Hi, I'm Back . . .

. . . and sort of dumbstruck:  by the turn the world has suddenly taken (at once terrifying and absurd), and by the contrast between my life and my brief escape from it. 

Most of all, bar and bat mitzvahs are about the turning of the wheel of generations -- certain moments on that wheel are marked so that you notice the motion that is raising others toward their heights as it carries you under (or vice versa, if you're young and it's your time).  Not only the next but the next next generation of our family was present:  our dad, the Director of Sunsets, is 90 and Matt and Julie's baby is already visible like the first edge of sunrise under her shirt.  As Gabe formally took on the responsibilities of a man while still mostly interested in playing games nonstop, the next generation, "our kids," officially ceased being kids.  Most of them are deep into young adulthood; it's their time and their world.  (Nick, 24, is even old enough to say for the first time, "I'm too old to . . . " in reference to falling repeatedly off a skim board.)  As we crammed ourselves ill-fittingly into the glass slipper of conservative Judaism, I was proud of our scandalous diversity, on display in this next generation who come in a post-tribal assortment of sizes, shapes, and shades, braiding many of the DNA trees as if they weren't nearly adulterated enough yet.  (Pictures eventually to come.)

My relationship to all this partakes of both delight and melancholy, because I don't directly have a dog in that fight, the next generation -- a fate I never imagined for myself.  It makes me feel strangely apart and detached from that wheel, going down loosely without pulling anyone up, like a kite catching the sun when I'm already in shadow.  The throng and babble of family seems at a slight remove even when I am, by some miracle (like finding Cody to take care of J), momentarily in the midst of it.  I was shipwrecked, I guess, by J's lifelong enactment of an ocean liner slowly, grandly going down, ripped open by the iceberg of Russia.  (Sorry, metaphor salad.) 

But I find quick and fitting relief in the fact that it's not about me any more.  Now it's about them. 

Comments

[realpc]

I don't know if every older person feels that way -- that their life is becoming irrelevant while only the younger generations are important. Maybe most do, I really have never thought about it before. Since young people have more time ahead of them, they have more potential, more decisions, more uncertainty, fear and hope. Old people of course have less of all that, but they have, hopefully, found themselves or parts of themselves. They have, with luck, much more serenity than the average young person.

So like anything it's a trade off, with advantages and disadvantages for all. Maybe certain subcultures have that philosophy, that everything should be focused on the young. Or maybe it's part of the youth-oriented culture that started around the 1960s.

I don't personally like the thought of becoming steadily more irrelevant. Not that I'm an egomaniac (I hope not anyway). I just think all of us, whatever our age or gender, have importance and relevance and deserve respect and attention.

[David]

Me miss you. :(

[Ron]

If it makes you feel better, it's still about you too, if the ship is sinking!

[amba]

D: me you too.

[amba]

real: I'm talking about something that feels like nature more than culture.

Culture counters it to some degree by saying that every individual has value. And many cultures (though not ours, lately) have countered it by specifically saying that old people have value -- that they're the repositories of memory and perspective.

I do think we can provide ballast and perspective and encouragement, the long view, to young people who are sometimes drowning in the present and can't see a horizon.

[Mom]

We have something important: the conniective tissue of experience and memory that helps it all make sense. Where would they be without us? And that means you, too, Annie dear. Each of us is an outsider, a bystander, and also a participant. We are both. You mean an enourmous lot to Dad and me. You are always important to us.

Love you--

[amba]

Ron: how's that? I'm trying to get inside the metaphor: I'm the captain trying to keep it from sinking? Or just an older person letting younger people have the lifeboats because I've had mine?

[RW Rogers]

Welcome home!

[karen]

You matter to me, too.

This crazy world of blog- it opens so many windows into lives... and the coming generations you influence by sharing and by writing- you may never know how many...

Glad you had a safe trip home.

[Harry Gottlieb]

The weekend wouldn't have been as joyous without you. We all continue to be relevant as long as we heed your advice and keep breathing.

love, dad

[realpc]

I guess I don't have any young relatives I feel close to. If I did, i would be very glad to -- not give advice or anything like that, -- but tell about what I have learned. Of course my own personal experiences would not be of interest to everyone. Our civilization is so complex and varied that an older person's experience might have no value outside a very small subgroup.

So I think Amba is expressing gratitude for having younger relatives who will continue when the older ones are gone. I would feel the same way if, as I said, I felt close to any young relatives.

And what I am trying to express, which I don't think I did express, is that we still have a personal future even if we are not young. It's too bad when people stop having goals and plans and hopes just because they aren't young.

Kids in school are always learning fun things (in addition to boring things) and trying to be creative. They might not be a great artist, but their parents proudly display their drawings anyway.

Then we grow up and no one hangs up our drawings and then we stop bothering to learn new subjects or skills or practice old ones. We sit in front of endless TV shows and stop evolving.

I don't want to do that! I am still learning things all the time, as always. I do not feel I have learned it all and understood it all and don't have to study any more. I know more than I used to, but still have questions.

Americans do not value or respect age (except in politics, where Obama is considered a young kid at 46), and the result is that a lot of older people focus exclusively on kids and grandchildren, forgetting their own selves completely. (I have a feeling that what I just said has many exceptions though).

[amba]

I don't think we have to worry about a lot of baby boomers forgetting their own selves completely.

[Walrus]

A metaphor salad perhaps, but a salad is only as good as its ingredients. This one was delicious.

This - "Matt and Julie's baby is already visible like the first edge of sunrise under her shirt" - was superb.

[realpc]

"I don't think we have to worry about a lot of baby boomers forgetting their own selves completely."

Yes, we probably have the opposite problem. It's nice that you still feel connected to extended family even at a distance. I almost never saw the youngest generation of my family while they were growing up, so I almost don't feel related to them.

[Outis]

Ron wrote: If it makes you feel better, it's still about you too, if the ship is sinking!

Ron, that may be the worst pep talk ever.

[Ron]

Outis, not so much pep talk, as trying to say Amba isn't shipwrecked, but here...on the ship...with the rest of us...which is sinking...hoo boy!

ummm...see, you're not alone, your suffering shoulder-to-shoulder with your fellows!

Yes, I see your point!

[Outis]

Ron, do you have any requests for the band?

[Ron]

Well, I suppose "Nearer my God to thee" is traditional, but I was thinking more "Have Nagilla", (Dick Dale version if you can!) or maybe "The Way We Were" or "Evergreen" for the mawkishly maudlin effect! Shouldn't XM Radio have a 24-hour Maudlin channel?

Given Amba's earlier writing up there (on deck as it were!) perhaps "Sunrise, Sunset?" OK, I'm having a Babs moment and am are all verklempt. Talk amongst yourselves. Topic: McCain in Palin's plane still isn't sure who's running Spain!

[Ron]

ignore extraneous "are" above!

[amba]

Have Nagila, Will Travel?

[Ron]

Oy, my spelling!

[Danny]

This post is so gorgeously written that if I tried to mention the phrases that took my breath away I'd have to retype the whole thing! I also like it because I strongly agree with the comments of ALL your readers, even the ones with whom I usually vehemently disagree. (Of course, such disagreements can be fun, too!)

[Melinda]

Have Nagila, Will Travel?

Have two; they're small.

[Ron]

I, do, of course, have a nagilla...but I don't talk about it much in mixed company!

[Donna B.]

Melinda, you remember Laugh In too? Though, I think the joke has been done several times since.

[Melinda]

Donna, yeah, I remember Joanne Worley doing that bit.

[Ruth Anne]

Did you make your special fish dish?

[amba]

I, do, of course, have a nagilla...but I don't talk about it much in mixed company.

Nagila monster, eh?

[amba]

No, I didn't contribute anything culinary. It was all I could do to get myself there.

[Ron]

I think this post is infused with a high amount of "shecky-on" particles*, and thus is filled with knowing, glowing humor and perhaps a soupcon or two of love...good work Amba!

*Something Star Trek taught me is that when you have no Newtonian explanation for something, invent a subatomic particle about it.