August 3, 2020
Good afternoon.
First, bits
and pieces. Then observations on Boomers and the pandemic.
In response to my notes about being a productive person, or someone with a purpose, a friend wrote back to me.
I was brought up believing and understanding that your self worth is based on your contribution to your family and community. I still believe that. I do lots of charity [work]. Even though volunteering may not be first on your list of things to do, I strongly recommend that you think about it. There are lots of opportunities to do things that make a difference for others. Everyone needs to be needed. Get out there and figure out what you can do for others. OK. Off my soapbox now. I see the same feelings you have in some of my friends here too, so you are not alone.
I wrote back and told my friend that "I was not brought up the same way you were. Actually, I can't recall that any part of my upbringing had to do with self-worth. We were both raised with the Protestant (work) ethic, I am sure, but that's not the same as self-worth." It is a puzzling question my friend raised. On the one hand, I'm not willing to let my self-worth be determined by external factors over which I have no control, but obviously one has to have some kind of standards by which one reaches a judgment about oneself. I'm sure there's an entire literature in both psychology and philosophy on this topic, none of which I have read. Maybe someday I'll decide what my self worth is.
Another friend wrote:
I am staying updated via daily NYT briefings in my In Box, but I can notice my sense of equilibrium starting to tilt if I stay in Covid Update Land too long. Maybe 15 or 20 minutes a day is enough, plus a little discussion and comparing of notes with [my spouse]. It seems like all of us feel emotionally unprepared to think about the worsening national picture, other than to hope hope hope for a Democratic landslide and sooner-than-expected vaccine. Wearing a mask has become a weird source of pride, or something like that.
And a response from another that I particularly liked.
On the topic of "being productive," I am reminded of my retirement hero, Frederick Sanger. In his career, he won two Nobel prizes, one for his work on protein structure and another for developing the first method for sequencing DNA. And he was so productive in so many areas of science -- a true giant. When he retired he said he was done with the science part of his life and was now going to enjoy gardening and his grandchildren. Many tried to get him re-engaged in science or science administration or science mentoring, but he was steadfast. It was time for him to putter. And he puttered until he died at 95 years old.
From the LA Times about him:
In a statement announcing Sanger’s death, Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, which funded much of Sanger’s work, said, “Fred can fairly be called the father of the genomic era: His work laid the foundations of humanity’s ability to read and understand the genetic code, which has revolutionized biology and is today contributing to transformative improvements in healthcare.”
And yet, in retirement, he puttered. See? My retirement hero!
I'm no Frederick Sanger but I think I have the license to putter.
A perceptive friend asked if we wear masks when we have people over to sit on the deck. We do not, not when we're outdoors and 10 feet apart. No one does. I think we all believe, based on the available evidence, that outdoors and spaced presents virtually no risk even without masks. We all relax as if the world were normal—we momentarily escape, even though it does seem slightly odd to be sitting 10 feet apart across two tables rather than around one table all together. (And we don't really fully escape--we almost always devote part of the conversation to the damn pandemic.)
A long-time faculty friend wrote back about time and retirement. It is an approach to life that I suspect typifies many faculty members. In labor surveys they consistently have among the highest job-satisfaction ratings. Why would you quit doing what you love to do, when "work" is not work?
I still have strong incentives to be academically productive and so the days go quickly as I follow up with various students and projects and, now, begin to plan for a hybrid honors seminar in the fall. So, I am backing more slowly than anticipated into retirement. The positive side is that this is that I genuinely enjoy most of it. Right now I am also trying to work out the logistics of more sophisticated online teaching and digital assignments - the plus is that this helps me feel less technologically behind. The minus, of course, is that I have not really learned to appreciate fully the potential of leisure time.
* * *
There was recently an article in our local newspaper, the Star-Tribune, about the impact of the pandemic on Baby Boomers. "After decades of denial, pandemic is making Minnesota baby boomers feel their age." When I first read it, I nodded my head in agreement. The more I thought about it, however, the more I decided that much of it is twaddle. So I'm going to make a few observations about one part of that demographic group. Feel free to email me and tell me I'm full of baloney.
My comments are ringed around with caveats. I don't presume to speak for any other Baby Boomer; this is an entirely personal response. Nor do I assume that all Boomers are in the same boat; they certainly are not. This is a set of observations about Boomers who (1) are still working and in reasonably high-paying jobs, or (2) are retired and have a secure and sufficient income for their needs and lifestyle. I recognize that most of the Boomers I know are relatively well off financially and their incomes secure.
Here are some excerpts from the article along with my comments inserted in italics. (Here's the link to the article if you want to read it: https://www.startribune.com/the-pandemic-is-causing-minnesota-baby-boomers-to-feel-their-age/571892422/ )
For baby boomers, it seems that COVID-19 has done what self-denial and evidence to the contrary has been unable to do: make them feel old.
Those who have engaged in self-denial and ignored the evidence just aren't very smart or aren't paying attention. Of course we are getting old—except I'd say "older" rather than old. "Old" is subjective, older is not. But I don't feel old and don't expect to for some time. If ever. I suppose that if I live into my 80s, I'll have to acknowledge that I'm old. But at 68 I sure am not saying that.
For the generation whose youthful battle cry was "Don't trust anyone over 30" and who prided themselves on remaining relevant as the years accumulated, being lumped in with the cohort regarded as frail and vulnerable has come as a shock.
Depending where in the Baby Boomer age range you fall, some may be getting into the "frail and vulnerable" bracket. The article says Baby Boomers range from age 56 to 74, so born between 1946 and 1964. That in itself is silly, as are all these "named" generations, such as Millennials, Generation X, etc. Someone at age 56 probably has very little in common with some aged 74. At 56 they could be parents with kids still at home/in college and are likely still working; at 74 they could be grandparents and are long retired. Maybe at 74 you start to get frail; you've had to lead a pretty rough life (e.g., drugs, booze, decades at hard physical labor) to be frail at 56. I—and most of my friends my same age—certainly don't feel "frail and vulnerable" unless they've had a bout with cancer and chemo and radiation or something similarly debilitating. And even those friends likely would not describe themselves as such—vulnerable to COVID-19, likely, but not "frail." (Millennials are variously defined as having been born from 1980 to 2000, and I pose the same comment: Someone 40 years old right now hasn't much in common with a 20-year-old, except that maybe in the midst of a pandemic neither of them can find a job.)
"The pandemic has been a reckoning for baby boomers," said Scott Zimmer, a speaker and trainer for Bridgeworks, a Wayzata consulting company that advises businesses on generational dynamics.
Based on sheer size, the 76 million American boomers, now between ages 56 and 74, have been courted by marketers since their postwar arrival. They have reframed every life stage they've passed through and were in the process of rewriting the script for their retirement years when the coronavirus arrived and stripped away their pretensions.
"They retain a youthful spirit and don't want to slow down like previous generations. They take on encore careers and find new activities to be passionate about," Zimmer said. "Now they're forced to acknowledge that they're not invincible. Even if they're in great shape, they can't deny that their age puts them in greater danger if they catch the virus."
"Stripped away their pretensions" and "forced to acknowledge that they're not invincible." Who is this guy talking to? Pretensions to what? And who among us thought we were invincible? Anyone who pays any attention to the aging process knows that we become more susceptible to various afflictions as we get older. This is not news. 60 may be the new 40 in psychological terms but the physiological processes of our body are still 60 years old. We're also in greater danger from the flu, pneumonia, and a host of other diseases. Most of us recognize that, not deny it, and take appropriate steps. (Google "60 is the new 40" and, Google tells you, you'll get "About 9,360,000,000 results.")
For many boomers, the pandemic is revealing, even cementing, some long-held negative stereotypes associated with aging.
“They are experiencing ageism with the assumption that a number — their age — is the defining marker,” said Katie Smith Sloan, president and CEO of LeadingAge, a national association of nonprofit providers of aging services. “They’re seeing how the contributions of older adults are undervalued and underappreciated.”
Again, this surely varies by age and, more importantly, employment status. What are the "contributions" of which he writes? I bet the parents with children whose grandparents are involved in daycare are not "undervalued and underappreciated." Or the multitude of activities in which retired people participate. If you're between 56 and 65, you may be in the highest income bracket of your life—and perhaps the highest productivity level as well. Whether or not age is a defining marker depends greatly on what you're talking about. For insurance company actuarial tables, yes. For AARP membership and discounts on movie tickets, yes. In general, however, at least in my experience, daily life doesn't present adverse ageism. I have noticed in recent years that when I'm on a train (both locally and elsewhere in the world), some people have stood up and offered me their seat. I tell them to sit down.
Age is just a number, but how that number is perceived is subjective. As people get older, the definition of “old” changes. In a Pew Research Center study, only 21% of those between the ages of 65 and 74 said they felt old, and just 35% of those 75 and older self-identified that way.
Like I said. I've always been drawn to "When I Am an Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple" as a good way to face down advancing age. (I know, it's for and about women, but the sentiment can be shared by men, even if they don't wear purple.) On the other hand, I will not start wearing skinny jeans and otherwise try to make myself look younger than I am. That is a foolish vanity, in my view. I have a beard and it's mostly white; my hair is gray and brown and white. Neither of them will ever be dyed. No botox for me. But how I appear does not have to be the same as how I feel and think.
My dad one time commented that he thought his parents thought and acted old even from the time when he was young (they were 45 and 43 when he was born, so they were "older," but I'm now 23 years older than my grandfather was when my dad was born and I sure don't want to think or act "old").
Advances in medical science in the past half-century have created a longevity revolution that is giving Americans not only longer life spans, but more years of good health. Still, anyone north of 55 is often lumped into the same age category.
[This is Gary writing again] It seems to me that Baby Boomers who are retired and whose income is reasonably secure (or who are still in high- or reasonable-income-earning jobs) have the least reason to gripe about the pandemic. Yes, we can gripe (more like whine), but we don't face a catastrophic loss of income (and perhaps career), we (those reading this, friends and acquaintances) aren't in a senior/nursing care facility at the end of our lives, and the disruptions to our lives are minor compared to the effects of the pandemic on just about every other age cohort above age 14 or 15. Parents are faced with children from K through 12th grade forced to learn online at home, the children face online learning (which is not easy), high school graduates face online learning in college (ugh), both high school and college graduates face a dismal job market that may get a lot worse before it gets better, many of all ages are losing their jobs (and housing), and this list could go on at length.
The group that is in the catbird seat, apart from the wealthy who aren't ever affected by economic swings of any kind, are the Baby Boomers who have a secure and sufficient income and (in many cases) are retired. We are in that period between employment and exit (or descent into senility or disease in some fashion). A friend told me there are three phases to retirement: go-go, stay-go, and no-go. Most of us are still in go-go—but yes, we can't go-go out to eat with friends or go to a movie or a baseball game or travel easily and safely in the U.S. and not at all abroad (just about anywhere). More bothersome, we can only see our kids and grandkids under constrained circumstances, if at all. The effects of the pandemic on our lives, however, is dwarfed by the effect it is having on most of our fellow citizens. I reflect on our situation, I am annoyed by it, and I'm unhappy at the loss of a year or more out of whatever "functional" time I have left in life (that is, not mentally or physically incapacitated). Others face much greater losses, so I figure I should keep my griping to a minimum. As my late great-uncle used to tell me, kwitcherbellyachin.
I'll quit my belly achin' and send this out. I hope you are well.
Gary
