Just Do It.

It’s standing room only at the Party House. Or maybe I should say the seats have been taken by those who need them most. A motley group of people, mostly in their 60s and 70s, wander around nibbling hors d’oeuvres and greeting each other warmly as old friends do when they meet at a wedding or memorial service—and we are there for both of those things.

What is the Party House, you ask? And why are we there for a wedding and a memorial? There’s no diplomatic way to describe either the place or the event. A distant cousin of mine has gathered family and friends together to celebrate the life of her first husband, who died a couple of months ago, and following a brief intermission, to witness her marriage to husband #4. The house itself, a 1920s-style residence in a quiet neighborhood, has functioned for the last 40 years as “the” place where nice couples meet other nice couples and then take off their clothes, though not always in that order.  My cousin and her first husband ran it as a business together even after they divorced; now it’s hers alone.

For this occasion, the house has been scrubbed clean and festooned with what looks like pale mosquito netting, paper leaf cutouts and winking Christmas lights. I suspect that a number of the guests are charter members of the Party House, former swingers now equipped with high-tech hearing aids and canes. Or maybe they’re still swinging—I try not to imagine. One woman in her 70s startles me when she coos, “Oh, you were making eyes at me.” It’s true, I may have been staring, but not for the reason she thinks. We leave immediately after the ceremony, not waiting to see if the group energy would coalesce into one of their traditional evening events for old times’sake.

The thought of seniors having sex makes me uncomfortable as I’m sure it does many people. That holds especially true when I think of family members, namely parents.  I’ll admit that it’s my problem, and that I should regard sexual intimacy as wonderful at any legal age. But I’ve always been prudish, more so as a child raised in the era of free love. Seeing couples make out in public has always offended me; once I even begged my father not to ask our neighbor when her baby was due. “Just don’t talk about it,” I said.

A few years ago my father and I were speaking on the phone; out of nowhere he began telling me about some sexual challenges he’d been experiencing with my stepmother.  I heard the word "Viagra," and felt like I was about to black out. Then he announced proudly, “But just this morning, even without the pill, I—“ And here I cut him off, saying I really didn’t need to hear it. He was 80 at the time.

Some of my friends found the story inspiring. “Your dad is eighty and he can still get it up?” one enthused. “I think it’s wonderful that old people can still enjoy themselves!” said another. Intellectually, I’m in total agreement. All the studies indicate sex is good for one’s physical and emotional well-being, even (or perhaps especially) for older folks. But that doesn't mean I want to picture it.

At this point, I can safely assume that the season is permanently over for my dad. I haven’t asked, and won’t, but judging from his frailty and diminished energy level I’d guess that there remains nothing more in that department than some good memories and occasional hugs. And if there is more, I truly don’t want to know.

The Wrong Route

I used to see her getting on the #24 bus in San Francisco. Coming up the little stairway she would emerge in stages: first the big blond wig, the heavily made up face, followed by a tight, low-cut blouse and miniskirt, the whole structure tottering on shiny red stilettos. Smiling brightly at the other passengers, she’d ease herself into one of the front seats. You might draw a few conclusions about this woman but they would all have to be juggled with the fact that she was, by my estimation, about 80 years old.

Nobody spoke to her, as I recall. There may have been a few snickers or droll comments from other riders but after all, this was San Francisco where anything goes. My own thoughts were strictly judgmental. Why can’t she act her age? Who does she think she’s fooling, and doesn’t she realize how ridiculous she looks?

These questions occupied me as I rode the bus to my job at an adult day health center, where old people looked and acted as old people should. The clients I worked with were long past pretending, or too damaged to care. They were old and they knew it.  But perhaps I’m being premature in my judgment; in my own case, do I feel like I’m over 50, or think I look as old as I do? Twenty five years from now, will my self-image be that of a proper old person?

I understand that women in our sexist society are under cruel pressure to look young, or at least as young as possible. For some of them, that means keeping the same hairstyle and color they had in their youth, using the same makeup (or just a lot more of it) even when it does more harm than good. But what they see in the mirror, or their mind’s eye, is the person they used to be—and they feel better for it.

My stepmother is one of those women. She visits her hairdresser every week for a shampoo and set, because she always did it and to stop now would probably feel to her like walking around naked in public. The same bright rouge and greenish-brown eye shadow haven’t changed in decades, even though the results call to mind a baked iguana with random fluorescent spots.

A total makeover and simpler hairstyle could actually improve my stepmother’s appearance, but I think that would be too difficult for her to accept. In her mind she is not almost 80, and doesn’t want to give up the illusion. So for the foreseeable future, Jeannie’s daughter in law will drive her to the weekly beauty appointments that, at least in my opinion, just waste money and time. 

It’s a good thing someone more understanding than I is responsible for that particular task. If it came down to it, I can imagine refusing, letting her make her own arrangements and causing a huge rift. I’d be accused of being heartless, of not understanding—and the accusations, at least in this case, would be hard to refute.

The Incredible Shrinking World

Preview of coming attractions: people shrink as they get older, and not just physically. How does it happen? What causes a vibrant, multifaceted adult to give up, bit by bit, the fullness of his or her experience and emotional life? Loss of physical stamina and mental acuity may have something to do with it, but I see a lot more voluntary contraction than can be explained by those things alone.

The inability to take for granted one’s own body, a sense of weakness and vulnerability may incite many seniors to live cautiously, but what about those fortunate few elders who continue to dance, swim, love and otherwise live life to the fullest, even in the face of physical decline? Are they merely the exceptions that prove the rule, or do they possess some wonderful secret?

I ask myself these things during weekly errands with my parents, as I witness their agonizingly slow progress from one task to the next.  Every step needs to be broken down into sub-steps with running commentary until finally completed, while family and employees wait patiently for the money to be counted out one bill at a time, or the check to be written or buttons to be pushed correctly. It would take me a fraction of the time to do all the shopping myself, but their efforts are part of the ritualized self-deception, the notion that they’re still independent which for now is too meaningful to abandon.

Even at home, life is lived carefully, by the teaspoon; every move is planned from the time they get up. Meals are predictable and bizarre at the same time. White vinegar is the primary seasoning no matter what’s being prepared.  The same two vegetables crop up repeatedly—even asparagus on sale doesn’t lure my stepmother, Jeannie, away from the usual broccoli and zucchini. Frozen peas or canned yams denote a special occasion.

This week’s grocery delivery did not go so smoothly.  Jeannie forgot to add fresh vegetables to her shopping list, and I failed to notice that the sugar free jello didn’t make it on the final order. After a lengthy discussion, followed by enormous relief that they weren’t charged for the things that were never ordered, Jeannie announced that she can do without her regular vegetables this week and will get by on canned yams and frozen peas.  The suggestion that she could ask my stepbrother, who lives a mile away, to pick up a vegetable—or even take a taxi to the store herself—was swiftly rejected.

Their lack of spontaneity is now matched by an unusual dearth of generosity. Since moving here eight months ago they have not once invited us over for any other purpose than to do their shopping or errands. Thanksgiving can hardly be called an exception given that my stepbrother’s wife did all the cooking. Even birthdays, which used to be an occasion to take us out to lunch or dinner, are noted with a gift card and nothing more. 

I’m torn between pity for the smallness of their lives and real irritation at their deliberate choice in making them so. Once again, the note to self is: don’t let this happen to me. I will be generous within my means, and enjoy life as much as I can. 

Shadow of Himself

There are times when I’m in the same room with Gene and he quietly disappears. He doesn’t go anywhere—I just stop seeing him.  Or he’ll come into the room while other people are talking and I don’t notice him until suddenly he’s right there, standing among us.  His life force, a presence which was never overly assertive, these days is more akin to a firefly on a summer evening: now you see it, now you don’t.

I value the brief glimpses of his quiet humor, and even the negative outbursts he occasionally voices. The other day, getting back into the car after our weekly bout of shopping, he was shaking with the cold, his eyes bright and intense. “You’re freezing,” I said. He sat on his hands, still shivering. “I’m FREEZING,” he said loudly, with more conviction than I recall hearing from him in a long time.

My father’s life, the things he’s experienced over these past 86 years would be considered noteworthy by almost anyone.  The list of flukes is long and uncanny. How many people from that era can say they were raised on a socialist-anarchist commune? How many boys actually saw the Hindenburg fly over their small New Jersey town, not to mention firing a BB gun at it? (No, he didn’t cause it to crash.) Would you believe that he saw Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig playing on the same field? That when he was 12, his father gave him a baseball signed by the entire 1936 team of the New York Giants, the same year they played in the World Series? (The ball, its autographs badly faded, is still with us.)  

 I can also note that my dad was listening to the radio on that night in October 1938 when Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds” was broadcast, causing mass panic throughout the country. For his part, he did not panic—but looked out the window and saw that everything appeared normal. Then, to make sure, he listened to a few other stations before concluding it was just a radio drama.

Gene was always a bright kid, and after graduating from high school at 16, headed straight to UC Berkeley, far from home. World War II interrupted his studies and found him serving in the army, stationed first in England (where he heard the sound of V-2 rockets overhead before they exploded) and then in Germany and Austria.  While in Vienna he used his nascent theatrical experience directing plays at the Theater an der Wien for the entertainment of American troops.

Back home, he completed his BA and went on to Stanford for a Master’s degree in dramatic arts.  He began a long teaching career; at 34 he got married, only to find himself in a relationship that was troubled from the beginning and which neither party had the tools to repair. My arrival became the primary focus of his life, as he had full custody of me from the time I was one year old.  I remember him as always there, reliable and quiet, focused and withdrawn at the same time.  People have told me how lucky I was to have such a loving, present father, one who read stories and sang songs to me at bedtime every night. I have to agree—he did his best.

It’s only now that we’re again living in the same area, seeing each other almost every week that I’m starting to realize that my dad and I are writing the final chapters of our story. As before, there are some sweet moments….but I’m angry to see what's happening to my always steady and predictable father; sad to witness the slow disintegration of his memory and wit, the loss of his physical stamina. And I’m forcing myself to accept the reality of his gradual, then ultimate, disappearance.

Her Own Worst Enemy...

WHEN it comes to getting old, my standard advice is: surrender! Apologies to Dylan Thomas, but it's better to go quietly....just fold and walk away while you can still do so with some dignity. If I seem overly focused on the benefits of renouncing independence, I have good reasons.  My experience in the health care field, mostly with older adults, presented too many train wrecks to count—a  host of disasters, many of them avoidable, usually brought on by people’s stubborn insistence on not accepting the help they needed, always trying to do things “on their own” even when such an attitude becomes virtually suicidal.

I’ve said nothing so far about my mother, who died in 2007. She spent the last nine years of her life in a nursing home, suffering, because she refused to move out of her house when she should have. A combination of living alone, being confined to a wheelchair and unable to manage most of her basic activities set the stage; a defective lamp that caught fire while she was in bed finalized the deal.  By sheer luck (if that’s the word) she was rescued by firefighters who that very day had been trained to use a new infrared detector that can locate people under water or in the thickest smoke.

Burned severely over one third of her body, she was in the ICU for weeks. Tube-fed, on a respirator and completely helpless, she was hit by multiple infections and a stroke. Amazingly, she pulled through but was never able to leave the nursing home, and on a regular basis made it clear she would rather be dead. It would not have been helpful at that point to mention that we’d warned her repeatedly of the dangers inherent in her living situation; we’d even found decent board and care homes that she could have afforded, but she always refused to leave “home” even though she needed plenty of support to stay there.

Our American obsession with independence and individuality—what we call freedom—becomes a trap when the elderly do their best to carry on alone after they’re clearly not able to. It’s not like this everywhere. In fact, years ago our own culture dealt with aging relatives differently.  When people became old and frail, they’d move in with their adult children (or nieces and nephews), and that was considered a good thing. But these days it’s almost unthinkable.

The results play themselves out daily throughout our society. An 82-year-old woman I know is so close to the edge, almost in free-fall, yet she won't accept reality. Living alone in a 2-story house, she has plenty of money and nobody to leave it to, but won't hire anyone (other than a twice-monthly housecleaner) to help. She's already had a couple of falls, and is so crippled she can hardly lurch across the room--she only makes it by clutching furniture the entire time. The fact that she can (barely) drag herself up and down the stairs and somehow stagger to her car gives her the idea that she's just fine, thank you, and can manage on her own... 

Yet she asks strangers passing by on the street if they could please carry her groceries upstairs. When she gets occasional visitors, the first thing she does after saying hello is to have them take out the stinking garbage since she can't do it herself. Bathing? I guess if sponge baths twice a week do the trick, good for her. Cooking? Forget it, she just orders takeout or has canned soup. The mere suggestion that she might hire an agency to send a bonded caregiver who could make her life much easier brings up a predictable response: "That's crazy, I don't know those people. And it would cost $100 a day." Does she know that a nursing home will cost her nearly $300 per day? That's where she's heading--unless she gets lucky and just breaks her neck falling down the stairs.

My parents, so far, are more intact, but they too are playing with fire.  I hope to be somewhat tactful on the day I tell them that they can’t continue in their current situation, that their desire for independence could result in their losing the very thing they're trying to preserve. And I can only hope they'll listen.

Who, Me Angry?

I call myself an angry caregiver, but what do I have to be angry about, given the relative ease of my situation? There are so many layers here. Perhaps I just don’t want to give up my spare time—pure selfishness. Or is it more along the lines of not wanting to take on a “parent” role with my parents? The fact of my not having children has placed me, more or less permanently, in the position of child (albeit adult) and maybe on some level I don’t want to leave my comfort zone.

Or it could be the realization that not having children means that as I reach the age of my parents, I won’t be able to rely on anyone other than paid helpers, if I can afford them. I might be feeling some resentment at providing something that I’ll never have the opportunity to enjoy.  Of course, kids don’t come with a lifetime guarantee of good behavior, and I’m aware of many older people whose adult children blithely abandon them, or worse, subject them to actual abuse. It’s hard to imagine the pain, the sense of betrayal that must engender.

Alternatively, I’m reminded of the “saints” among us—those of the sandwich generation who have both kids of their own and aging parents to care for simultaneously, and who manage it all with grace…at least outwardly.  But there is always a price attached to true sainthood. I guess I fall somewhere mid-range on the saint and spoiled brat scale. I’m helpful enough, but set limits, and occasionally make sharp comments or roll my eyes.

This past week’s visit was a lesson in successful multi-tasking, if not limit-setting.  The day began by driving my dad to the barber shop, and leaving him there while racing my stepmother to the bank, the pharmacy, and then (after picking up a patient, neatly-shorn father) finally heading to Safeway for the weekly shopping, all in a record two hours. 

No real complications, but while at the bank, the trust manager recommended a “personal appointment” with my stepmother sometime next week. She said she didn’t know when she could make an appointment as it all depended on when transportation would be available.  After hearing this, I tried not to show annoyance while pointing out that the short taxi ride to the bank might cost $8 from where they live and maybe, just maybe they could afford that. Her response: “Well, that’s more than the Sunshine Bus from the senior center costs.” Yes, I say, but they don’t drive you door to door at the exact time you want to go somewhere. I don't bother mentioning that they’ve never visited the senior center other than one time, under duress, to pick up the monthly activity calendar (just to see if they might like to go) and have never boarded the Sunshine Bus. 

But none of this matters, apparently. Again, I have to put myself in their position, wondering if I’d want to get involved with a senior center even if I were the right age. If there were no other options, maybe, but I can appreciate their reluctance. Luckily for them, my parents have options, and I am the one they’ve chosen.

Baby Steps

Everybody gets a gold star this week. I set limits patiently and kindly, and my parents actually agreed to try having their groceries delivered from Safeway.com. Of course, I still had to do the virtual shopping since my parents never joined the internet age, but it seems to have worked out and could become part of our routine now and then.

Grocery shopping per se has never been a problem for me. Unlike many people, I enjoy going to the store, meandering through random aisles just to see what might turn up. But shopping for other people, especially on a weekly basis, I find far less interesting.  In fact, it’s starting to feel like a reverse kind of the hell that parents shopping with toddlers must experience. 

“Are you sure you don’t need two rolls of paper towels? Didn’t you run out before? Oh—you want the sugar free, fat-free yogurt, not the low-fat. Gosh, a few extra calories might be a good thing in your case. No? OK. Yes, I already got the box of white zinfandel and the diet 7-Up. But you still need a quart of whole milk and ice cream—and I won’t forget the fat-free cottage cheese this time.”

It’s like shopping for Jack Spratt and his wife. My stepmother regards sugar and fat as hated adversaries (for no good reason; she is not diabetic and weighs less than 90 pounds) while my dad seeks them out: hot chocolate, whole milk and ice cream every day.  Both of them could stand to gain a good 10 to 15 pounds, but my nutritional advice falls on deaf ears. 

A spirit of rebellion, building toward blind rage, started to rear its head during our weekly trips to the store.  This can’t go on, I realized, so I calmly announced that I’m going to need one weekend per month “off,” and added that they’ll have to decide how to get their groceries that week. My stepbrother and his wife are almost never available on weekends, so the remaining options were hiring a helper or trying the delivery service.  For now they’ve chosen the latter. 

An occasional home care provider could greatly enrich their lives and would give them (and their family members) a measure of freedom and peace of mind. Money on that scale is not an issue to them, but the resistance to “outsiders,” those “people we don’t know” overrides logic. 

To a degree, I understand the reluctance to reveal their frailty—let alone their shopping habits—to strangers. But as they acknowledged, I do have a life. And I need to spend more of it outside of supermarkets.