The New Old Age: the Bad, the Ugly, and the Invisible

The New Old Age: the Bad, the Ugly, and the Invisible
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I don’t mean beauty as in wrinkles and I absolutely don’t mean beauty as in Botox or in surgery. I mean beauty in the old school sense of the word: what we perceive that gives us pleasure or satisfaction. The flip side of course, the beauty we want others to perceive, the satisfaction we want to give the world. The beauty found in our pose, our choice of words, our movement, the choices in our dress or from deep within ourselves. The warm, heart-felt smile we’ll give someone to thank their kindness.

Somehow, somewhere along the cultural ride of the 20th century this kind of beauty stopped being associated with age. All of a sudden the beauty of wisdom, elegance, experience, and inner peace that has always been associated with the eldest among us vanished from our imaginary.

For years now beauty has been youth and youth beauty. At the same time, aging started being portrayed as something bad, ugly, or simply invisible.

Why bad? How? Our society now thinks that aging should be conquered and avoided by any means necessary rather than celebrated, even venerated as in ancient times. When I say ‘bad’ I mean the fear that drives us under the operating table to transform our faces and much else, many times with terrifying consequences. ‘Bad’ as in that which rots, is ill, spent, and best forgotten. The ‘bad’ we’re forced to fight with ever worse choices.

But old age is also seen as ‘ugly.’ Aging is no longer the adventure of a new understanding, an improved vintage. Age is now a medical condition. And once we cross the threshold of youth, medicine takes over at the expense of beauty. The products designed and built for the aging community are the ugliest possible devices. As older adults become medicalized, become a burden for caregivers rather than a gift to society, their bedrooms and their bathrooms become the reign of cheap plastic and hospital smelling aluminum. Instead of well-designed, beautiful furniture to help them lead great lives, what’s supposed to help them age transforms their living spaces into emergency wards.

Finally, beauty becomes invisibility. No longer young, the old lose their right to be beautiful and any connection with the world of aesthetics. The old are not supposed to care what their homes look like, what their clothing looks like, or their hair, or anything else. They’re supposed to be too tired to care. As if the rest of society doesn’t want to see them and would rather hide them under a veil. But there is nothing more human than to be social, which is intimately related to an instinctual need: to see and to be seen. We want others to recognize us as much as we want to give recognition, approval, and affection. When we force our elders off the stage of life we’re killing one of their most primal needs. Beauty has its evolutionary roots in this need for recognition.

And that is why it’s time to fight for change. To fight for beauty, relevance, and elegance. And to start remembering so many beautiful people who have taught us how to grow old and wise, vibrant and graceful, from Ghandi to Toni Morrison, from Maggie Smith to Sir Ian McKellen.

We shouldn't forget the importance of growing old well and wisely.
We shouldn't forget the importance of growing old well and wisely.
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