Growing Old With Oneself

Back in 2007 I remember driving back to Newark through the Lancaster-ish areas, down Route 896 from I can’t recall where exactly….
I was coming back on an early Saturday evening from a long caricature gig for a company picnic somewhere out in Amish country.  As I was driving home I noticed a huge garden with rows of beautiful sunflowers and I turned around to park and take photos for painting references.
As I approached the flowers – which were somewhat near the two lane road – I saw an elderly man out in the garden area tending it. I walked up and asked the man if I might photograph his sunflowers.
He was delighted that I wanted to do that – obviously proud – and we chatted. I learned he was in his mid-nineties and he pointed up to his porch and said his wife was blind, and that was she, sitting on the rocker.
I recall the man had many other garden crops going and we chatted about the different plants. I was stunned at his age and how active and vigorous – and ambitious – he was!
I later painted the sunflower painting at the end of this writing from one of the photos I took that day.
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When I was in my early 20’s and occasionally contemplated growing old,  I think my reasoning was something like this:
 Well, most people live to about 80….and that is a long, long way off…I guess I have at least 60 more years.
Then, I remember around the time I turned 40, as I contemplated old age and what it meant to turn the big 4 0  …my reasoning became like this:
Well, a lot of people live to be 100….and that is a long, long way off…I guess I have at least 60 more years!
Hmmm…..now, I find myself 56 and at the beginning of picking up the pieces of my life going forward. Wondering, now what?

It is different than I felt at age 42, when I went through my first divorce.
I’ve often thought how as we age, that there is a feeling of life closing in on you.
When you are young…so much feels like it is ahead….the way is open and broad!  When you contemplate the future, the feeling is one of openness….you can be anything…do anything…right?

And life is not yet riddled with so many regrets…only possibilities and hopes and dreams!

Why does this change?  

Must this change?  Is that what it means to grow old?

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I think that whether we are married or single, with a partner or living life solo….growing old with oneself is an essential art.

How do we stay young at heart? How do we keep learning and growing and trying new things? When is it ever too late to do things you have always wanted to do? How do we think about how much time we might have left and how much longer before our body keeps us from doing what we want and hope to do and enjoy?

In many ways I feel like a twenty-something in my mind. I think many of us do.

As they say….youth is wasted on the young.
I learned a lot from my neighbor, Hellen, in Alabama!   She does not let growing old stand in her way.  One of the first times I met her in 2016, she told me she had recently been on her roof or something (I never quite got the story straight!) using a chainsaw.  She would have been about 80!

As we age we acquire wisdom, life experiences, many interests….we may still have ambitions and our minds are open to new things….if only we had the energy and body of our youth!

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So back to 2007 and the beautiful sunflower garden on Route 896 South…
Why was a 97 year old man (I kinda recall that number now…) out there tending a pretty huge garden in the mid-summer heat?

I mean…did he really have to grow those sunflowers? Isn’t watching TV much easier on a 97 year old?

And why would he go to all that work of growing his own food?

Surely a jar of spaghetti sauce is only 97 cents!

Why bother growing tomatoes, cooking…freezing…all that work!?

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Some questions don’t deserve answers, perhaps.

Try it, then you will know the answer. 

And it doesn’t have to be a garden.   

Maybe it is something else you shouldn’t bother with – at your age…

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Last night I was feeling a little blah. I’m in a huge time of transition right now. I walked away from many things in Alabama, including my gardens and chickens which brought me such joy and health on many levels! I miss the exercise it gave me. I miss having plants and outdoor creatures to nurture and tend as a break from indoor routines.  I miss fresh eggs and being able to walk outside and snap off fresh kale in the cold weather and nibble it outside as a snack!

I texted my older son last night and said, “ I feel trapped and confined here! Am I too old to get land and pursue my vision?”

He wrote, “No you aren’t too old!”
How comforting.

I’ve been told that my grandfather Luther Slifer – his great-grandfather – could be seen out hoeing his corn by hand in his early 80’s.

None of us know how long we have on this earth.

Keep going!

What an amazing gift this life is.