Growing older, I’ve taken more notice of how many old people perform self-conscious imitations of their own more youthful performances, especially the performances of tough, gutsy, stubborn, attractive, or independent. It’s a little embarrassing. I’m not even that old — seventy as this is written, though the Bible says my allotment is “three-score and ten”— and it would take quite an effort to not notice that my muscles have shrunken, my connective tissues are more frangible, my spotted skin thinner and more bruise-able, my flesh draping more from my bones. I am more dependent. I get sidelined by angina and sudden unaccountable pains in my joints. I run out of steam far more easily. If I were attacked, it wouldn’t take much to disable or kill me. If I was ever physically strong or tough, that’s no longer the case. I was never particularly pretty, but if I did turn a head here and there, it’s not happening now. And that’s how it is supposed to be. I feel embarrassment for a fellow elder who’s dyed the gray out of his or her thinning crown while the flesh folds and sags below, or at the wrinkled face — once a sign of wisdom and respect — made up in some kind of pathetic rearguard action over a skull emerging through a face to remind us there is a period at the end of our sentence. It seems not only vain — in the sense of being fruitless — but somehow undignified. This is part of what puts me off about advertising aimed at old people — usually pharmaceuticals, but also adult diapers, grooming gadgets, cosmetic products, whatever. Ads that portray old people doing “young stuff,” and having a great time at it — selling the lie that “you’re only as old as you feel,” and selling the performance of the frisky elder. It’s not just embarrassing, it’s pitiful, like we’re supposed to be cheerful in the face of how much we know about how much there is that makes feigned cheer obscene even as a young person, but especially for the old. Nothing is more pitiable than someone pretending to be cheerful. Old age shouldn’t be about performative cheer. It should be a time of sober reflection and sober expression. It shouldn’t be about denying that death approaches, but about embracing that reality with the seriousness it deserves and taking advantage of the perspective it provides; not reinforcing Madison Avenue youth culture by pretending we’re ever-young. But alas, we live in an infantilized culture. Have been since the salad days of post-WWII Cold War Keynesianism, when Madison Avenue began to tell our stories for us and stripped us, as we became elders, of our dignity.
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This piece is a strange coincidence. I have to admit that I had an upper blepharoplasty which was supposed to be functional as opposed to cosmetic, as in insurance paid, but vanity was a strong presence and truthfully, the driving force. To have my eyebags done was on me and not cheap. Yes I had large dark bags under my eyes but they functioned just fine. And yet I am not happy with the outcome! I have decided to leave well enough alone and forego any revision even though it would cost no money. I have certainly been confronted with my own ego and vanity and there's a lesson there. I must now learn to love the face I wasn't loving enough 6 months ago. While I do question the quality of the surgeons work, I'm ultimately the one who smiled and said goodnight to the anesthesiologist. At the root would be a lack of self understanding and caring. Which leads to the vanity. Stan it's a little comical for a a friend of mine..."A Green Beanie getting cosmetic surgery?"!!!