What a privilege it is to live a long and healthy life and to ease into the aging process with both dignity and vitality. I can imagine no better example of how to remain vital in one’s later years than that set by my parents. Despite restrictions and life complications inflicted upon them by the aging process, they continue to learn, love and live with gusto. They are lucky to have each other; I am lucky to have them.
We are all aging. Some of us will dance the dance more gracefully than others. There are any number of uncharted steps between basic life expectancy and true quality of life – the line we walk grows narrow and our individual paths unknown. From child to adult child; from nurturer to nurtured; the journey continues, as we each, in turn, cross our own bridge between.
This is not so much a story of my parents growing old as it is the story of them staying young.
Home is but four walls and a roof for my parents. It had become little more than the place they went to recharge their batteries. Little by little, the downtime between trips had grown longer; the doctors’ visits while home more frequent. Their calendar was still blackened with activities but, understandably, lunch at the Council on Aging; a visit to the podiatrist; a lecture or film; simple, daily activities that would seem to fill the lives of many couples decades younger; this was no life for Peggy and Carlo. This was simply getting by. These things were not enough to fill the days of people who refuse to grow old.
There was no denying that age was robbing my father of his short term memory… I cried for a week. I cried for my father, for his memory loss. I cried for my mother, for the frustration she must be feeling. I cried for them both, for the loss of freedom that this malady would surely cause them. And I cried for myself, because no matter how often I say I recognize the gift of still enjoying my parents at their advanced ages, I am not –I cannot be –I will never be ready to recognize their mortality or face their passing.
There in the Charles de Gaulle airport, a tiny voice inside my head taunted me: It’s s 2:30 A.M., do you know where your mother is? I hated that she was out of my sight even for a few minutes, rolling off to who knows where, pushed by a churlish attendant who might just as soon drop her at a gate for a flight to Mongolia than deliver her to her proper gate – not that my mother wouldn’t love to visit Mongolia, but that isn’t my point. I am the caregiver.
Too late, we were only halfway to the ramp when the vaporetto pulled away from our stop, on its way to the far side of the Rialto Bridge. “Not to worry. Get off at the next stop, walk back and over the Rialto and you’ll be fine,” our gentleman friend offered. Though his advice was appreciated, it was all I could do not to scream. Can you not see my parents? Can you not see how tired and cold they are; that they cannot possibly troop over the Rialto; that it would take the great Carthaginian general Hannibal and all his elephants to lift them over its span? Is it not obvious that we have kept them out for hours longer than we expected, in the rain, and now I feel like the most horrible, irresponsible daughter on the planet?
The day stood only at late morning by the time we stepped off the vaporetto and onto the picturesque island of Burano. A funky mix of a traditional Italian fishing village and tourist trap, the island has a playful atmosphere much different than seriously historic Venice. Like Venice, many shops and homes sit waterfront along canals; but Burano has a blue collar working class feel versus the aristocratic air of Venice. Burano is Venice’s little sister, decked out in party colors, giggly and merry. Her facades are a kaleidoscope of every hue, from sunny yellow to startling turquoise to rosy red, a child running rampant through her big sister’s cosmetic case . A peek at the gently leaning Campanile di San Martino leaves one smiling with the notion that residents of Burano do not take themselves too seriously.
By our best calculations, we walked somewhere going on three miles that day, counting our tour around Burano. Three miles of ragged cobblestones, over unadorned bridges sans handrails, through pooled rainwater, the proposed ten minute walk had taken three minutes short of an hour. We traversed the streets like the tide, riding the highs and lows. While some people chart a course in detail, others are content to flow where ever the current takes them. That day we were carried out beyond the shore and only faith and perseverance brought us back. You don’t have to believe in true destiny to know there will always be situations in life beyond our control and that, like it or not, we must deal with them. My parents had delivered that message a thousand times throughout my life, a thousand different ways. That day in Venice, it was not simply “do as I say” but “do as we do.” They are my heroes.
After nearly sixty five years of marriage, they function nearly as one being, relying on each other’s strengths as much as possible. They retain the best of who they have always been and still thrive on knowledge and adventure. Refusing to grow old and stagnant, my father is fond of saying he is “aging,” that he is not yet old.