Booming into old age

I can't say that I ever felt "special" in any way. Other than that each person is "special," that is. I didn't feel that I was privileged or that my childhood was better or worse than my parents' had been. Of course, they lived through the Great Depression and I didn't, but my mother's stories of those days were entertaining and she always cast them in a positive way, so it didn't really seem that awful.

And, of course, I was born after WWII, so I also didn't really understand what it meant to be so fully separated from husband/father/boyfriend during a time of war. And of course WWII wasn't divisive in the way our war was. People who were against the war or who didn't want to serve learned to keep their mouths shut. So the country may have been divided - but nobody knew about it.

I grew up in a working-class neighborhood and went to a working-class school. The vast majority of my friends had parents who were in the military (we lived just minutes from an Air Force Base), or who did some kind of manual labor or office work. I don't recall a doctor, lawyer, or other professional person among my peers' parents. Oh, there were some at our church (I was raised Episcopalian), but we really didn't socialize with them other than on Sundays. And we knew that where they lived was a far cry from where we lived! But I don't recall being particularly envious, nor do I remember feeling deprived.

That was largely - maybe even fully - thanks to my mother and her upbeat attitude. She was the original "be-thankful-for-what-you-have-there-are-starving-children-in-China" kind of mom. We had little enough; our polio-crippled mother was our only support - other than the occasional generous help from our church - but I never felt poor. Somehow, if that new Elvis record was really important to me, mom found a way to get it. Money for a high school football game? She'd make it happen. The only way I really felt different was not having a dad, and I did create elaborate lies to explain his absence from our home in those divorce-unfriendly 50s and 60s. But really, mom worked very hard to make our lives as much like our friends' lives as was possible. We often had little to eat, and it was frequently what we called "filling" rather than nutritious. But we not only survived; we thrived.

And we lived our lives pretty much as our friends and neighbors did.

So, although the term "baby boomer" wasn't applied to my generation until we were in our 20s (by some counts), I really don't recall thinking of myself that way until after my youngest was born when I was in my 30s. Since then, however, we've learned how "special" we all think we are; how we influenced television programming, advertising, consumerism of all kinds (most recently health care), and are generally accused of being a fully self-centered generation.

There are a lot of reasons put forth for our supposed feelings of entitlement: our parents wanted us to have better lives than they did (what parent doesn't feel this way?); we exerted a fiscal force to be reckoned with (with 76,000,000 of us, we'd all have to stay home to prevent some kind of impact!); we overwhelmed society with our music and values (as if Frank Sinatra and the bobby-soxers didn't shock the previous generations!).

Remember, though, my generation gave the world Bill Clinton AND George W. Bush. Many of us fought in a war that others of us protested against. We sang along with The Rolling Stones and Cat Stevens. We let it all hang out at Woodstock, and covered it all up with granny dresses. We smoked pot because our parents didn't want us to, and then lied about it to our kids to keep them from smoking pot. We left home, rejecting our parents' values and indulgences, and then we protected and indulged our children to a greater degree than any parents before us.

We are a generation like any other, in that we defy easy generalities. Some of us embrace our ageing with grace; others of us are kicking and screaming. Some have sought and enjoyed early retirement and its attendant woes and blessings; other vow that we would have no real purpose if we didn't have our jobs.

So today, January 1, 2011, as the baby boom generation begins to turn 65, don't be too hard on us as a generation - and let us not be too hard on ourselves. We didn't choose the world into which we were born; no one does. We didn't emerge from our mothers' bodies demanding special treatment, except in the way every infant does. We didn't walk in lockstep in the 50s (some loved Elvis, others loved Pat Boone), the 60s, or the 70s; and we don't walk in lockstep today.

We're your parents, your grandparents, your neighbors, your co-workers, your friends. We're as individual as you are and most of us - not all of us, by any means! - don't want to be lumped together as a bunch of navel-gazing, self-important old folks.

After all, most of us are still dealing with the fact that we're older than 30!

Growing old in the age of modern medicine

My mom (as well a lot of other people) used to say, "If I'd known I was going to live this long, I'd have taken better care of myself!) That has become my new refrain as I move toward 62.

I don't feel old, and I certainly don't think of myself as old (I do refrain from mini-skirts, however; I'm not blind yet!), and I know that my 61 is not my grandmother's 61. However...

Years of falling off my bike, jumping from moderately high places, working long hours on my feet, and a lifetime of weight gains and losses have taken a toll on my poor knees. Especially my left knee. The dreaded arthritis. It hurts my viscera just to see it in print.

The pain was awful, waking me up at night and then keeping me awake. Bringing tears to my eyes at times. Keeping me from running and jumping at the playground with Addison ("You knee hurt again, Gran?") In other words, knee pain was dramatically affecting my quality of life.

So, off I went to The Bone Doc, a nice young man, only a year older than my oldest son, which is another thing about getting older, but that's for another day! He took x-rays and then took the time to x-plain them. Both knees are arthritic, and there's really no difference in the degree. So why does my left knee hurt and my right knee feels fine? He doesn't know and neither do I.

As I sat there, expecting him to start discussing surgical options, he surprised me by saying, "There are several methods of treatment, and I want you to be comfortable with what we do. It's really your decision." Since I had really thought my only option would be knee replacement, this was nice to hear. As he began to discuss the options, I was intrigued by the idea of injections - not cortisone, not steroids, but of a medication derived from roosters' combs! Hyalgan, it's called, and I had heard about it from a family member just a few weeks before. It requires three injections, one week apart, into the joint. The results can be dramatic and can last for up to a year.

Sign me up!

To make a long story short, I actually had four injections, because of our December snow "event." It caused me to miss a week and I didn't want to take any chances, since the injections weren't the most pleasant medical care I've ever had! More uncomfortable than painful, but still.

The last injection was two weeks ago, and the results have bordered on miraculous! I no longer wake up with knee pain during the night. I can crawl around on the floor with Addison, run and jump, get up and down stairs easily. Oh, I'm still a bit stiff sometimes, but that's to be expected, given my age and level of activity. BUT I DON'T HURT!

And that, Dear Reader, is cause for celebration.

It's just me again!

Across the hall from me, a little boy is sleeping. Tomorrow morning he'll come into my room, touch my face gently, and say, "Hi, Gran. It's 6:30 (or whatever time it will be)." He'll climb into bed with me and we'll cuddle for a few minutes before he says, "I'm hungry."

That is how 2009 will begin for me. It is my 62nd New Year's Day. This is the year I will begin to collect Social Security, and Jim & I hope to make a long-anticipated trip to Europe this year and perhaps another trip across the US, taking a different route and seeing different things.

This is a good time of life.

We measure so much by beginnings and endings, and yet, truly, time is unimportant. Each day is a gift, each smile, each embrace, each touch of a hand - whether it's a hand marked by age or a hand still sticky with a cookie, each sunrise, each rising or sleeping, each is its own precious and special moment.

I really never make New Year's resolutions. When I was younger - a teenager - I would draw up lists of things that seemed to fill the bill for resolutions, but my heart was never in it. Beyond the vague "I really need to lose weight," it has always seemed to me that this great creation of mankind - time - is really immaterial to our lives. It drags on, it speeds by, it escapes our notice, or it becomes all we can think about. And yet all we really have is each moment.

This year, I plan to appreciate the moments. I hope I can live my days without anticipating what is to come tomorrow, without wishing away the moment I am in.

My mother used to tell me that I was wishing my life away. You know the wishes, I'm sure: I wish my birthday/Christmas/prom would hurry up and get here. I wish it was time for vacation. I wish my kids were older and I could __________.

Well, my kids are older. Adults, every one of them. And sometimes I long for those far-away times when I could hold them on my lap and listen to their dreams. The days that I muddled through in a haze, or wished away in anticipation or frustration, each of those days is gone, never to return.

I hope to look at each moment in 2009 with the eyes of a child, as a unique event that will never happen again in quite the same way. I know, even as I write this, that I will fail in this expectation; it's the way I'm made - perhaps the way each of us is made. But I'm going to try.

And so I will end 2008 secure in knowing that, across the hall, Addison is curled up with his blankie and his Winnie-the-Pooh. I will think of him and of all my grandsons - Andrew, David, Matthew, and Adin - as they embark on all the hopes, joys, disappointments, successes, and even failures of this life - and hope that they can find within themselves a lifetime of seeing the new in each day, each moment.

I wish for you, everyone, a bright and beautiful 2009, beginning with tomorrow's sunrise!

You can teach an old dog new tricks!

Here in Oregon, we vote by mail. (It's not my preferred method, but that's fodder for another post!) So my ballot for the election has been sitting on the breakfast table since Saturday, and some time within the next two weeks I will mark my choices for President, US Senator, and a number of other candidates and issues and send in my ballot.

This will be my 11th Presidential election. I'm a bit nonplussed by that number since I certainly don't think of myself as being *that* old! But I can remember every election and tell you who I voted for in each one. (I've never been a "party line" voter, and I did spend a portion of my life registered as a Republican.) This year, this election, is different for me in a number of ways, however. For the first time, ever, I have:

• put a campaign sign in my yard
• put a political bumper sticker on my car
• donated money to a political campaign
• watched the debates
• closely followed the polls and reports
• canvassed my neighborhood in support of a candidate
• made phone calls in support of a candidate

I frankly think Barack Obama is the brightest hope this country has seen in 48 years, and he has inspired me to become involved in a way that I never thought I would. Indeed, in a way I never wanted to. (That, too, is another post!)

Today at the volunteer phone bank at the Obama campaign office, I spoke on the phone with an 84-year-old woman. She was quite pleased to get my call, and said, "Oh, yes, honey, I have already filled out my ballot and I just put it in the mailbox!"

"You know," she continued, dropping her voice to a whisper, "I just changed to the Democratic party this year. If my father wasn't already dead, this would have killed him. He was a staunch Republican all his life, but it was not the party that exists today. He would have been disgusted with those people bringing all this religion into politics. That's just not the way it's supposed to be."

I agreed, and thanked her for her support. She closed by thanking *ME* for calling her and others to help get out the vote.

We should never be so set in our ways that we're completely closed to the idea of change. Really, what difference would it have made if this woman had not changed her party affiliation? None. She still could have voted for Obama in the election next month. She wanted - needed, perhaps - to make a statement. And even if she and I - and those who read this post - are the only ones who know, it doesn't matter. She made her voice heard - and I'm sure her father would understand!