I recently celebrated my summer birthday with a quiet evening around a bonfire with some close family and then a day at the campground and beach with my extended family. It’s true about simmering down as you get older. Those wild nights of imbibing in life’s pleasures until the wee hours of the morning are mostly over (sometimes a wild one pops up on you and you spend days recovering). I was thinking that a lot of people remark on the shortness of life and how it whizzes by, and yet it feels like it has crept along for me, slowly like wheels in mud trying not to get stuck.
I have been accused of remembering too much.
Maya Angelou writes in “On Aging” that the warranted sparks that once signaled life, such as small talk, are no longer necessary. “When you see me sitting quietly / Like a sack left on the shelf, / Don’t think I need your chattering. / I’m listening to myself.” I’ve always considered myself a hermit, preferring the solitary life, or at least–in the very least–a homebody, as I would rather spend time with the ones who have to put up with my antics than the ones who don’t. As I get older, I find that sitting in the corner by myself, thinking, is often preferable than thrusting myself into the discourse of the room.
Angelou continues, “I’m the same person I was back then, / A little less hair, / a little less chin,” which I suppose means we should revere the elderly as they were once young too; but, I actually disagree with this sentiment, sort of. I am a lot different from the person I used to be in my late teens and early 20s (mid-twenties even). If only psychologically. I have certainly spent more time trying to understand how my brain ticks, what limitations are in place, and where I am happiest. Certainly, I took a prolonged look at what has inhibited me and what has kept me from reaching my peak as well, which mostly came down to the habits of youth. Yet, I would hate to think somebody who only knew me at 18 who then saw me at 80 had the same opinion of my character. I think most of us would hate to think of that.
Aging makes me think of being young, which is probably the most cliched reflection in existence, but it makes me think of the stories and poems I read when I was a child–the ones that grounded me. A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein taught me all about verse and poetry, as did Where the Sidewalk Ends. In Attic, Silverstein writes in one of his poems: “Said the little boy, I often cry / The old man nodded. So do I.” which is strangely relevant as my daughter and I just cried together at the movies a few days ago (when a resolution gets you, it really gets you). My emotions have certainly changed a great deal from when I was a young man, guarded, protected…distant. If I was the man who fell to Earth, I am definitely more human now.
Angelou, much like Silverstein, shares the fear of being forgotten, ignored, or treated differently. I guess I don’t fear that as much, but it’s something to think about as the loafers get more snug and the midnight bathroom visits become more pressing. Angelou tells us “When my bones are stiff and aching, / and my feet won’t climb the stair, / I will only ask one favor: / Don’t bring me no rocking chair.” I think this is a good opinion on becoming physically obsolete. It’s okay to sit by yourself in a corner as long as your loved ones understand that’s just what you prefer in life…and not because you are difficult to be around. Silverstein echoes, “But worst of all, said the boy, / it seems grown-ups don’t pay attention to me. / And he felt the warmth of a wrinkled old hand. / I know what you mean, said the little old man.”
I suppose I remember too much, and that’s okay, especially as I get older, because I often find myself listening to my own inner monologue more often than not. Nevertheless, I can always be thankful, too, just as Angelou tells us at the climax of her poem: “A lot less lungs and much less wind. / But ain’t I luck I can still breathe in.”
Works Cited
Angelou, Maya. “On Aging.” And Still I Rise. Random House. 1978. Print
Silverstein, Shel. “The Little Boy and the Old Man.” A Light in the Attic. Harper & Row. 1981. Print.
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