No work of literature, and no doctor, had prepared the former residents of Katalin Street for the fierce light that old age would bring to bear on the shadowy, barely sensed corridor down which they had walked in the earlier decades of their lives, or the way it would rearrange their memories and system of values. They knew they should expect certain biological changes: that the body would set about its work of demolition with the same meticulous attention to detail that from the moment of conception it had applied to the task of preparing itself for the journey ahead. They had accepted that there would be alterations in their appearance and a weakening of the senses, along with changes in their tastes, their habits, and their needs; that they might fall prey to gluttony or lose all interest in food, become fear-ridden or hypersensitive or fractious. They had resigned themselves to the prospect of increasing difficulties with digestion and sleeping, things they had taken for granted when young, like life itself. But no one had told them that the most frightening thing of all about the loss of youth is not what is taken away but what is granted in exchange. Not wisdom. Not serenity. Not sound judgment or tranquility. Only the awareness of universal disintegration.
--from the first page of Katalin Street by Magda Szabo
Clearly they all need to join AARP so they can get the AARP magazine and read breezy, upbeat articles about reinventing themselves and having fabulously fulfilling encore careers. Though I imagine nothing of the sort existed in pre-war Budapest. SAD!
ReplyDeleteThe endless mailings from AARP are one thing, at least, that the characters are spared.
DeleteI heard this on NPR a couple of weeks ago - getting old sucks for everyone.
ReplyDeleteIf we live in a society of accumulation, one of the things that happens to you when you get older is that you begin to lose things. You begin to lose your friends, you begin to lose contact with the world. And of course, as you get older you begin to think about how you're going to lose your very existence, your life.
--Hanif Kureishi, interview
I initially thought that what you heard on NPR was "Getting old sucks for everyone"; I thought how casual NPR was getting in its reportage. Losing some stuff sounds like downright relief . . . friends less so.
DeleteI still can't articulate satisfactorily what this revealed to me. Valuing what is acquired over almost anything else, leads to fearing loss as the greatest ill, thus "keeping" is a primary goal.
ReplyDeleteInstead we could be celebrating the flow of the river of life without trying to stop it. Gah. turning towards Buddhism in my olde age, I guess.