Thursday, July 19, 2018

ON BEING EIGHTY

    A couple of months ago the micro manager turned 80. The occasion was marked quietly with a good lunch out. Life goes on.

    A few days ago I looked at the Micro Manager and for the first and only time I could see an eighty year old woman. What's been going on before this? 

    I tended to look at the Micro Manager as being a much younger person. I had an image in my head of her in her late twenties. This shouldn't be the case. We've gone through the ages and stages. We were a young couple. We had kids. Our kids left us. We worked hard and enjoyed freedom. Retirement came. Retirement goes on. All these things have happened and yet I still had the image of a younger woman in my head.

    For the most part this discrepancy doesn't matter but I got thinking about reality for a minute. Am I making the right decisions when I have an inaccurate image of age in my head? Do I expect more from the Micro Manager than I should? The Micro Manager is spunky and a hard driver. But still age has taken it's toll. She doesn't have the same energy anymore. However , she still wants to live the same old way. 

    I've heard many people say that they have an image of themselves which is much younger. The image of myself in my head is a young person who has just finished high school. 

     Now this is the first time I've noticed that I see another person as much younger than they are. 

    So I guess this is a time for me to stop and think about life. 

36 comments:

  1. I think most of us want to do things as if we were younger but sometimes reality hits us in the face. It's good if you've seen the micro-manager as younger and more able and up to date she has been able to live up to it. I think she'll tell you if she can't but maybe it would be nice for her (not sure) if you eased up on your expectations! I'm saying I'm not sure because some people get offended when you treat them differently, as in expect less of them.

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    1. It's touchy. some people want it both ways.

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  2. I’d be very careful talking about this subject around the micro manager. Have you asked her what she sees when she looks at you?

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    1. Oh , you're tough. She tells me what she sees everyday and it's not pretty!!! You do ask a very interesting question.

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  3. Not I. I see myself as the old lady I am and I feel it every year. I also am seeing it in my husband and trying to adjust. The hard part is he has no intention of slowing down (as if running ahead of death) and I have to be around to pick up the pieces as he continues to lumber ahead.

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    1. Well that's different. Most people see themselves as younger. Seeing yourself as elderly is probably much healthier.

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  4. I sometimes can't believe that I am 70 when something I always did costs me more effort than usual. Than I realize but I am 70! I can't have the same energy for ever. But you don't feel you are an older person but you are....

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    1. yes, running into challenging situations is tough to accept.

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  5. I do the same thing, Red. It's hard to take the old picture out of my mind and allow the new one in. It's the same for me and my image of myself. Although the way I feel today after a super hard hike yesterday makes me think of my age. Ouch! :-)

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    1. Yes, we do meet up with reality from time to time.

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  6. always good to stop and think about life but never stop seeing her through your eyes memory, for ever young, our outward appearance is just an illusion, its whats ticking inside that counts,

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  7. I think you are an optimist Red. Thats ok...how does she see you...handsome and young with no age related problems:)

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    1. I am hopelessly optimistic but I'm afraid to ask what the Micro Manager might see. She'd be brutally honest!

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  8. To me, getting older is more like me staying the same, and everyone else getting younger. Used to be, only old people drove cars. Now I see little kids driving cars. I'd go to the doctor, and he was an old man. Now I go to the doctor, and he looks like he couldn't possibly be old enough to be a doctor.
    I'm still the same, but everyone else is getting younger.
    Except my friend and family..

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  9. I'm younger. The only signs of time going on for me is a knee that gives me problems on cold damp days (thanks to a hit and run accident years ago) and more grey in my beard than there was a couple of years ago- which I credit more to a period of profound stress for several months in which I was dealing with a scumbag landlord.

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    1. Stress takes it's toll.

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    2. It does. It was bad enough that myself and other tenants told family that if anything bad were to happen to us, the police should look squarely at him as the culprit.

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  10. I think it is nice that you still see the younger woman in your Micro Manager. Why adjust your thinking? Stick with it. There's nothing wrong with that.

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    1. I don't think it's something that can be adjusted but we can use good judgement.

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  11. Interesting subject Red. I think I see myself and my husband as we were when younger most of the time. There are those days when I feel my age and they can come like a slap in the face. I usually see people close to me as they were when younger. My sons are both in their 40's but they still seem to be in their 20's to me. However if I meet someone new I am more likely to see them as their actual age. I think what Laurie (above) said is important. Outward appearance and age is one thing, but it is who the person is inside that really counts.

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    1. You make some good points . One must work to see your kids as adults.

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    1. Nice comment. I think you hit the nail on the head.

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  13. When I hurt, as I do often now, I am jarred into reality. My body knows it's old, but my brain doesn't.

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    1. Good point. we're working with the brain. Now as teachers we would go on about left brain ...right brain! Ha ha

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  14. Hello, I hope we all feel younger than we look. I think that is a good thing, we do not want to stop doing things. I maybe 60 something, but I feel more look 40 something. It is all in the way we think. Have a happy day and weekend.

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  15. I like that you see your wife as still being young. That is very sweet. I hope that my husband sees me as being younger. He does occasionally remind me of my age when I get out and over do something like cutting down all those trees a few weeks ago. I want to keep working.

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  16. Doing certain things take more effort than it did before but I do feel like I am 66 some days. I'm slower and more cautious than I used to be. It's all of us getting older and trying to understand the changes we are going through. How we look and think about ourselves and others will always be subject to change.

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  17. At 93 my Mother used to say that she still felt 18 in her head. On the other hand I know people who are old in the 40s. So long as the body keeps functioning we are as old as we believe we are. It's the wretched body that's the problem.

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  18. when i was a kid, we used to think anyone who made it to eighty was doing really well but my kids think everyone will live to ninety. As people live longer and healthier lives I think we forget to adjust our expectations.
    I think of myself as about thirty but a lot of eighty year olds are more physically able than I am so there's a frustrating disconnect

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  19. I think I must have forgotten to hit Publish on my comment a couple of days ago! Here it is again - there have been studies that show if you feel younger you can live longer. They're not sure why but feel it's probably due to getting more exercise, eating better, and staying interested in new things. I have to say I don't feel my age (sixty-one). On any given day I feel anywhere from twelve to forty-five. It's certainly NOT that I'm in great physical shape. More of a mental age. I don't know what that says about me - haha

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  20. I'm sure your wife quite appreciates your myopic view of her and age. I know I would!

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  21. It's been interesting getting older. Roger is going to be 76 in a few days and I'm 66. We don't have the energy we used to have, but we try to walk a couple of miles everyday. The thing that I recognize is that people our age are irrelevant to the marketing forces unless they are selling pain medication and other drugs. The world sells to the young. We are an afterthought. I like one of the earlier comments about noticing that all the doctors are the young ones now. So true. We're the gray generation. Still the coolest, but definitely gray.

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  22. My late husband said he always saw me as the young woman he married. I never stopped to think of how I saw him, but I loved him just as I did when he was 28 and I was 24, only more so.

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