amazing. 

Christina

Check out: http://www.gratefulness.org

Does categorizing limit expansion?

Some may think categorizing women by age limits society's view of them as well as their view of themselves.  But the truth is transitioning into the final years or decades of one's life can be especially difficult and is often determined by the years that came before, the expectations we held, the relationships we had, the interests we pursued and especially, how we felt about our bodies.

This blog is dedicated to opening the channels of communication between "woman of a certain age" in order to ease the transition and learn how others have handled and continue to handle it. There has been nothing in my life so important as having a role model, a model that allows me to open myself to another way of seeing things.  My hope is that women will come to "Over the Fence" and by sharing their experiences and their opinions, become models for one another.

I'm walking across the lawn now, coffee in hand, the day is bright with a slight breeze and I'm ready to talk... and listen over the fence.  Please join me.

Christina

Back after a long day in New York City.  I hadn't planned to write tonight but I am compelled to comment on the manner and thought of the path Ulla has chosen.  Some of us find ourselves more confused, some less.  For some of us the separation is too much of a shock while for others, its a new beginning.  So much of our reaction has to do with the history we choose to bring to it.  And I say "choose" because some of us might have taken a bit of the baggage left over from our own histories and wallowed (and I say that carefully) in the pain of the loss.

I remember the day I dropped my first child at school.  I had no idea what kind of wrenching experience it would.  I'd thought that my sheer joy for her to be moving on with her life would satisfy me.  Not the case.  I, too, cried.  All the way home.

But amazingly, years go by, another separation, tears, more tears and then something inside shifts and we learn this is part of a process.  Like my garden, most of us reach for the light.