WELCOME TO SENIOR LIVING
Weekly Postmedia feature debuts
Postmedia is pleased to present to readers an exciting new feature page we’re calling Senior Living. Each Tuesday, the page will highlight a columnist writing from their own experience about the challenges and joys you may find at different stages of your life — in your 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s — as well as a regular column of practical financial advice from bestselling author Christine Ibbotson.
Two years ago a friend celebrated her 90th birthday with great fanfare and a lovely lunch organized by her nieces. Even though I usually don’t like to reveal my age, I have to realize that, now that the months have rolled by, my own big nine-o has come and gone, and I have ambivalent thoughts about it.
It was just another birthday, I tell myself. Or was it?
Should turning 90 not be celebrated? Nine decades — roughly 32,850 days — of living, breathing, being alive. I look at the obituaries and see that the year of my birth, give or take a few years, appears frequently.
But I am still here and in good company. True, looking around among my friends, nobody in my age group has stayed the same which is sad to see. A bent back here, glaucoma there, arthritis, limping, leaning on canes and walkers, hearing loss. Some of us debilitated by stroke. We are a somewhat sad bunch, but those of us left are fighting on.
And how about me? I am dealing with the appearance of age spots, weight loss, hearing aids, AMG (that’s age-related macular degeneration), wrinkles — and the list goes on. I am walking much more carefully these days, head bent so as to avoid anything I might trip on. Stepping on or off the sidewalk is a new challenge.
Talk among my friends these days revolves around whether or not to move into a “residence.” Some of us have acquired an “emergency button,” others check on each other daily. There is usually news of someone having fallen, either on the city’s icy sidewalks or tripping on a rug at home.
As for me, I am still “hanging in there,” living at home, independent, driving around in the daytime, doing my balance exercises. And while we are at it, I don’t ask for special treatment on account of my age. OK, look at me and offer me a seat on the bus when I get on, but otherwise, please don’t remind me of being “old.” Just treat me like you would any other person. Ask my opinion on any given subject. I just might have the answer, but you have to ask me the question first!
Then there is the mental aspect of aging.
“I am no longer who I used to be,” complains a former high school teacher, now in her 90s.
It is easy to give in to a sense of loneliness, lack of purpose, the temptation to just stay in bed in the morning. That’s when I find it useful to repeat my handy motto, which says, “No matter how you feel, just get up, dress up and show up.” No excuse allowed.
Yet there is hope and there are role models. I am always on the lookout for people who don’t let their age get in the way of what they wish to accomplish — provided, of course, that their health permits it.
Didn’t Sheila Goldbloom publish her memoirs at age 93? And how about one of my favourite actors, the charming Christopher Plummer, up for an Oscar at 88 and still going strong at
90? I read that Herman Wouk, author of The Caine Mutiny, later made into a movie starring Humphrey Bogart, was hard at work on his latest novel right up to his death at age 103. These are people I admire and, the Good Lord willing, I plan to be among them.
So, whoever is turning 90 next, I say bring on the cake (but forget all the candles) and let the celebrations continue. Nineties unite — the best is yet to come! Alice Lukacs is a Montreal writer.