By Natasha Josefowitz, Ph.D.
LA JOLLA, California — I have just noticed that I have become more cautious. I used to not really notice curbs—I would naturally walk off and on—now I am aware: there is a curb, I must step carefully. I never noticed uneven pavement; now I walk with my eyes down looking for slight irregularities where my foot could get caught. I don’t like movie theaters where you have to walk up a lot of steps in the dark without a ramp. I don’t feel too sturdy.
When I drove, if I knew the way, I never thought about the road ahead. Now, even though I have been somewhere many times before, I think: let’s see, at the top of Torrey Pines I will turn left and left again at the light. I make a mental map of where I am going. I never had to do that.
I need to look at my day’s schedule several times and even then I can forget to go somewhere because I was involved with something else at the time. I have to write down, not only the person’s name who called, but more often than not their affiliation—the university, the doctors office, the friend’s friend.
Some of my friends have cars with very low seats. I can usually get into them, but getting out is another story, especially if they have parked right next to a curb so that the floorboard is even with the sidewalk. It is like getting up from the floor, which I cannot do without crawling up to a chair and hoisting myself up with my arms. Waiting for my friend to give me a hand is embarrassing because as he pulls me out of his vehicle I am a dead weight. I like old-style London taxis with a decent height from the car to the street, where my feet are actually under my body and not even with my hips.
Deep sofas can be a problem especially if I sit in the middle where there are no armrests to push myself up on. And let me tell you about low toilet seats: they are made to accommodate small children, not slightly shrunken older folks.
It is not news that print should be larger, but people don’t seem to realize that red ink on white paper and white ink on black paper in playbills and other publications are very hard to decipher.
Romantic lighting in restaurants may work wonders for wrinkles, but not for reading the menus. And loud music definitely ruins any possibility for conversation for the hearing-aid-wearing crowd.
I read that 10,000 people reach age 65 every day, and the segment of the population growing the fastest is 85+. In the airport security line, I wish they would not make me take off my shoes; it’s hard to get them back on. I’m sure no terrorist organization would recruit a little wrinkled person with glasses, white hair, and a slightly bewildered look.
On the other hand—yes there is another hand—these can be the most fun years yet, having shed a lot of the burdens of young adulthood and middle-age, we are free to indulge ourselves: We don’t have to worry about the cumulative effects of our bad habits, they will have no time to accumulate. With our shrinking hippocampi, we have less impulse control and thus we tell the truth more often—even if it is unwelcome—and have fun being outrageous at times. And it is good for young people to see feisty grandparents doing their own thing.
And so there is compensation for everything—just be sure to take advantage of every moment, every situation, there isn’t much time left, so let’s become the best of what we have always known we could be.
© 2015. Natasha Josefowitz. This article initially appeared in La Jolla Village News. You may comment directly to the author at natasha.josefowitz@sdjewishworld.com, or post your comment on this website provided that the rules below are observed.
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