Perspective Grand old folks borne along on
faith
By ARTHUR JONES
We each have generational markers in
our lives. And, with fond memories and sadness, watch entire generations ahead
of us slip away. I was 16 when my last grandfather died, 26 when my last
grandmother died. All my grandparents had outlived their siblings and most of
their friends.
Then came that quarter-century interlude until it was the turn of
my parents generation to age and die. And I, in my 50s, began counting
off the uncles and aunts, my parents and their friends. And yet, find Im
still counting.
For, unlike my grandparents generation, where death in
ones late 60s through early 80s was general, a noticeable part of my
parents generation is using 90 as a marker. These nonagenarians or
greater who, wobbly or wandering, gamely or gravely, have hung on, are now, one
by one, beginning to go.
That began several years ago when my wifes friend, Mabel,
died in Kansas at about 103. She was still driving. The youngest of three
sisters, all schoolteachers, shed nursed the older two through their
90s.
Then Madge died at 98. What a turnout! She always was at Mass.
Smartly dressed, well-read, frail and feisty until the end. And, in the final
decade, protective of her age. Shed fudged 98. Her granddaughters checked
the records of the ship Madge had arrived on from England in 1904. Apparently
she was really 102.
Anna, my journalist chum and a Rome correspondent for three-plus
decades, died in her late 90s. At her 90th birthday party she chided me as her
greatest disappointment. The party was attended by three former
directors of the CIA and many CIA friends from her Rome days. One wonders what
Anna had had in mind for me, 30-plus years earlier.
Our friend Lewis just died at 91, and God was kind to call him,
though his wife, Mercedes, may not feel so. Not after more than 60 years
together.
In the Depression, new college graduate Lewis landed a teaching
job in the Midwest, quite a plum when unemployment was the norm.
But it didnt last. When they realized Lewis was a Catholic,
he was ousted to make room for one of their own. And Lewis, later, after
donning a uniform in World War II, became and remained a mailman. A happy
mailman, a kindly, tall and gentle man, and entertaining, until quite close to
the end.
My friend, Dero, not quite 90, wants to attend his 70th college
reunion a few years hence. My wifes mother -- and the sisters in Ireland
-- peg each fresh nonagenarian day like a move on the cribbage board, a
progress measured equally in determination and luck.
Whatever the woes, all these folks have been borne along in their
first eight or so decades on the crest of their deep faith.
When they die, or sometimes just before, los viejos like
these take on the aura of something akin to an unrecognized national treasure.
It is simply a matter of their having survived, and we want to extract the
wisdom while we may.
Fifty years ago this year, when I began as a boy reporter, people
living over 90 were so remarkable I was assigned to writing about them. My
approach then was curiosity.
I interviewed a woman who had been to the first worlds fair
-- the Great Exhibition of 1851 -- and had her portrait made there as a
6-year-old. There was the old man on Hume Street who fought alongside Buffalo
Bill in the Indian wars. There was Charlie Lee who sold oysters in the medieval
market square outside the Barley Mow pub in Warrington in northwest
England.
He sold his oyster stand when he was in his 90s. And I wrote that
no one could remember Warrington market without Charlie Lee. And a man from
Wales wrote and said, I can. I sold the stall to Charlie. So much
for my categorical statements.
And then there was Miss Hill.
Miss Hill was to be 102 the following day. I turned up with a
bunch of flowers and introduced myself and said I wanted to write about her
102nd birthday on the morrow. And she replied:
Mr. Jones, on the occasion of my centenary, your newspaper
wrote an extensive article about me. And my views havent changed in two
years! (Moral: Dont patronize the elderly.)
But she didnt close the door. She invited me in for a cup of
tea.
And I got the story the others had missed. How shed wanted
to be a concert pianist, was taught by a friend and pupil of Mozarts. But
her tiny hands couldnt span an octave. And she remained an enthusiastic
amateur instead. How shed always hated Bach. But at 90, with arthritis
seriously setting in, she found all she could manage to play, for the fingering
permitted it, were certain pieces by Bach.
Imagine, she spat out, having to develop an
appreciation for Bach in ones 90s. And then she smiled, and gave me
her little bit of wisdom. Personalities do not change with age. The only
girls who grow up to be sweet old ladies, she said, are sweet young
ladies.
Its implications amount to a cautionary tale for all of us.
Arthur Jones is NCRs editor-at-large.
National Catholic Reporter, January 18,
2002
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