Veronica's
aunts grew old and died gracefully. Generally speaking. It was
dignified. According to the book. No botox or hair dye. No joining a
gym. No facelifts or bum tucks. Long white hair coiled into buns.
Dresses and cardigans and stockings. Sensible shoes. A little face
powder and rouge on special occasions. Just a touch of lippie. The
siesta after lunch. A gentle daily constitution.
A paddle in the sea on a hot hot day. An aspirin for
headaches and a dose of Dr Williams pink pills for arthritis. The
said they were setting an example for Veronica.
Rocking
away in her rocking chair on the verandah, her Aunt Frances was still
reading Saturday's paper on Monday when the neighbours noticed. She
had “passed away”. They thought she was asleep, so peaceful they
said. She wrote and published poetry, sketched, played her piano, was
as mad as a hatter and a trial to the family. Growing older she spent
her time avoiding her daughters, the medical profession, social
workers and religious maniacs. She indulged her passion for jigsaw
puzzles which she borrowed from the local library.
“Dying
is an art” Veronica wrote in
her diary at the time.
Penned
long before Sylvia Plath gassed herself, coined the phrase and hogged
the site on Google.
Growing
older, Veronica's aunts slowly disconnected with their friends, their
homes and their families. And themselves. Avoided do gooders and told
the same story day after day. Strokes and heart attacks and senility
sent them their separate ways. Gwen simply retired into her overgrown
garden, a tiny woman who progressively became smaller. No children.
No grandchildren. Just herself. On the day she turned 90 she wandered
out of her garden to a bed in the nursing home round the corner and
quietly sang nonsense to herself.
Not
long before her death at 86 Veronica's Aunt Cecily was still rising
occasionally at dawn to paint the sunrise. Making jam that never set.
Bottling fruit. Swimming in the ocean in her pants and bras.
Wandering by the river. Singing to herself. Quietly she slipped away
in her sleep one night with her broken hip. So they said. The year
before she died she still managed to make mouldy cream puffs for
Christmas.
Veronica's
mother began the dying process as soon as her father died. It took
years. Her father had talked to her about dying and how this would be
his last winter. That last year when his pub days were finally over,
he shared quiet sherries with her mother in the evenings and watched
TV. The day he died he drove to his favourite bush haunt to cut poles
for his runner beans. He gently keeled over in the process.
It
is different now says Veronica.
Conferences
across the western world are planning the future needs for the
elderly. Pre-baby boomers like me have been classed as the Silent
Generation.
Silent?
Hello! Me? Veronica Lazenby?
Along
with the silent Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Nina
Simone? Martin Sharp, Mirka Mora, Germaine Greer and Peter Booth?
Come on! Who introduced sex and drugs and rock and roll? Equal pay?
Television, computers, child care and karaoke? The mini skirt, the
internet and valium? Post modern, op and video art? Graffiti? Well
perhaps not the sex and drugs and graffiti.
Who
walked on the moon? Well not me exactly says Veronica.
On
Google Strauss and Howe define the Silent Generation as: pre
1946, an
Artist/Adaptive generation....born during a Crisis, ... and spends
old age in an Unraveling.
It
sounds wonderful. Like a big party. Veronica says it sounds like
academic crap. But perhaps Mick Jagger and crew know what it is all
about. They are unraveling beautifully. But not dying Veronica points
out.
Too
old to dream, Veronica looks at her choices. Swim out into the ocean.
Stock up with nembutal. Lie under a favourite tree. Stop eating.
Wander into the wilderness. Slip into the river with stones in the
pockets. Jump off a cliff.
Not
allowed. Sorry.
Out
come the SES, the Police, fire brigade, ambulance and helicopters,
the spotter planes and the media. Splashed all over the TV and the
internet. Families weep and feel guilty. Society raises its eyebrows.
So does Veronica.
According
to Google, Veronica tells me, governments across the world are
funding middle aged bureaucrats to tell us that it is compulsory to
join a gym, go for a swim, take a hearing test, walk a mile, have a
medical test, do the crossword, eat vegetables, take up a hobby, help
others, eat more protein, join a group, go to lectures, lose weight,
put on weight, stop smoking, smile and generally to stop being a
nuisance.
Quite
frankly even thinking about that exhausts me says Veronica, I feel
like dying. I am going to write to Mr Google and tell him I need
proper advice on this matter. This getting old and dying thing. See
what he comes up with.
Dear
Mr Google
A
young Dylan Thomas wrote to his father:
Do
not go gentle into that good night,
Old
age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage,
rage against the dying of the light.
Good
advice. But Dylan managed the raging and the raving and the dying
without the unraveling and getting old. So not much help.
Leonard
Cohen sings
Well
my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I
ache in the places where I used to play...
That's
more like it. I know how he feels.
Growing
old gracefully according to your many sites Mr Google, takes eight or
ten steps. Have a facelift, dye the hair, get a fake tan, buy
expensive vitamins, buy a new swimsuit with built in bosoms, invest
in funeral insurance, become a grey nomad in your new eco van, buy
the magic machine to keep you alive, purchase designer glasses, get a
free makeover (with age defying ingredients costing the earth). Not
to mention all those ads popping in between. Start running in the new
coloured NIKES. If you fall over you shine in the dark. Take up YOGA
in our new trimming lycra tights. Made for the young at heart.
Honestly Mr Google. Have you seen what they look like on a 75 year
old male body?
OMG
Mr Google. I am not sure where the old or graceful comes in. But come
on, its expensive too! Whew! And no mention of dying.
According
to your many dying sites we have the right to die with dignity.
Sorry. Give your friends on the doctor sites the opportunity and they
whack you into hospital, by-pass you, swap your knees for plastic,
stick needles and tubes in, patch this and patch that and send you
home fit to die. The minute you talk about dying they interfere. Take
my cousin Amy. Ready to go at 77. In the land of the bewildered at
79. New knees at 81. Hip replacement at 83. Triple bypass at 87. And
there she silently sits day after day with all the other cardboard
cutouts in their cardigans. Not much dignity there Mr Google. And no
dying.
Come
on Mr Google. Tell us the truth. Give us some proper advice. Let's
face it. Growing old and dying is a real shit. Our eyesight fades.
Our skin gets thin and bruises. Our muscles turn into wrinkled flesh.
Our bones ache and get crumbly and break. We stumble and fall. We
grow deaf. Our memory fades and gets befuddled. It's not much fun.
Let me tell you there is a real art to this dying thing.
the
wind is blowing
cold
leaves in our windows
rattling
our doors
hollowing
our sky
our
winters drag
time
along the empty streets
and
the night pauses
before
the rain
blots
out our stars
we
all grow old
those
who are left to grow old
So
let's start the
unraveling
get
into the swing
dying
is an art -
and
all you can do is let Sylvia Plath hog the site with her sorry tale.
And some punk group that wants to die early. It is just not good
enough. We deserve honest advice on this matter.
Please
rectify this Mr Google. You will need it someday.
Love
from
Veronica
Lazenby
