Enjoying life isn’t just for the young
THERE’S no question that young people have had a lot to contend with during lockdown. So many life chances ripped away as schools closed and universities barely functioned. Many have seen their jobs disappear or been left trying to work from home in crowded flat shares where the nearest thing they have to a desk is their bedspread.
So yes it’s been awful. But at least they’re... you know... young. They’ve got time.
“But we,” said my best friend, my soulmate since the age of 18, when we talked on the phone, “we don’t have any time left at all. Think of all the things we’ve missed out on in the past year.”
She wasn’t talking about hugging grandchildren, though that’s part of it. But there does seem to be an assumption among politicians – Matt Hancock for instance – that hugging our grandchildren is the only ambition left to the over-60s. And that isn’t how it is at all.
Of course we baby boomers understand that we are deeply unpopular because of all the privileges we enjoyed in our misspent youth. We know we should put up and shut up and not spend the kids’ inheritance. We should step aside in deference to the young and probably die as quickly as possible.
Yet my spirits lift when I hear that Sir Ian Mckellen is going to play Hamlet at the age of 81 even though it could be argued that he is taking the work from a young actor. Although Hamlet is supposed to be young it presents no problems for Sir Ian who first played the Prince of Denmark when he was 31. “When a young person plays an old person they
don’t know what it’s like – but I do remember what it’s like to be young!” he said.
Mmm I get that. My problem is forgetting how old I really am. Sometimes it gives me quite a shock.
Last week Felicity Kendal, 74, observed that she had no intention of giving up on sex and neither did a number of her friends. She lives with the theatre director Michael Rudman. They used to be married. Then they divorced. Then they got back together. She’s had a life but she’s not ready to stop yet.
“It’s the lack of years we have left that I resent,” she said.
That’s the heart of it. Even the last, boring lockdown year has rattled along and as you get older time speeds up relentlessly. The big lie is that age brings contentment and wisdom. It does neither. When time goes so fast and there’s so little of it left you resent anything that holds you back from doing what you want to do – whether it’s having sex or playing Hamlet. Or hugging the grandchildren.
Perhaps it’s spring in the air which makes me so restless. Happy Easter all!