https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Adolph_von_Menzel_Halbfigur_eines_b%C3%A4rtigen_alten_Mannes_mit_gesenktem_Kopf_1884.jpg
at the doors of 59, i am about to become a senior citizen – aka, old man.
but my heart is still not knowing what is this, to be ‘old’ - it has not felt it, not experienced it, so far, and hence does not know, except what it has heard/read from/of others. and all those still do not ‘feel’ inside..
all of them are ‘cognitive’, not ‘affective’. i have not experienced them.
but, i see it coming - for sure, inevitably, inexorably, ahead.
and that makes me think more about this terminal reality - old age - for every one of us who do/did not have the fortune of dying young.
i do not need to seek far for material, to contemplate on it. here is my own father, 91 years of age, right here with me, and I with him now twenty-four hours a day, courtesy covid.19.
i see him, i see myself and others in the family around him, all with relation to this ‘being old’.
i similarly see my generational siblings, cousins, friends and neighbours, with their elders - old.
and i see these things, these common things, these patterns, in all of them – jointly, or severally.
i see it ideally - in the beginning, in those that are caretaking the old - the respect, love, affection, care, concern, pity, and sense of duty - all of them there present together. normally, at this stage, the old is old only by elderliness, but is fully mobile, self-supporting economically, emotionally and physically..
and everything is just dandy.
and if there are (grand)children around, then it’s even better..
then i see - with time, routines, demands and infrequent illnesses - this lovely package getting abraded; mutely, infinitesimally but persistently.
with that the love diminishes; first, imperceptibly, oh, ever so imperceptibly.., but certainly, it diminishes, by that incessant wear and tear.. - others remain.
more time passes. the elder’s memory starts becoming hazy, thinking slows. the habits step in and step up to supplant them, provide the scaffolding for the day’s routines to run, flow. the elder is still not imposing on you, not much..
as the debilities creep in, and the dependencies increase, the affection is tested. it is then stretched. and you supplant it by patience, empathy and reserves of care and concern, strongly underwritten by the sense of filial duty.
with lack of interactions with the outer world, without any unstructured meetings or transactions with new people, or uncertainties in the routines, to exercise the brain and keep it in renewal, the elder’s dementia emerges..
that starts interfering with the habits too, which have come to be the proxy for the memory and thinking. this starts the aggravation. the elder starts getting confused and becoming hapless. then (s)he resorts to two things. he/she tells or asks others to do things for them, and starts repeating them even before/while the younger ones come to do it..
the ones doing the bidding do not mind initially, but slowly it starts irking them inside, and sooner or later they blurt it out in some form - a protestation, an instinctive admonition to wait, or a plaintive cry as to why the elder can’t see her/his wish is being attended to…
this, the first time it happens, it is innocuous, but is deadly - a small, little transgression that is to become insidious eventually…
meanwhile, debilities come. movement gets compromised, incontinence comes, hearing fades, eyesight dims.. - all of which violate the sense of normal, engender shame, and nameless, often subconscious, anxiety in the elder’s mind.. such debits also decrease interactions, increase isolation, which in turn affects orientations, presence of mind, diplomacy.., the infamous second childhood sets in.
but it is not a return of the earlier childhood. This is something else, an adverse, seemingly perverse, mix of the child and the elder – the faculties diminishing to a child level while with a confused identity of being the elder, aggravated by the increased dependencies and the resentment of it. with that come the tantrums, the tactless, barbed words, decaying social graces, and with all that, loneliness..
dependencies go up. If at that stage no hired help is taken, by choice or need, then the next stage, next level of commitment, starts…
in the meanwhile, and amidst all this, *you* are also getting ‘old’, entering into your sixties, with the elder into eighties and nineties…, but still being the son and daughter – in a curious, slightly disorienting, ageless state - to the dad and mom..
In these moments, the colours, lark and exuberances of the youth seem so far away, as if a distant, fading, dream…
the real tragedy, god forbid, comes when the chronic care-wear erodes the love, the affection and the innate respect, leaving only the concern, pity and the sense of duty. That is when it becomes ugly, a relentless, endless moment of truth, of unceasing soul-search, and a self-loathing..
I scold my dad, a wilful child in nineties,
‘times harsh that seems unfair; In anxiety, care submerged, from tease;
Left in remorse later, and a pity that’s tender.
When she did it, it seemed so right, And was fine by him too, he would just smile,
Though just obstinate then, not senile.
With Mom’s passing it fell on me.
I have become my mom,
I have become his mom, I have become his parent.
And as parent, anxious.
He has fallen, broken limbs in trice, In two decades last, restored thrice,
Emerged unscathed, by God’s Grace.
Can he afford one more; am anxious.
At eighteen I traversed the oceans,
Climbed swaying, yawing masts, Came down the derricks’ swinging ropes,
By myself, calm, cool, in repose.
Have changed career tracks thence thrice, Each time to unknown destinies, Some when going great, just heeding that inner voice.
Why am I anxious now? And whence?
For one, far back as I could recall,
Would run with imagines fervent, Until reality’s advent; Thence, relieved, be comported for all.
And, tinkered heart opened the neuroses
And gave form and store To the formless disquiets of yore As impending calamities, fret and anxious.
With a mended heart of fifteen years,
With a spouse that’s repaired twice,
With the aging, senescent pater splice, Living by ‘selves on my watch here, am anxious.
Now anuj* is with us, that’s fortuitous ease,
But i hate to pile on his young shoulders,
What’s mine to bear and render, Yet thank God for such tender mercies.
Behold, my anxieties then are twofold;
One, for the sake n care of kin, The other, of frenetic imagination
A Gauntlet run till present takes hold.
No matter! To be there for others, is to live,
Life’s meaning is naught but Care. To be born is to reach out, give Unsought, love, assist, and share.
(*second son)
awareness, and articulation like this, though no cure for old-age, is a reminder, reorientation, a crutch.
and it helps repair the erosion too, somewhat.
still, a renewal. one curious thing in all this - it is mostly old *men* who form these case histories, these pathologies; not the old *women*...? in fact i am struggling to recall even one - why is this?!! and finally, i wonder how will i fare, when my time comes to be there..
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