“Old age is not for sissies.” — Anonymous, though attributed to Bette Davis, Malcolm Forbes and others.

Begun Saturday, November 16, 2024

Intro

This month I turn 77. Like other old people, I have begun to labour under the delusion that younger people might give a hoot about what I have to say about being old. So I’ll tell you. Also, like other old people, I ramble sometimes, so I’ll put these random observations in separate chapters. 

Chapter 1: On Falling Apart

(This chapter might be painful to people who already have dementia or terminal diseases, or for people close to them. I will understand if you don’t read on.) 

When I was young I read an essay by a journalist in his 90s. I wish I’d kept it. I remember three things from that essay. One was that he identified as a journalist, not a retired journalist. Another was his statement that he felt, not like an old man, but like a young man with a lot of stuff wrong with him. And the third was his admission that if the toothbrush was wet, it meant he had just brushed his teeth; if dry, he had not. The toothbrush thing took me by surprise. It was a shock to learn that the author of this wise, witty, beautifully-written essay couldn’t remember if he had just brushed his teeth or not. 

I have since learned that as our bodies begin to collapse around us, we maintain an illusion that their disintegration has nothing to do with Us. We cheerfully compare notes about hip replacements, bad knees and fading eyesight, as if we are sitting inside these crumbling bodies, inconvenienced by, but not actually part of, their decay – like the owners of so many rusting automobiles. 

So that essay now haunts me. I haven’t yet perceived my mind starting to deteriorate – which means either that it hasn’t or that it has. Either way, I now wonder whether experiencing your mind starting to collapse is like experiencing bad hips and fading eyesight. Does your essential self sit inside your brain, watching your synapses fall apart around you? If so, how long can you keep this up, before the part of your mind that you identify as You declines along with the grey matter around it? 

Chapter 2: Old Canadian Playwrights are New

I am part of a new phenomenon, almost unheard of before my generation: an elderly Canadian playwright. Playwriting in Canada got going on a large scale in the early 1970s, practised by a bunch of young hippies who are now the eminences grises of the art form. 

Of course the theatre scene has changed too. Our youth meant, almost automatically, that we were on the cutting edge and the avant-garde. Now, I’m yesterday’s man – and yesterday’s ethnicity and sexual orientation. Of course, there’s no point in complaining about this. We straight old white guys try to accept our fate like gentlemen. We had our turn – for centuries. It’s now time for the women, young people, queer people, and people of colour. 

But I do find it fascinating to read the bios of, and publicity about, younger theatre artists. Often they seem to boast of their ethnic origins and queer orientations, as we boasted of the few shows we’d done. At first I found this annoying. I wanted to read more about what they’d actually achieved! But then I realized that it’s a necessary part of their project, on top of the actual work: to educate the audience in the validity and respectability of art from unfamiliar sources – which, in fact, is exactly what my generation had to do while introducing the then-novel concept of Canadian playwrights. 

Chapter 3: Being True to my Blurred Vision

Another interesting irony: young artists are very rightly advised to be true to their vision, rather than practising their art with one eye on the box office. But the stereotype is that such uncompromising work is inevitably avant-garde, cutting-edge and ahead of its time. At first we may be overlooked or scorned for our weirdness; but if we remain true to ourselves, the world will come around and recognize our genius. 

Maybe I’m different. I wrote my most recent play for my own pleasure and amusement, to keep that part of my brain active. And if those stuffy old bourgeoisie didn’t like my bizarre, irrational, surrealistic, absurdist rantings, then the hell with them! The result was a pretty conventional drawing-room comedy about Oscar Wilde visiting Kingston, Ontario in 1882. 

I’m almost embarrassed to admit this. But I do love the play; so make of that what you will. Maybe I’ve come out of a rather large closet, full of artists ashamed of the secret that their radical personal vision is actually more Neil Simon than Sarah Kane. Or maybe I’m the only one. 

Chapter 4: Hippies No More

In the last season of the HBO series Six Feet Under (2001-2005), the teenage daughter of the family (Lauren Ambrose) attends a weekend party of elderly hippies, and watches in horrified amusement as these flabby oldsters smoke weed, drop psychedelics, dance naked around a bonfire to acid rock music, and have orgiastic sex in the grass. Those scenes reminded me of the image I had, in my 20s, of what life would be like in old age, for our generation. It isn’t.

As with most things, it’s a mixed bag. Weed is legal and psilocybin is enjoying a resurgence in popularity, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. But there’s a new respectability to it all that seems to have taken the edge off. “Pot” was dangerous, exciting, and illegal. “Cannabis” is good for you – which, sorry to say, makes it a little less fun. 

And those orgies of nude geezers cavorting around the bonfire? Yeah, no. We sit around at dinner parties, just as fully clothed as our parents and grandparents were, though some of us have had a toke beforehand instead of a glass of wine – and we have the same conversations they did: cultural events, politics, prices, our medical conditions, and, weirdest of all from members of a generation that truly horrified our elders: complaints about Kids Today. 

Chapter 5: Did I Already Say This?

Besides this blog, I also write comments elsewhere, so I sometimes post the same stuff more than once. So there are lines in this month’s blog that I’ve also written elsewhere. Normally I would cut these lines. But I’ve decided to leave them here, as a way of saying, yeah, I repeat myself sometimes. I’m allowed. I’m an old man. 

Note: This may relate ironically to the theme of this month’s blog, but I’m going to be cutting back on these blogs in the New Year. They might no longer appear on a regular basis on the first day of every month, as they have in the past. – J.L. 

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