Being Seventy: Two

Here is another bit from Being Seventy that I liked.

Page 27: I remember in Honolulu hearing that wonderful old Friend, Cathy Cox, say, “Youth is for learning; middle age is for doing; old age is for enjoying.” When you are old — as I to my astonishment now am — learning is also enjoying. One goes full circle in more ways than entering second childhood.

My first round of formal education ended when I was seventeen and graduated from high school. I took a couple of college courses at night school during the years I was working, before marrying. But I didn't get very far with that. The practical learning of my twenties was learning to be married and learning to be an adult, followed quickly by learning to be a parent. I didn't return to college until I was forty-eight and was totally surprised by how much I loved  formal learning. Seminary was more of that -- so much so that upon completion of the M.Div., I enrolled in and finished my S.T.M. More than once, in that middle-age time, I considered continuing on and taking a D.Min., just for the sake of doing it, for the learning. 

So, for me, the learning was the doing. The doing was the child-raising, the friend-bonding, the charitable activity. And, of course, the working, as I followed the generation of stay-at-home moms. And the doing continued on into old age in that I was sixty-eight when I began my work as a paid hospital chaplain.  I'm thinking, too, about my quilting goals for this calendar year, the skills I want to learn. I wonder if that's about the learning or about the doing.

So, while Cathy Cox's life was easily divisible into segments, for me, it wasn't that simple; there was a great deal more overlap, a kind of fluidity.

I can't quibble with the part about old age's being for enjoying. Honna recently observed that she'd been struck by how content I am with my life. She was close: I'm more than content; I am joyful. I work three mornings each week, not for the income, but for the joy of the place, for the pleasure of being with dedicated teachers and interesting students. I do my shift at the food pantry because I've learned that, truly, it is in giving that we receive. The long friendships, the pride in who my children have become, the spectacularity of grandchildren all bring joy. The comfort of a marriage of more than fifty years to a man who continues to make me laugh out loud every single day is the greatest joy of all.