FEBRUARY 15, TUESDAY

GETTING OLD

It is 8 in the evening and I haven’t written a post for the day. I have been sitting here all day at the dining room table where I sit and type every day. I did take the trash down to be picked up at 7, and at 2 I went down and picked up the mail and brought the two trash containers back up. That was the extent of my outside activity during the day. I had cold cereal with dates and walnuts for breakfast, Radha’s Kofta curry, with an aloo paratha and eggplant chutney for lunch, Aldi barbecued ribs with collard greens and baked beans for supper. I washed the dishes. From 3 to 4 I took a nap. Otherwise I sat here all day with my two screens. I looked at the news, erased all the Democratic requests for money, read a short story, looked at a video, got invited out to lunch tomorrow by email, read a little of Sheila Heti’s very interesting Pure Color, a novel like no other, on Kindle. And now I am streaming Mahler’s 9th Symphony on my iPad from Paris with the sound that fills the room through my two Apple Homepods.

My son Tom called to say that his dog Maggie would be brought over at 8 a.m. tomorrow for four days. In the afternoon I decided it was time to find an Airbnb in Paris for the month of April and after finding a couple found that Paris is much more expensive than Greece. But I have a free airticket through my Bank of America travel card, I’ll be able to afford Paris. After looking at Airbnb’s I looked at my airmail and there was Paris again on Scott’s Cheap Flights for $513 round trip from Asheville (for only the next couple of days) so I sent it on to Susie. She looked at Airbnbs and called me back and may be able to come for a couple of weeks.

Otherwise I have sat here and written as I do every day, lately about 6000 words a day. Writing is something I enjoy doing.

But I haven’t written a post for tomorrow. NHT, Nothing has happened today. I’ve eaten, washed the dishes, gone down to the street twice and otherwise sat here and done nothing to report to anyone. So this is all I have, my post for the day, and I’m half way through. This is all I have to report, but not quite all.

Let me comment on what it feels like to be 84 1/2 and sit all day and barely move. Let me wonder how an old man’s stationary day, what many people hearing about would feel sadness for, was actually a pretty marvelous day.

Mostly my delight in the day comes simply because of the fact I am getting old. I was connected with so many people and books and concerts and dreams of the future and memories of the past that my day was full, almost brimming over, almost too intense, almost too much to bear. I was alone but certainly not lonely. My fifteen year old self would have found this day endless and boring and empty.

Part of getting old I realize is that there is so much that I have let go of. My life as a teacher was often hectic and often great fun and at the time seemed to be very, very important, both the institution and my part in it. It took me awhile to let go but I have let go completely and even wonder why I took it all so seriously.

Family and domestic life for 60 years was very rich and all consuming. I didn’t want to let go, but since Kathe died I have had to let go of all but the memories. I am alone, I simply can’t live that way any more. But while I am physically alone I am not alone. I can connect with other people of all ages through this post and through letters and even travel and connect with people in ways I couldn’t before.

At first being free was hard to get used to. But I like it. I didn’t choose it, it happened by accident and was painful. But I am free in ways that I wasn’t able to be free before.

In some ways I am free of the past and all the things institutional life and domestic life demanded of me. I was suddenly free after seeing a cheap ticket to Greece to think about it for five minutes and then to sign up and go. Almost no one I know at any point in their life can do that. I invite anyone to come with me and no one can.

I am free of the things in my past that constrained me and drove me, not because I chose to be free but because this is what happened simply by becoming old man and outliving the people I cared about. I am free of the institution and domestic life and even money worries.

I am also in a curious way free of the future. The people I care about are dying around me, the people I don’t care that much about are dying. They are in the obituary section every day. It is quite clear that I am about to die, in relative terms, not tomorrow but soon. This should cause high anxiety, even fear, but for some reason this realization brings just the opposite feeling. I am suddenly not going anywhere, I don’t need to live in the future either with worry or anticipation or determination to get something done. The future is so uncertain that I can simply live right now in the present, because this is all I have left. The past is gone and the future doesn’t exist.

So I can sit right here and type, as I am doing now, because I like doing it and at the same time listen to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, which I never heard before this month when it appeared on Arte TV, European PBS, and have since sat through at least ten times. Suddenly, with almost no time left, I have plenty of time to listen to Mahler as often as I want. With no time left I can travel freely.

One advantage of having only the present to live in (which has always been true for me, I just didn’t realize it) is that just as it did for Emily in Our Town everything, even the smallest things, can become more intense. A day of sitting still can be filled with delight and wonder.

And one final discovery about old age. Finally I am simply an, not quite doddering but not too spry either, old man who has become almost invisible and certainly harmless. I can connect with people of all ages without being a threat in any way to anyone, not demanding commitment or attention or anything. I have become neuter and can say what I please, as I am doing now, without pleasing anyone or threatening or demanding anything from anyone. All my life I have had to play a role of teacher or authority figure or person trying to change the world or a host of other roles foisted on my because of my gender or age or social standing. I look in the mirror or at my passport and see a harmless bleary eyed old man that no one will lust over, no one will feel threatened by, too late to be a Me Too threat even if I wanted to be, no longer an authority about anything. It’s all over. And now I can let all of that go. This is another way that being old brings freedom. Getting old can feel good, look forward to it.