The purpose of growing old

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By Gilda Cordero-Fernando

Philippine Daily Inquirer

MANILA, Philippines - People believe that old married couples just sail peacefully together into the sunset. Hey, not always together! We are shocked when, in our own circles, break-ups can occur even after a 50th anniversary.

Luckily, the majority of senior citizens do grow up. When quarrels erupt and #### hits the fan, old seamates do know that it's just a tropical squall. That it's a phase, like others in their long life together, and that it will pass.

A golden anniversary is a graduation of sorts. That is why it is celebrated so grandly (and always with a long boring video). Dressed in gold, the antique couple beams with undisguised pride, especially if they've weathered so many marital difficulties. They are graduating summa cum laude from life even if they never got an honor in school.

Robert Browning says, "Grow old with me. The best is yet to be." There is tremendous fulfillment in sticking it out with the same partner for 50 years that young impatient couples cannot imagine. They take their differences too seriously and often give up.

We have noticed the trend, in the present generation, of two marriages in a lifetime. The first is a practice marriage, the second one is (hopefully) for keeps (also known as "First Wife" and "Last Wife").

Opposite characteristics

A psychiatrist friend, Honey Carandang, says that people who marry, oftener than not, have opposite characteristics. The health buff will marry a couch potato, the culture vulture a telenovela addict, the orderly one a helter-skelter, the adventurer a homebody.

They are perfect fits—in theory. What one is good at the other is not, and vice versa. Actually, they just plod along. My shrink friend, however, also says that opposite poles will stay together when they share a few ground values. It could be the belief that a marriage is for keeps, that children should grow up with two parents, so that breaking up is never an option.

Or it could be that they both value individuality and freedom and will allow each other ample room to navigate. Or they may share a belief in a life of service to fellowmen and work on this together, if nothing else.

The values that bind a couple are not necessarily traditional ones. In fact, being hopelessly stuck in old values could be detrimental to a marriage.

"Tiis lang. Anyway, it's you he comes home to every night." "Prayer is the answer to everything." "Old people always know best." "Babae ka lang." "Pasalamat ka na sa'yo ang lalaki (when a grandson impregnates his girlfriend).

(By the way, when my daughter could not give her teenage son a brass tacks lecture on safe sex, I said nothing. I just quietly slid a condom into his wallet. Once in a while I ask my daughter to peep if it's still there).

Interpreting Pinoy husbands

Older Filipino husbands, in general, do not like to communicate verbally. "Talking things over" never works with them. Unlike Caucasians, they hate confrontations. To be able to interpret a traditional Filipino husband, you must be very sensitive to his moods and feelings. Does he mean this? Oops, no! You retreat. Does he mean that? Well, sort of. What about this one? Getting warm. That? Finally! (Sigh)

The one thing my husband and I worked hard on and are so proud of is how our children have turned out. They are principled, hardworking, intelligent and successful. And their marriages are stable and peaceful.

How about us? I asked my old partner. How do you rate our relationship? He made a gesture to mean "middling." Which was the absolute truth! We had weathered so many typhoons, so many tsunamis. I laughed out loud. (He is authentic, that's for sure).

We reached the self-serving conclusion that we must have been extraordinarily good parents for having produced children with excellent marriages when our own had so many undertows to reckon with. Imagine! Victory over handicaps! We drank a toast to that, but bickered whether the drink should be beer or carrot juice.

Flexibility

In late adulthood, the most important quality to develop (or maintain) is flexibility. Our bodies are beginning to be as rigid as railroad tracks. "Flexible" means one can adapt to the unexpected. Or learn new things.

For instance, if ever, at a late age, one discovers (eureka!) that one's partner is gay, one's relationship can metamorphose into that of just being a sister to him. And still continue to be his wife. (Easier said than done).

In turn, when a husband's sexual potency diminishes due to blood-pressure, drugs or old age, the relationship should become that of platonic best friends (as if one had a choice).

Habits die hard. A wise American lecturer once told of how irritated she got when her old husband would, every morning, dodder from the dining table to his easy chair with a trail of cookie crumbs in his wake. How easy for him to just carry his cookies on a saucer and not eat one on the way. (She wouldn't have to clean up after him).

But no, every blessed day he did it again. Until one morning it dawned on her that if there was no more cookie crumb trail it would be because there was no more John. Wow, we wives certainly learned a lot from that story.

My friend Mariel F. and I like to think we learn from life. We try to understand how spirit works to help us become better, happier human beings. And we try to share what we think we know through our writing and workshops.

Disconcerting

And so it was disconcerting for me to realize that, as my husband and I grew old and he got sick, that he had imbibed none of the spiritual lessons that had given me such comfort. I could not share with him the joy of transcending the material world. He had no desire to even browse through the spiritual books that I so casually scattered around the bedroom. I felt like a failure.

But then I bumped into a psychic friend, Bernie Nepomuceno. Over coffee, I shared with her my frustration. "Why do you make your husband your scoreboard?" she retorted. "Why should you be responsible for what he accepts or rejects? Your only mission in life is to love him and to make him feel your love."

What a relief! I realized he had his own type of spirituality, very unlike mine, but it was there. His spiritual growth was not my responsibility. Whew!

What else is there to live for?

I recently went to visit an accomplished woman who had turned 90. She had broken her thigh bone when she reached out for some object and lost her balance. Like most elderly who break a bone, she was not even doing anything extraordinary.

When I visited her, Narita Gonzalez was just home from a long hospital confinement. She asked me seriously, "When you have done everything you need to do or want to do, and you are 90, what else is there to live for?" She was very earnest and said she wanted a real answer.

"First of all," I said, "You are an exceptional person. You have been an excellent wife and caregiver, and you have been able to do commendable literary work on your own. You have your wits about you, and are the exemplar of what a graceful late age should be. When the doctor told you that you wouldn't be able to walk if you didn't have this operation, you yourself made the decision to have it. That was exemplary courage.

"What one's purpose is for living is the same question people in every stage of life ask. And it is the same answer for all." I repeated Bernie's answer. "God put us on earth for only one purpose—to love. Nothing else. Loving is fulfilling one's mission."

Old age has another purpose. It completes the cycle of life for young people to see. It is how we all end. From its positive or negative examples we are able to extract the lessons we need.

Which brings me to the incorrigible texter Danny Dalena's item about a very kuripot Ilocana. When her husband died, she asked the newspaper how much a death notice would be. The ad taker said: "P300 for five words."

Mrs. Tanoy said, "Puede ba two words lang, 'Tanoy dead'?" The ad taker said, "No ma'am, five words minimum." After a while of thinking, she said: "Okay, para sulit, put 'Tanoy dead. Toyota for sale.'"

Da end.

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