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anna

Will you still need me when I'm 64?

by anna at 12:03 PM on June 06, 2005

This weekend I met my Aunt Caroline for the first time. She's been in, like, Wisconsin all these years and nobody goes there. I think it's in Ohio. Anyway, Caroline is 86. We were power washing my mom's house, creating a flood comparable to the one Noah fled. We were joking about our impending visitor, saying we hoped she didn't slip from her walker and break her hip.

Boy were we in for a surprise. She pulls up in her Volvo after a six hour jaunt from her assisted living place in Southern VA. She bounds out like those folks you see parked in handicap spaces. Dragging her luggage behind, she looked radiant with her white hair stulishly coiffed.

We'd been dreading the inevitable old people conversations about myriad medical problems and reminiscing. But she turns out to be fully lucid and engaging. She doesn't have any medical problems to speak of of and thinks reminiscing is a waste of time. She did relate one amusing anecdote about an 84 year old friend of hers who's taken up with a 64 year old boy-toy. The friend has taken to guzzling port wine, worrying herself sick that he is stepping out with some other chick at the home. Caroline thinks he's too young to be in assisted living, and that he just came to hit on the ladies. I guess it's working.

Old people are a precious resource. They have a lifetime of experience and wisdom to impart. A lot of their advice is wise. For instance, she told me that I am more like my dad than I think. Now my dad was no paradigm of virtue to say the least (and respect the dearly departed.) Then she says I will become more and more like him as the years go by, unless I decide not to. Hmmm.

The aged are valuable in other ways. If you're a smoker and you see one smoking it gives you a smidgen of hope that you won't die a horrible early death. And I just love it when you see them holding hands or resting their frail heads on one another's shoulders. I even dig it when they start smooching. But I don't even want to think about them giving oral or something to each other.

People talk about the sexualization of children these days; the embodiment of which has to be that Jon-Bonet Ramsey girl. But just as disturbing is the sexualization of the elderly, from The Golden Girls to About Schmidt to Something's Gotta Give. Eek!

comments (5)

The elderly are great. One of my great-aunts is like your aunt. There's a picture of her where she's about 60 and she's holding a baby. She's as thin as a pencil with old-lady hair like a three inch high hairsprayed helmet all over her head, makeup on, and in a cocktail dress. But you look at her arms and you realize they're like *guns*. The muscles on her forearm and upper arm are bulging. You look at her face and you know you don't mess with her. No frail little old lady there.

The elderly really do have the best relationship advice, too. When the advice is good, it's really good.

by jean at June 6, 2005 11:26 PM


An ex- of mine claimed he overheard his grandparents having sex... including hearing his grandma say things like, "fuck me harder."

Granted, he did lie about an awful lot of things, so I have to doubt that story, too -- but isn't it just too awful to want to dismiss?

by Jen at June 7, 2005 7:56 AM


Yeah Jena they do sound awfully similar. Rarely have I felt awed in the presence of somebody. My mom must have known this as she spent 3 weeks cleaning her home in preparation.

Jen, I think the worst word in the English language is menopause. Maybe that is because I may be dealing with its side-effects soon. But today's elderly seem to feel pressured to keep at it. So your friend's story is probably true. Hopefully it was a drug-we-aren't-allowed-to-mention-inspired grandpa she was urging on.

by anna at June 7, 2005 8:39 AM


I dunno.... I'd wish I could learn via the old, but it's always the same end result, we're all we the fuck behind the ears....

....the old end up like infants...

....I will be BACK In the BLACK soon or end this madness.

by Lockheed at June 9, 2005 8:55 PM


For me the worst is when old people get all wistful about what might have been. I haven't got time for that.

by anna at June 10, 2005 7:36 AM