As a child I was always taught to respect my elders. I learned to listen carefully to those older than myself and not question their decisions or ideas. The seeds of deference were sown, fertilized and carefully cultivated; wild shoots were “nipped in the bud.” This was the way I was until two points of history converged: my becoming a teenager and 1968. Practically overnight, as if a switch had been turned in my brain, I began to question everything. The world had turned from the homey black and white world of “Father Knows Best” and “The Donna Reed Show” into the ugly “living color” of the Vietnam war, the Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy assassinations and Watts riots on the evening news. There was a lot to think about and come to terms with.
Looking back at my life, I can see that I have learned to combine the two concepts. I approach life from the standpoint of questioning the status quo but in doing so, I always try to respect my elders. I am just not one to accept the concept of “we’ve always done it this way” because just as never is a long time, always can be gone in the blink of an eye.
Recently I have found myself conflicted on the question of when one becomes an elder. Although my heart and mind are still the same as they were when I was a young adult, albeit a much wiser version of my other self, the reality is that I will turn 59 in a couple of months. Does that make me old enough to be a peer of the other elders or will I be perpetually deferring to those older than myself?
I’ve discovered that sometimes the older a person gets, the harder they clamp on to placement in their community. If they chair a committee, they won’t step down. If they perform a specific task in an office, school or church, they do not welcome outside help. It can be very frustrating to us younger-elders, still waiting for a chance to step up like Prince Charles, wondering if he’ll very become king! The sad thing is that if people my age won’t be given the opportunity to step up, is it any wonder that our young people aren’t even bothering to try? They probably look at us and figure they have a good twenty to thirty years to go before anyone will ever want them to become involved.
At a time when folks are living longer and more productive lives, there should be more intergenerational sharing of roles. We elders need to make sure we are including those younger folk in all of our activities and let them carry some of the load. We also need to remember the fact that if we’re doing a job that we think nobody else will do, it may be because we’re standing in their way.