THE BEGINNING AND THE END

Have you ever been in that space……when your reading tastes have transported you to a ‘remembering’ time.....when you are not looking for new ways to tickle your pysche……but instead have set out to revisit good times that still have a hold on you?

For me there were no better times than the family adventure Roma and I wrote about in the book we called A Year to Remember……that time spent in Winchester, England, where we had gone so I could write a novel.

A few days ago I took that paperback off the self to confirm a bit of forgotten information. By this morning I had reread, and relived, the entire story.

It was that bit of unplanned impulse that has me wanting to share the mood it had created. But how? This blog does not deal in book-length posts. So instead I settled for this……a sketchy beginning to our story that morphs into an equally sketchy conclusion……with room in-between for a year’s worth of remembered adventures.

With that……IN THE BEGINNING.......Chapter One of A Year to Remember.

                                                       **********

You have heard of, perhaps even seen, the famous inscription on the Statute of Liberty….the one that implores the world to send us “your huddled masses.”

Sadly, in today’s world of immigration squabbles we are not as universally welcoming as those words might indicate. Yet it remains a noble statement of intent, worthy of our admiration. For many of us the mental image of those “huddled masses” arriving at our shores remains as powerful as ever.

True, in 1972 England still had its immigration welcome mat out for members of its once-great Commonwealth. But on that August morning our forlorn troop of traveling Yanks, which so closely resembled a “huddled mass,” was apparently a more serious test for the starched and stern Custom Agents who greeted us at London's Heathrow Airport.

To be sure, we were a uniformly disheveled bunch….rumpled, tired, and grumpy, some even barefoot….thoroughly intimidated by the chaos of what claimed to be the busiest airport in the world.

In the coldly-efficient eyes of the clerk standing behind the Customs counter we must have looked like a trans-Atlantic reincarnation of Jed Clampett’s hillbilly clan….resembling “displaced persons” more than tourists.

To further complicate things, it took only a few seconds to realize that the fast-moving “Tourist Arrival” lines would not accommodate the likes of us. We claimed to be “Long Stay” candidates. Though the British Consulate in Portland had mentioned that distinction, they had not explained how it would impact our encounter with the “Customs people.” We were about to find out.

The first Long-Stay clerk we talked to never did seem to grasp what we were about, or why Gil was standing there in the dimly-lit room wearing his very-dark sunglasses, the only unbroken pair he had. 

In the clerk’s eyes the six of us must have looked for all the world like Third World refugees, asking for permission to stay in his country for an “extended period” of time. As near as he could tell we had no jobs, no idea of where we would live, nothing but a desire to locate somewhere in England.

To illustrate our good intentions we showed the clerk the Application for Indefinite Stay permit provided to us by the Portland consulate. Moments later things were further complicated when Gil explained that we planned to stay for twelve months. That had the poor fellow scratching his head, trying to make sense of our request to use an Indefinite Stay permit to cover such a well-defined, very-definite period of time. 

There was nothing for the poor fellow to do but to retreat to the back office for a discussion with the higher-ups. Fortunately for us his supervisor was an older fellow, perhaps used to dealing with young and foolish Yanks. 

When he stepped out to join the conversation he calmly began by explaining that an Indefinite Stay permit would not allow any of us to hold a job. How did we intent to support ourselves? There would be six mouths to feed, with absolutely no expectation of help from the English welfare system. He emphasized that fact more than once. 

At that point Gil produced our Cashier’s Check, at substantial amount that confirmed we could fund our stay. Thankfully the Consulate had warned us to be prepared for that necessity. 

With our passports and Cashier’s Check in hand….the most precious of our possessions….the supervisor returned to his office. For the next ten or fifteen minutes we would be waiting….the six of us, the last remaining travelers in the Long-Stay service area. 

We sat huddled in a corner, wondering if the ever-efficient English bureaucracy would allow us to stay in their country, or put us on a plane back to New York. There we waited....tired, hungry, and out of sorts….growing more impatient by the minute.

Finally, wonder of wonders. When the pair of Customs officers, the clerk and his supervisor, returned the older man was actually smiling. Perhaps against his better judgment we had simply worn down his resistance. 

Stepping to the counter he stamped our three passports with an authorization for a ninety-day stay, then gave us a form to complete once we had a permanent residence….requesting permission for a longer stay. By then we were too relieved to argue with his semi-suitable offer.

                            ***********

Without realizing how fortunate we were, we had won the right to find a home somewhere in England……though we had no idea where……and settle into a year of sometimes unbelievable highs and lows.

How would you do that? How would you create your own Year to Remember. Where would you even start?

Then, a year later it was time to be going home. There were bound to be highs and lows involved in that process too……but it had to be done. With that, on to……THE END.

                        ************

After three weeks in Ireland we were on the ferry back to Fishguard....returning for a last visit to Winchester. More importantly it would be the first step toward “going home,” returning to where our travels had begun. We had seen so much, done so much, and made so many friends. Now all that was coming to an end. 

We had circled Scotland, and traveled England....south to north, east and west, and back again. We had spent a few days getting a sense of Wales. Now, after three weeks spent seeing part, not all, of Ireland it was time to be leaving 

There would be two last nights at a Harestock B & B....savoring again the ancient downtown heart of Winchester and saying our goodbyes. It was hard to leave those good friends. Thankfully the fates would allow us to see them on our return trips to England. Later, when the Morgans emigrated to Calgary, Canada they would come to visit us in Oregon.

Meanwhile, there was a last bit of business to take care of. For those who believe in signs, or perhaps hexes, the first miles in our Ford Estate Wagon might have been a hint of ongoing troubles. Yet once the necessary repairs had been made, months before in Aberfeldy, Scotland, it had never again let us down. 

Through Scotland, England, France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Wales, and Ireland our trusty wagon had done everything we asked of it. In the end, when the car dealer John Berry recommended gave us half of what we had paid for it ten months earlier, we took his money, boarded the train for Heathrow Airport and our flight to Washington, DC.

Brother Roger met us at Dulles Airport, driving our Chevy Suburban, the only car he had that would carry all of us and our luggage. Back at his Malvern, Pennsylvania home we were surprised to find that Gil’s parents, Morse and Dorothy, had flown east to make our return a family gathering.

They had rented a large house just off the beach in Atlantic City. There, the whole crew....Roger’s family of four, the six of us, and our parents would gather for a three-day family reunion. 

Within an hour or two of reaching Roger’s home we were in need of a few items from the local supermarket. No problem. It was just down the road. Gil would drive to the store. His father offered to join him.

Minutes later, when the two of them started off down the street to the store, they were suddenly caught up in a startling “welcome home” moment. Morse’s excited yell must have been heard a block or two away....when Gil pulled the Suburban out of the driveway and started off down the left side of the street, heading straight toward the on-coming traffic. Apparently, learning to drive on the right side of the road would take some practice.

Having Gil’s parents on hand provided another unexpected advantage. We were fresh off the plane, and Amy’s distinctive British accent was still intact, heard by one and all. That would not be the case by the time we reached Oregon. By then her accent was nowhere to be heard. It had vanished in a matter of days. Today, more than fifty years after the fact, we must play the cassette tapes we had sent home from England to recapture the sound of our “English” Amy.

Finally it was time to be on the road one last time. Ten days later, after a long cross-country drive in a vehicle that had room for the kids to stretch out, we were back in Oregon, visiting again with family and glad to be home. 

Oh yes....regarding that other piece of unfinished business....Gil’s novel, the one that had sent us half-way around the world for him to write. After sitting for forty years in a manilla envelope on a closet shelf, Forever Starts Now finally appeared on Amazon in paperback and Kindle formats on June 20, 2014. As it turned out, seeing the world, making new friends, and learning about our family’s roots had all been accomplished quicker than putting his story into print..

                     ************

As you can tell, this bit of self-indulgence has been a matter of following good memories where they lead us. Don’t be afraid to follow your own. I recommend it.

ONE OF THOSE HINTS

 

I realize that most folks may not share my personal belief in life after life. But for those who have learned that truth the following letter, posted on Facebook by Emma McCarty, may sound both familiar and comforting. I for one, took it very personally.

Hi there. This is your late loved-one speaking. (You can fill in the name of the one speaking to you.) I don’t have long, so listen up, because I have a lot I want to tell you. 

First off, I get it. I understand.……..Ever since I left this world you have missed me, and I know you’re bracing for the upcoming holidays without me. No matter what anyone says, those festivities are going to be really tough. 

In fact, let’s be honest, this festive season will probably suck pondwater. But then, Thanksgiving and Christmas are tough holidays for a lot of people. You are definitely not alone.  

You see, the misconception about the holidays is that they are one big party. That’s what every song on the radio claims. Each television commercial you see shows happy families clad in gaudy Old Navy sweaters, carving up poultry, smiling their perfect Hollywood teeth at the camera. But that’s not exactly reality. 

The reality is, fifty-eight percent of Americans admit to feeling severely depressed and anxious during November and December. Fact is, many folks will cry throughout the “most wonderful time of the year.” 

Well, guess what? Nobody is crying up here in heaven. This place is unreal. There is, literally, too much beauty to take in. Way too much. 

For starters—get this—time doesn’t even exist anymore. Which I’m still getting used to.

 

Right now, for all I know, the calendar year down on Earth could be 1728, 4045, 1991, or 12 BC. It really wouldn’t matter up here. This is a realm where there is no ticking clock, no schedule. Up here there is only this present moment. This. Here. Now. That’s all there has ever been. And there is real comfort in knowing that. I know this all seems hard to grasp, but if you were here you would get it. 

Also, for the first time I’m pain free. I feel like a teenager again in my body. You probably don’t realize how long I’ve lived with pain because I never talked about it, I kept my problems to myself because I was your loved one, and you needed me to be brave. 

 

But pain is a devious thing. It creeps up on even the strongest person, little by little, bit by bit. Until pretty soon, pain becomes a central feature of life. 

Sometimes my pain would get so bad it was all I thought about. No, I’m not saying that my life was miserable—far from it. I loved being on earth. It’s just that simply waking up each morning was getting exhausting. But, you know what? Not anymore. In this new place, I am wholly and thoroughly happy.  

But enough about me. I don’t have room to describe all the terrific things I’m experiencing, and you don’t need to hear them. Right now, you’re grieving, and what you need is a hug.  

Which is why I’m writing to you. This is my hug to you. Because you’ve lost sight of me. And in fact, you’ve lost sight of several important things lately. 

Death has a way of blinding us. It reorganizes the way you think. It changes you. You will never be the same after you lose someone. It messes with your inner physiology. It reorganizes your neurons. But through it all there is one teensy little thing you’re apt to forget: I am still around. I haven't gone away.

Yes, you read that correctly, I’m right here with you. No, you can’t see me. No, you can’t reach out and hold me. But did you know that one of the things I’m allowed to do as a heavenly being is hang out with you? 

It’s true. I’m never far away. I’m in the room with you now, along with a big cloud of ancestors, saints, and witnesses. I’m shooting the breeze alongside you, watching you live your life, watching you raise your kids, watching your private moments of sorrow. 

Here, in this new realm, I am in the perfect position to help you learn things. Which is what I vow to spend the rest of your earthly life doing, teaching you little lessons, lending you a hand when you least expect it, while desperately trying to make you smile. Actually, I’ve already been doing this stuff, you just haven’t realized it. 

What, you don’t believe me? Well, wake up, pal. You know that tingle you get in your spine whenever you think of me? That’s me. 

You know how, just yesterday, you had a beautiful memory when you were driving and it made you cry so hard that it actually felt good and you began to laugh through tears? Also me.

 

You know how sometimes when you’re all alone, preoccupied with something else, suddenly you get this faint feeling that someone is standing in the room with you? Hello? It's me.

You’re not alone on this earth. You never were. You never will be. So during this holiday season, when cheerful families are getting together and making merry, and taking shots of eggnog, I’ll be clinging to your shoulder, helping you muddle through somehow. 

I’ll be making your spinal column tingle a lot, and I’ll be sending plenty of signs. Each of these signs—every single one—is code for “I love you.” So start paying attention to those hints. 

Because this was ONE OF THEM.

The Story Only You Can Tell

 

A while back I suggested that everyone, especially October/November folks, ought to consider writing their own personal memoir. After all, you have lived a full life. Chances are you have time on your hands and stories to tell. Seems to me those are the necessary ingredients for the most personal late-life project I can imagine…..one that only you can create.

So, what kind of response did I receive about what I considered a viable idea? Most replies sounded like……“I couldn’t do that. Why would I want to? I’m not a writer. Besides, who wants to read about my life?”

Those are all valid replies, but perhaps they are the right answers to the wrong questions. More to the point, they seem to miss what I have come to accept as the most important virtue of creating one’s own memoir. 

What if the first and most important question to be asked is…. “What would I gain from writing my own memoir?”….What would I learn about myself if I took the time to study the most eventful pieces of my life, from beginning to now. Have I ever stopped to think about how those ‘pieces’ fit together to create the ‘me’ I have become?

Allow me to digress for a moment. I have mentioned before that I have walked that ‘memoir path’……378 pages of serious digging into my life through 2020. On the very first page of that story I said, “I want to know more about the ‘me’ I have become.” When I had finally completed that search I had the resulting book self-published, and ordered five copies, one for myself and each of our children. There will be no reason for any more copies. 

Based on that experience I learned that the process of reviewing my life…… the highs and the lows, one step at a time……while trying to understand what each step meant to me, was an empowering adventure. 

Most of us think of a memoir as something to be read by others……the few who may care enough to read our story. I am asking you to consider ‘your story’ as something by you,  for you……..an opportunity for you to visit, and revisit, your life, one step at a time. Whether or not you ever ‘write’ that story, you may find that the time spent reviewing and reliving those ‘steps,’ outlining your own memoir, is the most productive part of the process.

With that in mind I have decided on what feels like an October Bold approach. What follows is Chapter One of the memoir I call In Retrospect…. My bumpy road to growing up, which explains my memoir logic about as well as I know how.

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                           CHAPTER ONE

“An unexamined life is not worth living.”

Socrates

“Only as we look back at the course our footprints have traced do we fully understand how we have read life’s inkblot.”

                    Huston Smith

                                   WHY TELL THIS STORY?

There are, of course, dozens of reasons to explore one’s life, and dozens of ways to approach that process. Beyond those matters of motivation and technique lies the most fundamental question of all. Why do I feel called to tell my story?

As I set out on this journey I have at least three reasons in mind. Chances are I will find others along the way. For now, however, I will be seeking to answer these questions. 

1) Why did I choose not to concentrate on the opportunities I was gifted as a young man? 

2) Why did I instead settle for my own ‘road less traveled.’ Making my way to a more satisfying destination? 

3) And, how was I lucky enough to win the lady who would put up with all my foolishness, while providing a helping hand in my search?

I want to know more about what made me the ‘me’ I have become. In the process I will be retelling and perhaps even reliving bits of my life in hopes of gaining insight. To be sure, this will be the most personal writing I have ever attempted. And most importantly, I am doing it to satisfy myself, no one else.

At eighty-three it is high time to face this life of mine head on and see where my thoughts take me. Hopefully I can confirm that satisfaction and fulfillment are not prizes to be found in the world of ‘things,’ but are instead products of soul-deep expectations we cultivate in the course of a lifetime.

I won’t pretend to address every detail of my long life. Instead I want to gather the recollections that stand out to me, whether or not their importance is obvious to a casual reader. It is that hopeful gathering of long-dormant memories and emotions that draws me toward telling my story. 

I know there are intuitions and aspirations, anxieties and injuries that inhabit the inner ‘me,’ like ghosts of times past. I want to know more about those invisible specters. What should they mean to me? How are they connected to the person I have become? How do those long-ago episodes, perhaps insignificant at the time, relate to the answers I am still seeking at this advanced stage of life?

Have you ever wondered how seemingly-minor, often-momentary events are able to create such lasting subconscious associations? You and I live daily with hopes and anxieties that confirm the significance of long-past events. 

Are those yearnings and apprehensions real? Are they the basis of a fruitful life? Or simply illusions, unsafe to lean on in the heat of life-stressing situations?And where do all those questions come from? 

More to the point, why is my octogenarian mind still seeking those answers? Surely, by this time of life I should have learned to live with my accumulated doubts and uncertainty. Why haven’t I created more satisfying answers by now? Seems that most people my age have managed that.

In the course of a lifetime all of us construct explanations that we rely on to create our ways of coping. Some of that logic may be shaky, barely able to hide the dysfunction it is meant to address. Some of it is more productive. I would like to know more about the ‘answers’ I have fashioned on my life journey. Which ones created real resolution? Which ones simply shielded me from the reality of unwelcome questions?

My search for personal answers, the strongest motivation of this exploration, may not make sense to anyone else. The drama and emotion of my seeking may be real only to me. Chances are an outsider will consider my questioning asides strange at best, occasionally humorous, and perhaps at times the work of a deranged mind.

For the most part my life answers have been adequate. They have allowed me to deal with the situations at hand, if not always well. Some questions that required an answer in an earlier time have ceased to be an issue for me. And, of course, there have been times when my answers were simply wrong and unproductive. 

Like you I have spent a lifetime trying to create satisfactory responses to life’s challenges. In the process I have reached the supposed calm and quiet of retirement……yet there are questions that still remain.

Will this telling of my story, help me find those answers? How can I know that at the beginning? Ask me again when we reach the end. In the meantime why not join me on the bumpy road to my Becoming.

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There you have it, dear reader. Whether or not you ever create a memoir, I happen to think that the process of thinking through the chapters that make up your life is a worthwhile exercise. I invite you to consider that challenge.

DO YOU REMEMBER?

 

                                         Do you remember?

Wow! Can you believe it? There I was, nearly eighty-six years old. That has the ring of November, doesn’t it? Which makes it easier to admit that I can no longer do some of the things I did in the “old days.” 

But never fear, there are some things I can do better than ever….for instance, ‘remembering.’ Though I am prone to forget where I left the keys, and our offspring occasionally kid me about “living in the past,” the truth is, like my October peers, I do remember a great deal about the life I have lived. 

Consider the obvious. We have so much more past behind us than we have future before us. In that case why not take a moment from time to time to recall and revisit that past, and the ways it has impacted the persons we have become.            

For instance, a while back, in an informal email census of my high-school class, I have heard from several long ago friends. Truth to tell, claiming those folks as “friends” is stretching things a bit. We were in school at the same time, sixty-some years ago, and were more like acquaintances than friends. 

Though we haven’t seen each other in years, there was a time when we walked the same hallways and greeted each other in passing….or did not. Through no choice of our own we had been thrown together in a common place and time. Some of us had reveled in those common experiences. Others simply endured them. Either way, in the process we cultivated a common mythology, some of which we have shaped and molded over the years to suit our own needs.

Fact is, after so many years I enjoyed the chance to reconnect with those folks in a casual email contact. Actually, I recommend it. You ought to give it a try. But be aware, even the most superficial of visits is apt to trigger some serious remembering….a return to places and events you may not have visited in a very long time. 

Most of the resulting recollections will probably be of a general nature….pleasant musings about what we like to recall as an unfettered, less-structured time of life….creating a mood we may choose to linger in for a while. Occasionally those remembered moments may become more detailed and specific, complete with faces and names. Either way there can be no doubting the power of serious, heart-felt remembering.

Remembering, of course, is a very individual activity. Two or more persons, reliving a shared experience, are bound to remember their times together differently. After all, our recollections are shaped by our own uniquely personal filters. Yet no matter what we remember, a single constant remains….we are dealing with the past. Remembering is about looking back, and assigning our own values to what we experienced. The future, on the other hand, is a great unknown. At best it is a blank page of undetermined possibilities….answers we hope will arrive on time, but may not arrive at all. 

That is the dichotomy we live with, at eight or eighty….remembering our past, while trying to decipher the future. Having spent most of nine decades creating my own answers….some right, some wrong….I realize there is more, much more, for me to remember about the past than there is for me to look forward to in an ever-shrinking future.

So why not accept the truth of it? Connecting with caring “friends” in even the most casual way….with no need to impress or “one-up” each other….is one of the most therapeutic perks of late life. With that in mind I give thanks for pleasant memories of pleasant times spent with pleasant people. (Even those times when one or the other of us was not so pleasant) 

And a special thanks to the recent string of memory-makers who, for reasons of their own, stepped forward to offer their personal feelings about the highs and lows of October and November life. 

Their sharing and caring was enough to fuel my own remembering. I realize that was not their intention, but that’s the way it works. Though it may be unhealthy to dwell too long on our remembering, in the end everyone of us is a part of someone else’s memories.

OCTOBER DREAMIN'.......DON'T STOP NOW

 

October dreaming'....don't stop now

Hey, it’s okay. It is allowed. If you have given up on some grand idea, perhaps it is time to try again. Go ahead and dream your dreams. It’s good for you and fun too.

Recently, as I was roughing out my Family Matters story, I found myself deep in the “dreaming” business. The story I was creating followed three generations of the Padgett family as they struggled to find the elusive place where their individual, sometimes conflicting visions of the future could be blended into a common dream. It was clear from the beginning that not everyone would get everything they wanted. In the course of their seeking there was bound to be discord and the need for compromise. Sounds a lot like real life, doesn’t it?

For two hundred seventy pages the frustrated Padgett grandparents, the family’s late-life element, deals with radically differing visions of what retirement ought to be, while their daughter tries her best to save a relationship torn apart by another set of conflicting dreams. Meanwhile the granddaughter, longing for a return to the laissez-faire freedom of her Los Angeles roots, struggles to imagine a future for herself in small-town Tanner. At every turn it seems that someone’s dream is in danger of being stepped on.

I call them “dreams”….those enticing hints of the future we long to have for ourselves. It seems to me that if we nurture them properly and allow them to play out, those idealized visions can help us be the person we want to be and live the life we want to live. 

    I suppose most folks understand how important dreams are. In the beginning, when we first set out to find our place in the world, what else did we have but dreams? But now the question is….is there a place for dreaming in late-life, when it sometimes feels like we are used up and out of possibilities? If someone is taking a poll on the subject, put me down as a loud “Yes.”

Like you perhaps, I have had a few ill-defined “want to’s” bouncing around in my head for as long as I can remember. But it was only a few years ago, during what I like to think of as the September of my life, that I found the nerve and motivation to double down on my personal “dream thing”...telling stories about my Tanner friends and their October dreams.

Each of us grows up with a uniquely personal vision of what-can-be for us. Sometimes that vision is hazy, hard to make out. At other times it is as clear as daylight. And even as we shape and reshape those images they are also shaping us. We are both the cause and the result of our dreams. 

After all, we have spent a lifetime painting our own personal mind-picture of the person we are. Though we rarely allow anyone else to see the whole of that intimate portrait our dreams, the ones that remind us of “who we want to be,” are constantly at work on that mental canvas…. redrawing, refining, and clarifying the “me” we view through the lens of our personal dreams.

We October types have been involved in that process long enough to realize that integrating the idealized images which our dreams produce with the untidy facts of real life can be difficult at any age. Perhaps you remember how hard that was as a teenager. I do. How could I have ever entertained those silly pie-in-the-sky fantasies….of doing the things I dreamed of doing, of becoming this or that, of some special “her” liking the likes of me? You might think I would have learned my lesson back then. 

Yet here I am, late in life, still playing those silly mind games….telling my stories and dreaming those October dreams. And I’m pretty sure that I’m not the only one trying to live out my “want-to” dreams. 

      In the face of October reality the “why” we keep dreaming may be found in loneliness, boredom, isolation, and frustration….or perhaps it is disappointment with our earlier efforts. Whatever the reason, most of us are inclined to wander back to that familiar mind space from time to time….telling ourselves that we ought to know better….yet still seeking the undeniable comfort of our dreams.

Of course, along the way there will be detours and disappointments, times when we step back to ask ourselves why we have not become the person we had hoped to be. Yet in the face of those shortcomings we keep dreaming….because we must. That was true in our formative years, in adulthood, and now in late-life. As always we are a work-in-progress….constantly bumping heads with reality, even as we continue to lean on what I call dreams. 

In Family Matters the Padgett family is forced to face their dreams....the ones that are pulling them in very different directions. (That happens sometimes, doesn’t it?) In the course of their journey there will be moments when the common ground they seek appears to be out of reach. But they are first and foremost a family. Their individual dreams require a recognition of that “familyness,” even when it means reshaping their own motivating visions. For them, just as it is for you and me, it will all be about the often frustrating blend of family, dreams, and compromise. 

A GIFT ONLY YOU CAN GIVE

    

       A GIFT ONLY WE CAN GIVE

(This bit of fluff first appeared on these pages several years ago. Now, even deeper into Elderhood, it seems more appropriate than ever.)

Sure, I do fuss a lot about our late-life challenge to keep Becoming more than we are. I believe there are ways we can continue to grow, even improve, at our age. Still, I must admit there are times when I wonder how an old fossil like me can pull that off....when it feels like those doubts have the upper hand.

Then, of course, there are times when I come face to face with the sad reality of how much I can no longer do……..those moments when my mind’s ‘want to’ is trumped by my body’s “can’t do.” In those sometimes depressing instances it is hard to believe there is still any meaningful Becoming left in me.

So how do we carry on as late-lifer ‘Becomers’ when the clock and calendar seem to be working against us? Among the many possibilities is one that only we, you and I, each of us on our own, can make happen. Fact is, no matter how age has slowed us down we will continue to create and refine our personal legacy. 

Take a moment to consider the notion of “legacy.” The formal definition speaks of “Something transmitted by or received from a predecessor.” On a personal level we are talking about our life, the way we live, and how that affects those whose lives we touch. 

Passing on our unique, very personal life experiences and the lessons we have learned, is something no one else can do for us. As elder members of our personal sphere of influence we are always in the process of creating and refining that legacy……the lasting impressions and lessons we bequeath to those whose lives we impact. Whether by words, writing, or loving example our personal legacy is a gift only we can give.

I mentioned in an earlier post a book I was reading…….William H Thomas’ “What Are Old People For?” One of his most important answers to that title question reads as follows….“The first task of elderhood is the creation of a legacy that can serve others and be handed down to those who have yet to be born.”

Barry Barkan, founder of the Live Oak Community, puts it this way….“An elder is a person whose work is to gather wisdom from long-life experience and formulate it into a legacy for future generations.”

I would submit that each of us, in our own way, is capable of doing exactly that every day of our elder life. Certainly no one else can do that for us. A lifetime of words, deeds, and attitudes…..of choices made….has shaped the nature of our legacy and continues to do so to this day.

For better or worse, our presence in the lives of family and close friends has and will continue to have an impact. There is no way to avoid leaving our stamp, however modest, on every life we touch. A lifetime of choices made has created the wake that marks our life journey, shaping our individual Becoming and the legacy we pass on to our inheritors. 

We live in a world that is too often seems unwilling to accept that we October/November souls have anything left to offer. Perhaps we sometimes nurse those same questions. Yet we ought not doubt the fact that our life’s example…..the legacy we are still creating, has an impact……while serving as an indelible sign of our own continued Becoming.