musingsonwomenshealth.com

Reflections on 40 years as a doctor in Women's Health

A staff of honour for mine age


There are times on moonless nights when more than clouds obscure the stars; times when it seems that my previous identity has abandoned me; times when the only challenges left to meet are those of my failing mind, and my fading strength. I am weaker in the dark I think. My memories are too thick then; they wrap around me like the blankets I’ve piled on to help me sleep, but they bind and irritate, and I cannot shake them off.

In the morning when I can see the world around me, things are different though -or is it that I am different in the daylight? I’d like to think so anyway. Still, I am bothered by the past -that’s where memories live, isn’t it? Memories of a time when I was different and the world was not littered with the experience of Age; when it sparkled with anticipation… and Hope.

There was always Hope, but it has a different texture now than when I wore younger clothes; faded colours now drape loosely around me like garments that no longer fit. I cannot tell in the dark of night… But should I still judge myself on past performance? It’s a question that begs for clarity I think, but who should adjudicate the answer -the older, or the younger me?

I happened upon a brief treatment of the art of growing older in a weekly newsletter app called The Marginalian edited and compiled by Maria Popova. She was covering some of the thoughts of the Australian artist Nick Cave on aging:  ‘We’re often led to believe that getting older is in itself somehow a betrayal of our idealistic younger self, but sometimes I think it might be the other way around. Maybe the younger self finds it difficult to inhabit its true potential because it has no idea what that potential is. It is a kind of unformed thing running scared most of the time, frantically trying to build its sense of self… Then comes the reassembled self, the self you have to put back together. You no longer have to devote time to finding out what you are, you are just free to be whatever you want to be, unimpeded by the incessant needs of others. You somehow grow into the fullness of your humanity, form your own character, become a proper person.’[i]

That was an epiphany for me. It is, after all, why elders in a community were once respected; why wisdom requires an accumulation of knowledge and experience, and like fine whiskey, should be distilled and aged. It should not be drunk at the moment it was made; it must be ripened patiently in an equally aging vessel. The young often ignore it in their hubris; the aged sometimes forget it in their frailty.

The various bubbles in social media come to mind, where to agree, however minimally, with a posted comment incorporates you into a like-minded series of opinions; where to add a variant perspective condemns you to an inextricable public stance from which, it seems, you are subsequently seldom allowed to deviate.

Perhaps it is brittle Age that has protected me from judging these public displays, or for that matter, the need to express an opinion on whatever cause with which others have allied themselves. It is a game of youth, it seems to me, a competition like any other where the object is to win. I suppose there was a time when that was important to me, because status has always been accorded to the winning team, and even partaking once in the exercise demonstrates a willingness to play.

But, when the game is rough, and involves unacceptable risks, it is a time to watch from the stands; spectators are important for such events, I think -even silent ones lend value to the exercise, lend justification to continuing the competition. My cheers, however few they may be, are silent now, though. I have been on the field before; I know what it is like to be bruised and yet not to win the laurel wreath; I know the feeling of desolation when I have not achieved success despite my best efforts.

And yet, looking back, I now realize it was only a game -a competition in which I had to partake before understanding that perhaps its only value was in experiencing it. In the heat of battle, there are no other thoughts… it’s only later that they organize themselves. It’s only later that, win or lose, they make some sense.

I imagine there is a reason why the really hard work of Life occurs in the young; it is often in the early acts of a play that the plot is revealed, and the possibilities entertained. Permutations and combinations require time to explore; only later, once a direction has been chosen and the destination is in sight, is there time to consider whether the story was well conceived.

There is no correct ending to a Life, of course; even the content and number of the chapters can be difficult to anticipate at the start. It’s only in the epilogue that there may be clues. Authors are strange creatures when it comes to their storyline, justifying one thing, and ignoring another that might seem to have been a better choice if they had been allotted more time or space to consider how things should end.

But, unlike the wizard Merlyn in T.H. White’s The Sword in the Stone, I am not living my life backwards; I do not get younger as the years progress, nor would I wish that on anybody. I’m beginning to appreciate the struggle that was necessary for me to have survived long enough to look back on it with a smile. Youth is a lesson we all have to learn; we understand its importance -or at least formulate our perspective- only when it has past. Only then, can we truly decipher the plot, I think.

[i] https://mailchi.mp/themarginalian/nick-cave-pico-iyer-birds?mc_cid=8795ba0510&mc_eid=f05b720963

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