Elderly Folks

This August, I'll turn 60. My daughter says that this is the cutoff for mid-life crises. I can have one up to then. What about afterward? I asked her. We'll put it down to senility, she replied. We do tease about that. She told me that she told some friends that she teases me about being old and being a crip. They were astonished, and she was astonished by their astonishment. I guess most Dads don't tease like that, she concluded. I guess not.

My imminent entry into the ranks of elderhood has affected how I think about old people, a little, even though I still maintain that the older I get, the older old gets. (Currently, it's about 75). I get somewhat exasperated when my mother does some things, as when she threw out all of her Tylenol, because she'd heard of people damaging their kidneys or livers through excessive use; it took a call from her family doc to assure her that taking up to four thousand milligrams per day (which works out to eight extra-strength Tylenols) would be okay. Or when she agreed that I could take her to the library on our way back from her medical appointment; after going significantly out of the way from home, she said as we were pulling into the lot, that she didn't really think she wanted to go in; she would wait in the car while I got some books for her. Then why the hell... I thought. I didn't say it, but I think it was fairly obvious what I thought. I have to remember that this is a fairly old -- 85 -- woman who's somewhat frail and apprehensive; she doesn't like new things, or exerting herself, or challenging authority (and she has a wide range of what she considers to be 'authority'; her once a week companion, for example, carries the same weight as her doctor). I will occasionally say to my wife If I ever get like that, just shoot me. I just don't have much patience for it.

And yet this afternoon, when she looked really frail and sounded really tired, I thought I know she's going to die, probably in the next five years, and maybe less, but I hope it isn't today. Because though I can handle the idea intellectually, I don't think I could do it emotionally. And because she asks so little now, it's more than a little cheap of me not to give it willingly, while I have the time.