Given our growing number of retirees, it’s surprising that there isn’t more debate, in these pages and elsewhere, about the theory and practice of doing what so many of us are busy doing: aging.
Having reached the age when I’m no longer taking immortality for granted, I’ve begun to pay attention to the discussion about the latter part of life. Turns out it’s a hot topic.
There is even controversy, for instance, about whether living longer is a good thing. In general the lengthening of the average lifespan is seen as progress, and we cheer on promises by scientists such as Aubrey de Grey that deliverance from the curse of mortality is right around the corner. But Dr. Sherwin Nuland argues in “How We Die” that the immortality project is an inherently misdirected effort. He defends the logic and rightness of being phased out after you’ve had your turn.
In a recent article, Michael Kinsley argues the drawback of even living longer, let alone forever: “So there are two forms of competition in the boomer death-style Olympics. There’s dying last and there’s dying lucid. And…the better you do in one the worse you’re likely to do in the other. If you’re prepared to die at sixty, you can pretty much scratch dementia off your list of things to worry about.”
Life extension aside, there is no unanimity about how we should live our declining years. Poet Dylan Thomas’s famous plea to his father–“Do not go gentle into that good night… rage, rage against the dying of the light” –was that good advice for the old man, or a young man’s cheerleading, full of denial?
The rage, rage school seems ascendant, as evidenced by books with such titles as “Younger Next Year; Live Strong, Fit, and Sexy—Until You’re 80 and Beyond,” “Grow Younger, Live Longer,” “Stop Aging Now!” The unrelieved upbeatness of these books seems to contain a considerable amount of denial. (One kept referring to life post-60 as the “next third”, employing some dubious calculation while avoiding the dread word “last”)
The titles of the go gentle school are not as depressing as they sound: “Jane Brody’s Guide to the Great Beyond, ” “Learning to Die,” Nuland’s “How To Die.”
Daniel Klein”s “Travels with Epicurus; A Journey to a Greek Island in Search of a Fulfilled Life” features the ancient’s recommendation of withdrawal from public life, going with the deathward flow, making sure to smell the roses along the way. Klein does not call attention to the irony of his own decision to stay busy writing a book about the subject.
I was talking the other day at a gathering of ancients at a bar after a contentious BOS hearing with a friend who admitted that he had not been at the meeting. What about your civic responsibility, I chided. “Hey, I just retired a couple of years ago. I’m done with meetings.” Drinking beer with the guys was as far as his interest in remaining active went.
“Use it or lose it, stay involved in life” is a popular idea. But not universally agreed on. Avoiding stress, another axiom of good health, would seem to prescribe not getting all wrought-up about causes, debating contentious topics in town meeting. I know seniors who have cancelled their newspaper subscriptions to reduce stress by keeping the world out of the house.
Is retirement itself bad for the health? The bestseller from some years back, “Your Money or Your Life,” helps you retire early not to stop work but rather to do all the really meaningful things you couldn’t do at the not-so-meaningful job you did to make money.
Grandchildren are widely considered a blessing of later life, but even on that I suspect we are divided between those who get most of the meaning of their life doting on the grandchildren and those getting most of theirs from some sort of second career.
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