3 PENSIONERS 1 THIRTYSOMETHING AND A TUK TUK A month-long trip to India was truly unforgettable for Eleanor Wood
When Eleanor Wood, 38, booked a one-month trip to India with three relatives (all over 70), she wasn’t sure what to expect. It turned out to be the best thing she did all year...
At my age, my grandmother was a single mum to an 18-year-old and a 13-yearold and worked full time in community health. I am 38, and like to spend my time watching Rupaul’s Drag Race and eating in bed. The closest things I have to ‘dependants’ are next door’s cats, who like to get away from the noisy children in their house.
When I went through ‘a bad patch’ after the break-up of a 12-year relationship, my 88-year-old nan, Dorothea, was the person I turned to. Partly because retired people tend to be at home so are more likely to answer the phone. Also because she is patient and kind, so doesn’t mind listening to my problems long after friends and siblings have grown tired of it.
During this period – when I am living alone for the first time and terrified about the future; in my 30s, but feeling ancient and like every decision I’ve ever made is wrong
– we speak every day. I soon become hooked on the gossip involving her friend Sylvie from church having an affair with a retired weatherman. Then, after a test run – our first holiday together was a week in Spain – we decide to go on a month-long trip to India. Nan’s older sister, my great auntie Rose, 90, and her younger sister, Ann, 72, join us, and we opt to stay in a big hotel in Goa, all on one level and with golf buggies to take you to the beach. Nan struggles to walk long distances and Rose uses either a walking stick or wheelchair depending on the day. Glamorous great-auntie Ann is a whippersnapper by comparison, but after a lifetime of hockey and running, she is awaiting a hip replacement, which makes walking painful.
The four of us make an unlikely travelling crew but our lives are surprisingly similar. My nan’s and aunties’ husbands are no longer around (divorced, dead or both); their children are long grown up. Now they are as fancy-free as I am. I just missed out the middle bit. We spend much of our holiday lying on the beach, drinking cocktails (Nan and Rose stick to gin and tonics – always doubles – and opt to pay more for Schweppes), eating a lot of curry, going sightseeing and visiting hippie markets. They are heroic in always saying yes, even if it means tackling logistical issues – wheelchair in the back of a rickety tuk tuk, or all of us holding each other’s arms while trekking along dusty dirt roads. Rose’s wheelchair only means we do these things very slowly. The forced change of pace is not only good for me but becomes quite enjoyable. Most of the time. Sometimes waiting for them to get ready to go for breakfast takes hours and I have to remind myself not to become irritable.
I see close up what it’s like to be a woman over 70. Day to day, it’s invariably painful and difficult: Rose has a frozen shoulder that sometimes means she needs help getting dressed; Nan has such bad arthritis in her hands that she carries special implements in her handbag in case she needs to open a jar or encounters a stiff bathroom tap. Ann is entirely uncomplaining but I occasionally catch her wincing as she tries to disguise her limp. They are all incredibly stoic, but I realise being old is not for the faint-hearted.
Every evening I go running along the beach, and feel mildly guilty at being set free for an hour, when the others would have loved to be able to do this, too. It makes me run a little bit faster and reminds me to enjoy it while I can.
On the beach in the afternoons, we see the bright flash of a parasailor in the sky over the sea, a yellow parachute billowing in the wind attached to a speedboat below. Rose has always loved anything to do with flying and desperately wants to try it. We enquire, but they say she is too old and it won’t be covered by her insurance. It seems such a shame, as she sits
‘THEY ARE ALL LIVING EXAMPLES OF KNOWING YOUR WORTH’
and watches them go up every day, wishing it could still be her – being old is very unfair sometimes. On our last day, she decides that someone has to do it, and pays for me to have a go. ‘Up, up and away,’ she says with a wink.
Up there, floating above the sea, I am at peace. Everything, quite literally, falls away. Relationships, money problems, jobs, home. My nan assures me that this is what being old feels like, on a good day. She remembers walking home from work in tears every day after her husband left, exhausted from putting a brave face on it, with two small children waiting for her. It’s far away from her now, and so much has happened since that she remembers it as a long-ago learning experience. A short period of her life, in the scheme of things. She lives alone and has a great life; she says she is too busy to feel lonely and I believe her. It wasn’t always like that, but she got used to it and then learned to enjoy it. My auntie Ann, whose beloved husband died after a long illness, spends her days going to art galleries and the cinema. She’s very fun and attractive, and has often been asked out since being widowed, but always says no – she is free to do whatever she wants, and never wants to look after a man again. By this point, my nan and aunties are all living examples of knowing your worth. They have a quiet confidence, they are not afraid to speak their minds, they have true gravitas. It’s sad that, because they’re old, not everyone recognises it straight away. At the airport, a young couple with rucksacks inadvertently shove in front of Rose – not trying to be rude, they just don’t see her, because old ladies in wheelchairs are pretty much invisible. She flags them down, looks them in the eye and eloquently explains why this is not okay. They learn their lesson. And Rose seems to be able to let things go more easily than I can. While I’m still furious when I think of that inconsiderate young couple, she wishes them well and laughs about it. Life’s too short and too much fun to spend it worrying about such things.
Yet the older women have an admirable commitment to life’s small joys. I notice how much they relish their gin and tonics or just an hour sitting in a comfortable chair while we enjoy the last of the sun. They pay attention to the details that make life a little bit more pleasurable. Nan likes her coffee to be extra-hot and doesn’t mind sending it back if it’s on the lukewarm side, whereas I would be inclined to grudgingly accept it. Rose, who loves spicy food, asks for a side plate of sliced raw onions and chillies with her dinner everywhere we go, even if sometimes making herself understood is a hassle I would quickly abandon. Back home, Nan pours herself a drink every evening before dinner, with Hula Hoops or peanuts in a fancy bowl. She says that’s the sort of thing you have to do when you live alone, ‘to make sure standards don’t slip’. It makes me rethink how I eat pasta from a mixing bowl and sleep in a woolly hat as it’s not worth putting the heating on ‘just for myself’.
They are often mystified by my habits. They watch with not-at-all-concealed amusement when I take selfies. They are less amused by the hours I spend texting a man who replies about one-third of the time. But it gets them talking about their own relationships, how when it’s right, you don’t have to try this hard to get somebody’s attention – they’ve all had good and bad relationships, and know how to spot the difference.
I talk a lot to my practical auntie Ann about this; we have time to kill daily while Nan and Rose get up and dressed, so we sit on our balcony and chat. I tell her how I hoped things with the disinterested man might improve, and how he and I had agreed to ‘discuss our relationship’ when I get home.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ she exclaims. ‘That’s not a good sign. That sounds like very hard work to me.’ She’s right, of course. I try to justify it to her, but realise I can’t even justify it to myself. In good relationships, I’ve never had to work hard at all. Not like this. ‘You’re too young and too attractive to waste your time,’ Ann tells me. I decide to look at myself through her eyes: where I still have so much life ahead of me and anything could happen. Calling myself ‘too old’ to do things compared with these inspiring women seems ridiculous.
When I get home, I stop seeing him and meet someone nicer, who my nan and aunties approve of. Inspired by their can-do approach to life and living alone, I get my house in order and sort out a mould problem. I give up smoking (Rose said if she could do it after 50-odd years, I certainly could). I don’t magically get everything I want, but I feel better about things I don’t have. Nan, Rose and Ann all made very different choices at very different times, and all had incredible lives. It makes the stakes seem a bit more manageable; I become less paralysed by choice and indecision. Whatever happens, it will probably be okay in the end. Because if we’re lucky, it’s a long life.