Last weekend, I attended a memorial for a fabulous person who died too young, even though he was actually pretty old. Some people are always young, and he was one of them; a friend and business mentor to people much younger than he; a pleasure in company; idiosyncratic in style and full of character.
The memorial was fulsome and a balm, as they often are. But there is no getting away from it: death is much closer than we imagine.
In the final scene of the TV series Godless, the preacher says at the burial site of one of the slain heroes in front of the tearful inhabitants of the little town: “It is a fearful thing to love what death can touch. A fearful thing to love, to hope, to be … and oh … to lose. It is a thing for fools … and a holy thing. A holy thing to love, for your life was lived in me, you laugh once lifted me, your word was gift to me. To remember this brings painful joy. It is a human thing, and a holy thing, to love what death has touched.”
Beautifully put. Like so many of my generation, we blinked, and then we were old. It was ever so. Not so long ago we were attending weddings, celebrating births and dancing like idiots in the moonlight. Now we look up and it’s death’s face we glimpse in the shadows, and all too often, the reaper stalks among us.
It has all happened too quickly; there is so much left to do. Life is by definition incomplete. It is a thing for fools.
It raises an odd and new question: how do you get old? What is the best way to get old?
My first instinct has always been to ignore it. Then maybe it will go away. Turns out, that doesn’t work out all that well.
There is a line in the famous poem by T.S. Eliot, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, in which the protagonist laments,
I grow old ... I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
The lines and poem in general suggest Mr Prufrock worrying about getting old and looking silly, so he decides to change his style to match his age or perhaps pretend that he is younger than he is, at least in spirit. He is off to stroll on the beach. Or that he doesn't care.
When you are young, you often believe your elders have life so fully organised. In fact, I think we grow more doubtful and uncertain, not more knowledgeable, as we get older. Life seems to happen to us rather than be shaped by us.
I’m no expert in this, but I think there are a few general ideas about getting old that are well observed. Some have been told to me, some I have read, some I have seen in my elders.
First, learn how to accept help. Independence does not mean doing everything alone. It means retaining as much control as possible over how help is given.
Second, avoid the two great traps: bitterness and nostalgia. The past was not as golden as memory suggests, and the present is not uniquely foolish. Every generation mistakes its own discomfort for civilisational collapse.
Third, don’t retire from usefulness. Engagement with the world is not necessairly paid work, or at least not only paid work. It is curiosity, thoughtfulness and contribution. Utility, in whatever its form – and even if it's selfish – is its own justification.
And fourth, and this may seem an oddity, don’t lose the confidence of your mission. Until the very end, you still have an opportunity to demonstrate that you were right all along! It's important, at least in my mind, to hold the line on your own sense of self and your own sense of righteousness, even if the form it takes is irritating and confusing to people younger than you are.
The memorial I attended, like so many before it, was great opportunities to learn and reflect, and this is what passed through my mind at the time.
Later, it will become apparent whether I have the courage to obey my own rules. 💥
From the department of the machine that grades on a curve...
From the department of the silvery ... sun!
Uppsala University
From the department of, well, everything ..
Thanks for reading - please share if you have a friend (or enemy!) you think would value this blog and ask them to add their email in the block below - it's free for the time being. If the sign-up link doesn't appear, you'll find it on the site.
Till next time. 💥
