But this number comes with some titles and labels, the main one of which that I would like to adopt is "elder." Now being or becoming an elder carries some trappings with it. For example, it is precisely twice the age we swore never to trust anyone older than, back in the 60's. It probably looks a tad silly for an elder to be rocking out to AC/DC, so my view of myself as a rocker may need some alterations. But most formally, an elder ought to be a mentor, not to anyone specifically, but to society and people in general.
So what is it that I have to give? On what do I offer my mentoring? All I really have to claim solely as my own are these scars - wounds from various battles - and lessons taken from really screwing up royally. But, you see, that is the wisdom of aging. We don't really learn much from our successes. We simply note it and say something like, "Cool, that worked!" But our failures - wow - we ponder them; we slice and dice and analyze them until we figure out where we went wrong and use the pain of the failure to make certain that the lesson sinks in so that we don't repeat the same mistake.
Several years ago I wrote an op-ed piece on what I called the "Shadow Resume" - the compilation, not of all our good accomplishments, but of our lessons taken from the crash-and-burn failures. That is what I have to offer today - I survived all of those tough, painful, don't-want-to-do-that again stuff. Perhaps it is all any of us really can lay claim to.
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1 comment:
i think i'm missing something, and maybe it's that my age starts with the wrong digit and i still see la vie en rose, but if you can offer your elder wisdom, then i'm going to offer my youthy optimism because like the yin and yang, we need each other.
Perhaps it is all any of us really can lay claim to.
i'm not buying it. maybe in moments of doubt or uncertainty our lives look like nothing but the lessons learned from our mistakes. but we are more than our mistakes - even if they are the most beautiful, complex, defining parts of us. come on, dad - you can "lay claim" to me, can't you? our relationship may not be perfect, and it certainly has been shaped by mistakes, but without the other side of the coin - our strengths, our successes - you don't have the full picture.
it's easier to learn from mistakes, i'll give you that, and i want you to write those books we talked about on our last ride together (because someone needs to! and i vote for you) but i wouldn't want to stop there. that would be a mistake.
happy birthday, dad. (and don't worry, you've always been "old" to me! hahahaa)
:)
p.s. and why can't an elder rock out?? don't redefine rocknroll because your age is "uncool" in 60's standards. maybe it's your ability to rock out and be an elder that makes you truly respectable. don't people always talk about respecting most those elders who have the youth of a child and the wisdom of the world??
rock on.
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