A Surprising Life

Here’s a post by Erica Jong worth reading — and, as far as I can tell, overwhelmingly accurate as to the recognition (or non) of current young women fiction writers:

“Jeffrey Eugenides had his moment, then Jonathan Franzen and Jonathan Safran Foer. But the chair for the Serious Novelist is rarely held for new women novelists — unless they are from India, Iran, Iraq, China or other newsworthy countries. American women novelists are more often bracketed as genre writers — in chick lit, romance, mystery or historical fiction — and quickly dismissed.”

My older daughter is experiencing this at this moment as she tries to get her first novel published. It’s not easily categorizable as chick lit and it’s character, not plot driven. Young first time male authors are routinely lauded as the next great thing on the thinnest of talents, while it’s rare for a literary book written by a woman to be recognized.

It reminds me of when I was in law school over twenty years ago and one of my favorite professors (female, big surprise) was denied tenure because her scholarship centered on “non-weighty” subjects like health care and medical ethics rather than corporate or constitutional law. After several years of fierce battle and student support, she finally won tenure, and now is recognized as a preeminent expert on these topics, which are central to the real lives of real people.

I always taught my daughters that they could do anything and be anything they wanted. And I often marvel at how much things have changed for women since I grew up. But some barriers, not so subtle, and infuriating, still exist.

My job successor called last week for some information and began the call with “how’s retirement?”

The thing is, I’m not retired. Or at least, not retired in the way I think he means (meaning, passively).

I have more ideas and stuff going on than I ever did when burdened with a job I heartily disliked and therefore felt weighted down with. Instead of waking up every morning feeling peevish and annoyed, I’m waking up excited and energized by the day’s prospects.

All right. It’s not even been three weeks, but still… what a relief to find out that I don’t suffer from depression. And now that my mind has been liberated, I find myself brimming with ideas.

So here’s what I’ve done in the last bit of time to round out the portfolio (or pie chart):

• started the process of setting myself up for work as an arbitrator/mediator as well as a trainer on applied ethics
• came up with an idea for a book I want to write
• painted the walls of badly scuffed bedrooms
• actively raising money for the presidential campaign of Barack Obama, the one candidate who represents real change and can get us out of the unfathomable mess George W. Bush has gotten us into
• began the process of acting as the owner/builder on a new vacation home on nine acres in the mountains
• lost 13 out of 14 games of Scrabble to my visiting eldest daughter, who seems to have discovered the secret to achieving two seven-letter words a game and 400+ points (it’s great to have kids who are smarter than you)
• started training for a half-marathon in July (again with said daughter)
• made plans to go away for the weekend on the East Coast (Martha’s Vineyard) with my husband, and then visit my younger daughter (who will probably also beat me at Scrabble)
• started to work at losing the six pounds I’ve put on (either due to some wonderful carrot cake my husband made that proved irresistible or just general unhappiness, see above)
• gone on some wonderful hikes with the dogs (and visiting daughters); taken some incomparable photos

And finally started living like time is life.

Today’s New York Times Thursday Styles section features an article entitled “Older, Better, But Harder to Dress.”

They’re talking about me.

Not sure how it happened, but most of my closet full of carefully picked clothes for all occasions look ridiculous on me. Is it because my taste or my body has changed? Still, I’m reluctant to discard anything in hopes (seemingly futile) that either one will revert.

So yoga pants and TravelSmith shirts (many bright colors — don’t wrinkle– great on the recent India trip) have become my everyday wear. Going out means black top on black trousers topped by black jacket. I wore a skirt for the first time in memory a few weeks ago, and it felt weird to have my legs exposed. I hated the caftan-like concoctions my mother took to wearing in middle age in the attempt to hide the body and yet look feminine. Clothes my daughters look fabulous in are a disaster for me.

I have found one pants manufacturer, however, who seems to get the middle-aged woman’s body: Fabrizio Gianni – for whatever reason the fabrics and cut work to enhance, and not hide. I own their pants in every conceivable fabric and color — all ordered online.

But more than ever, the only thing I really enjoy shopping for (not online) — does not require me to look at the fit on my body — and that’s shoes. The feet have not changed one iota in forty-odd years.

Today’s my last day on the payroll. Who knows? I may never find myself on a payroll again.

At the farewell party last night, two questions dominated. What’s next? And what are you doing to make the break?

This entire blog has been about “what’s next”, and of course, that’s a work in progress. I’ve learned that when people ask that question, they really are asking about work, rather than the full variety of life activities, that I call my life portfolio. And they typically are seeking a short, easily digestible answer. So I’ve developed an easily digestible answer about the work bucket, without calling it that. Is this focus on work an exclusively American phenomenon, we who are so work- focused and identify with what we do rather than who we are?

As for the question of what I’m doing to mark the end of this phase, clean out the head, let go of problems (they’re not mine anymore!) and begin the next phase, I’ve never been good at that. I tend to carry around the old load for a while.

Take a vacation to warm climes? Seems a little artificial, and in any event, the head and thoughts travel with the body. Drink a wonderful bottle of champagne? Perhaps, but I’m trying to cut back on alcohol consumption in some meaningful way (too many wasted calories).

All cultures mark life change with some kind of ceremony — bar and bat mitzvahs, retirement parties, confirmations, weddings, funerals….

So here’s what I’m doing (or have done already):

a nice, long, unencumbered trail run with the dogs (see photo above — can’t be beat for cleansing body and soul)

scheduling a equally nice, long, massage

cleaning the family room rug (the aforesaid beasts having rendered it a grungy shade of gray)

cleaning my home office (my husband will stand up and cheer — he cannot stand the disarray and imagines (falsely) that it must reflect disorganization in my mind)

all and any other ideas welcome.

Today’s New York Times Magazine is all about “The New Middle Ages” — forty to sixty. The most insightful article, by Stephen Hall, focuses on wisdom, which should come with age, but as we all know, doesn’t necessarily.

Research shows that as people age, their emotions even out, and

they rely on a complex and nuanced emotional thermostat that allows them to bounce back quickly from adverse moments.

Perhaps not so surprisingly, wisdom shows up in all socioeconomic groups. Those with high IQs are not necessarily wise. The Hebrew word for wisdom is chochmah,

which ancient peoples understood to evoke the combination of both heart and mind in reaching a decision.

One researcher quoted in the article, Monika Ardelt, a sociologist at the University of Florida, Gainesville, devised a test which can be found and taken on-line. Generosity and empathy are central in her findings on who’s wise:

People who rated high in wisdom, she adds were “very generous,” both financially and emotionally; among those who rated low in wisdom, “there was this preoccupation with the self.”

I couldn’t agree more.  Wisdom has many opposites, not just stupidity.  Narcissism is its true polar opposite.

For so many reasons, I am looking forward to seeing “Away From Her”, the new film written and directed by a young Canadian actress, Sarah Polley, based on an Alice Munro short story, “The Bear Came Over the Mountain” and starring Julie Christie.

This is a film about the impact on a long marriage of Alzheimer’s. The wife (Julie Christie), realizing that she is slipping away, elects to go into assisted living. As A.O. Smith describes it in the New York Times,

It takes the twilight of a long, mostly happy marriage as a vantage point to look back at youth and forward into the waiting darkness…. the film is by turns sharp and somber, alive to the lacerations of ordinary experience and quietly attentive to grand absurdities and small instances of grace.

Who of my generation can forget the Julie Christie of Billy Liar, Darling and Petulia? Sensual, vulnerable, yet somehow cerebral, she epitomized the ideal yet real woman of the sixties. She apparently is not so interested in her past image, fame, or the culture of celebrity, but was drawn to this portrayal, by this young writer/director.

What I’m most interested to see, however, is Sarah Polley’s exploration of “the puzzles and pleasures of a long, imperfect marriage” which I suspect adroitly describes most long marriages, including my own. That’s a hard concept to grasp in youth, rapped up as we all inevitably are in romantic ideals, starry-eyed notions, and intense urges and surges (not in any way to deny their place or importance at a certain point in life). But at a certain point the simplicity, comfort, familiarity and depth that can only come from a long relationship — and they’re all imperfect — becomes the state of grace. Not to be traded in at any cost.

My posts have been few in the last few weeks because I’ve been serving as an arbitrator (filling the work bucket, happily) in a fascinating, complex dispute between two technology companies.

Equally interesting has been getting to know my two co-panelist arbitrators. One, my age, grew up in a family of nine (no that’s not a typo) brothers and sisters — all a year or two apart. After he had grown up, he learned that his mother had battled depression her whole life. The one time she did better, he recounted, was when she went to work as a file clerk in a local hospital because his father’s health precluded him holding two jobs.

My own mother never worked when we were growing up. I don’t think she was depressed, but I do think she felt stymied, without any real outlet for her considerable (an understatement) energy, curiosity and intelligence. Coming from the working class, she only attended high school, but read widely and had a real sophistication about a broad variety of matters, from world affairs, to design, to literature. Truly a woman way ahead of her time, but frustrated by the boundaries that circumstances imposed on her life. She told me frequently how much she envied my generation, with so many opportunities for women.

The debate rages about SAHM (stay-at-home-moms) versus working moms, and which is better for the kids, not to mention the moms. A new book, The Feminine Mistake, by Leslie Bennetts, argues that women make a mistake when they opt out of their careers and sacrifice their financial autonomy (a point I made in an earlier posting and that my own father drummed into me — you must rely on yourself). Of course, when small (or even teen-aged) children are involved, it’s a next to impossible balancing act in which neither — work or family — seems to get the right amount of attention. Even though I always loved working, whether my job was loading trucks at the post office or being a lawyer, I remember always feeling exhausted when my children were young. That, and guilty about the time not spent with my children, or the time not spent at work.

But what I drew from my colleague’s comment about his mom doing better when she worked outside the home, and from thinking about my own mother, and from thinking about my own sense of self and satisfaction with life — is that there are just some incalculable and irreplaceable psychic benefits that come from working. Not just financial autonomy.

Today the AARP announced that it would be developing, in partnership with Aetna, a “gap” health insurance product for people between the ages of 50 to 64 — 65 being the qualifying age for Medicare.  Fifty being the qualifying age for AARP, and no doubt an age when many find themselves without the benefit or possibility of group health insurance.While the devil is always in the not-yet-disclosed details (how much does it cost? what does it cover?  what pre-existing conditions does it exclude?), for me, it’s heartily welcome news.  My impending lack of health insurance has been a major worry as I plan to join the ranks of the self-employed-semi-retired-unemployed (depending on the day you talk to me) next month.

My last foray into the world of individual health plans was an eye opener.  Ailments endemic to middle age excluded us from all but the most expensive coverage.  AARP promises that while it will not be able to cover the most sick, most will be able to obtain coverage.  We’ll see; I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

This does not solve the overwhelming problem of the uninsured in our country.  It would seem like along with shelter and food and education, the right to health care is simply a human right.  That’s the way most of the rest of the developed world sees it.

But this is a good, overdue, and welcome start.

An interesting approach to this time of life (when the main events of child raising and career at least appear to be behind, rather than in front) is the subject of a New York Times article today. It’s for those of us for whom days at a golf course or playing bridge or seeking another full-time work commitment are less than appealing, but still have energy to spare and want to know what to do. It’s approaching life as one would approach a financial portfolio — figuring out the mix and match that creates the right diversification. And re-balancing when the portfolio goes out of whack.

For most of my life (and I suspect for most people), balance has been impossible to achieve. Too much work; too many responsibilities. Always a price to pay — not enough personal and family time, or not enough interesting, rewarding work.  And imperatives kept me rolling forward even when I wanted to stop the world and just get off.

So now that I have all this freedom, I like the concept of a portfolio.  It’s one I understand.  What would be the right diversification strategy for me?   Unfortunately, unlike the track of earlier life choices, this one needs to be self-designed and initiated.  At its center is still work, but work whose parameters I can control and that’s meaningful and rewarding.  A challenging proposition at this stage.  Other aspects are easier and within grasp — family, reading, writing, exercise, home, some travel.

The article resonated because it described how I’ve already started to see this period of my life unfolding. When I tell people I’m leaving my job next month, they inevitably ask what I’m going to do.  I’ve stumbled over the response. I have no “and I’m taking this magnificent and important position,” which is what I think they expect to hear.

Now I have a way to talk about it — I’m going to manage my portfolio.