Advice to the Newly Old

If you thought you will be young forever ... and you no longer think so ... Welcome to the newly old.

If you get up, in the morning and take your first look in the mirror and you wonder for a moment whose is that face, yep, you are one of the newly old. Congratulations, you are not dead.

What happened to your face at night? Did some gnome sit around on it dislocating your jawbone? Pulling it down? Making your cheeks flatten out like pancakes? Yep, you have stepped into the worlds of the newly old. Do you have a double chin? Oh you just noticed it today? Yep. Newly old. But most of all do you have to sit down when you are dressing in the morning? Yep, you got it.

In the Goddess community we have made a great deal about “old is good”. Old is wise. Hail to all crones! We read books about the juicy crones, the nimble and fast footed dancing crones. Well that’s fantasy. Hopeful thinking. And all out fibbing. Aging sucks big time and everybody knows it.

First Advice (not very holistic advice but why not):

Go into total denial. Denial works at this stage. Make the most of it. Later it won’t. Things will be too obvious.

We can always use philosophy. Getting old is not really age related. It's true, some teenagers are older then you. Hey there are some pre-teens who are older then you. Cherish this. As long as it lasts.

Denial of age is wonderfully aided by a multibillion-dollar beauty industry. If you think you have money to throw away, go ahead. Get worked on. I would not.... In a few years the fat is back, but not your money, the sagging is back but for awhile you didn’t have to think about mortality. If you did all this to get more love you will notice that being fat or slim has nothing to do with getting love. It may have to do with getting attention, but hey, attention is cheap if you desired love in the first place. That’s the point, of course — not the better looks. The looks you had, you had to hand back into Life like rented shoes at the bowling alley.

Denial works when you act “young”, body aches permitting. Body pains of course grow like weeds. But be careful, when you take the painkillers and work out in denial, you may wake up with more troubles than just aging. Like a broken bone or pulled muscle or a ruined liver. You may end up in spasms. In which case we go into the next advice.

Advice 2

Avoid pain at all costs.

Our entire culture is set up for ’no pain no gain'. For the newly old it’s just the opposite!! "No pain, all gain" is our motto A day without pain is a day enjoyed. Get a lot of meds that actually kill/prevent/modify pain — alternative meds or not. Investigate and get them. The meds industry is next to the weapons industry. Our culture can kill very well sometimes — even kill the pain. But they cannot cure a thing.

Nothing got cured since the invention of antibiotics. We are powerless against viruses. Aging??? Forget it. Its not meant to be cured.

Don’t suffer. Suffering is for the young.

Advice 3

Relearn to play.

When you are newly old you are not yet clever about the ways to spend your time with the most pleasure. You worked all your life, you have forgotten how to really play. This is important to reclaim this skill, play.

Playing begins with the important skill of doing nothing.

Doing nothing is fraught with difficulties. The most disturbing of this is Guilt.

Remember that the guilt you feel about not working is false guilt. You have already given society back all you can. Your youth was spent in the serving of society, raising kids was giving back to the future. if you had no kids, you served society by being birth control. You own nothing to anybody. Get rid of guilt by practicing doing nothing every day for about five hours. Once you are good at this, proceed to...

Advice 4

Play for free.

One part of the education of the newly old is to find out what is offered to old people, and to take advantage of it immediately, even if you are not quite a high senior age.

I get lower price movie tickets and go to Yoga for free. Senior centers have lists of services and entertainment opportunities. Sign up for the most expensive gigs. Feel good looking better then anybody else around you. Amongst the real seniors the newly old can enjoy the illusion that you are still young.

Advice 5

Most of your energies must be used to develop a group of Friends around you for friendship and care. Make sure they are a little younger than you. In case you get older ... it's good to have friends who are just beginning their journey on cronehood and still have energy to take you out, drive with you to places, and make your life a little easier. Of course you cannot make “old friends”. They are inherited from your well-spent queenhood, you earned them like frequent flyer mileage. Old friends are holding your youth in their memories. In their eyes you cannot age, you are eternally young. Old friends must be carefully tended and kept close to the heart.

Advice 6

The newly old has to have its dose of entertaiment. Don’t, let the culture forget you. Write letters to networks and complain if you don’t find what entertains you. Letter writing is a big power both in politics and entertainment. TV networks cater to the young because they drink Coca-Cola or Pepsi and have disposable income. Write a letter and explain to them you are buying stuff too, get advertisers for stuff older people need: mattresses, fine linen, comfortable clothes, healthy vitamins, herbal teas and coffees. We use spas, massages, body oils and dietary supplemrets. Candles and produce. Online shopping. Healthcare items.

Instead of showing up in person to concerts, now that you need to be
comfortable, attend the concerts from the best seat in the house, your couch. The couch has now risen to crone altar status in your life. Make sure you are very comfortable in it. Tend your couch with care, clean it, reupholster it, and make it the best you can.

Advice 7

Get rid of all mirrors in your house except in your bathroom. Mirrors lie.

When you look into mirrors you don’t really see you as others see you. You see yourself looking suspiciously into the mirror. That’s not reality. You bring a lot of attitude to that look in the mirror. You are critical of your body, your fat, and the lines on your face. You condemn yourself when you look into the mirror. So don’t.

Live as your humanity, not as the mirror tells you. Live for the day. Your humanity is all you have and have earned.

Let’s take a whimsical look at the wonderful world of the newly old. This is not what’s in my latest book Celestial Guide to Every Year in Your Life (published by Redwheel, coming out in the spring). Celestial Guide is helpful but it is still PC and wise. Its about astrology and the big celestial picture projected on the smaller personal charts. I find myself having more than just the wise woman point of view and see people in-groups of:

a. The non-old.

This group is eternally old. No matter what age, they were old at birth. They had been around the old solar system many times. You ask them a question and you get tired, weary answers. How are you? would get you Who cares?

b. The brand newly old.

These people are still in their twenties, but they have noticed the march of time. Many need eye glasses, which are new to them; many need drugs to cope. These people think life has passed them by already. They gave rise to the ancient saying of “youth is wasted on the young.”

c. The newly newly old.

This group is thirty something, but they miss their twenties. This group is in deep denial, they step up their workouts, and they spend the most money on looks. Yet they are frightened every day as they see their faces in many many mirrors reflecting back their humanity. Where are the eternally jogging lap types now? They have no more kneecaps! They are on crutches while you, who didn’t jog, have both knees still and are walking. Stop all strenuous exercise.

d. The newly old.

Forty something’s.

This group is the main target for the plastic surgeons. This group has the money and the desire to be young again. They look good, but they are still over forty. The body is underneath the tout skin aging.

Actors in this age group tighten their faces like sitting in a gale of windstorm. Don’t bother. Think of the beautifully lived-in faces of European actors, their every reflection tells a story. Faces tell their life story. Have one. Now is the time to start treasuring your humanity and not your looks.

e. Newly oldish.

This is the over fifty group. Since we live a longer time then ever before this is a group I call the young cronies.

CRONIES HAVE A CLUE. The aches and pains and their relief now ranks above the way we look, and more like how we feel. We now don’t care how we look as long as we feel good. Internal realities have taken over external superficialities. Who can enjoy looking good when your back is aching? It's like being praised in the funeral home about how good you look dead!

This is a rapidly growing demography, millions of boomers are coming into this group. This is the generation that gave us Woodstock. The real Woodstock, not the following ones with pills and booze and expensive waters and no shade. The first Woodstock with marihuana and juices and mushrooms and acid. That was the only true Woodstock nation gathering, even thou we felt there may be more coming. We actually thought that would be the mode of the new culture.

Where are they now? I wonder if we could ever call back the old Woodstock nation for a reunion. Many tired, the younger ones have a nostalgia for those freedom times, but the drugs have changed and rage has built up and now its hell at those gatherings. Young people are righteously outraged when they are exploited.

f. Truly old

Here is everybody over 8o. This group is remarkable. They get a third wind at 84 and fly off the chart. I know many people in this age group and I hold them dear as role models. There is no BS at this age group. They are truth tellers and if they are blessed, sharp minded. I don’t know if I will ever make it that far. My aunt Titi is 88 but still lies about her age. She said she is 86. Nobody cares.

Aging still sucks. My auntie is getting ready for her death every day. She gives away her books to friends. When the day comes, she will be the best-prepared dead person in Budapest. I don’t want her to go. I don’t want her to die. My last ancestor. So many questions still to ask. So many answers that will never happen.