The Perils of Aging

Fred Smith comments on the benefits of staying in the present.

By Fred Smith

When I was in my forties, I started making a list of things I would not do once I was old. I knew I'd need the list, because then those things would seem so natural to do. There were little things on it --- like not sleeping with my mouth open and not wearing mis-matched clothes. But several more important things on the list are worth exploring.

Reminiscing: A television talk show host told me that if she interviewed someone on the air who dwelt on the past, she never asked that person back. I say, good for her. I get sick and tired of listening to people reminisce. They apparently have no present and no future; everything is past. That's a sure sign of age.

Class reunions hold no interest whatsoever for me. There is so little to talk about that everyone talks about the past. And if you're objective about it, very few people have come anywhere near the potential of their life. So you're suddenly faced with this horrible thought: these people, who were going out to do so much, have done so little.

When I talk about reminiscing, I'm not talking about the study of history, which we analyze and learn from. Reminiscing is simply trying to relive the best parts of the past while believing it is something worth revisiting. Part of maturing is learning you can never go home again. Once you get out of bed, you can't find the warm spot again.

As we get older, we tend to make unrealistic comparisons. We talk about the good old times and the quality merchandise we had when we were young. I remember the quality crank that spun a Model T Ford engine and the quality piece of wire that pulled out the choke. I also remember the tremendous amount of aerobic exercise it took to get the thing started and the danger of breaking your arm if it kicked. Was it really so much better than sliding into some leather-seated sports car and driving off in regal splendor?

This tendency to make unrealistic comparisons carries over to the church. The preacher doesn't preach the old-fashioned gospel, we say. I had fun once at a preachers' convention by getting up and expounding about how we needed to return to the old-fashioned forms of the faith; how we needed to go back to the reverence for the old-fashioned Book. The longer I carried on, the more amens I picked up. Then I said, "What I mean is, let's really go back to the old-fashioned circuit riders, when people only had to go to church every three months." Graciously, they didn't stone me, but those preachers gave me stony silence.

There's always a danger when we compare the present with the past, because we usually compare the bad of the present with the good of the past. It's like buying a new business: right away you see the benefits of an unfamiliar operation, but you overlook the disadvantages and liabilities. Only after you get into it do the liabilities stare back at you. We have to say, "The past had its good points, but my memory is selective, and I cannot compare objectively."

Every economist, when he gives his forecasts, should state his age in the first line. He ought to say, "I am sixty-three years old, and my predictions for the economy are thus and so." That's because as people get older, they either become very pessimistic or Pollyanna optimists.

People who are not truly excited about the future take refuge in blind optimism: "young people are great; the country will survive; right will win." It's all a spiel. The other extreme, of course, is to become cynical and pessimistic. A realistic view of the future is hard to come by because there's a fine line between cynicism and idealism.

A cynic and an idealist, if they're objective, will see the present exactly alike; it's the future they'll see differently. The cynic, because of his bitterness, says the future will be exactly like the present. The idealist says it doesn't have to be; change can come, improvement can be made, an individual can make a difference.

Every age suffers its pessimists; every age needs its idealists. The Christian must remain an idealist. Most of all, we need to be realists who make the most of today, redeeming the time.

© 1982 Fred Smith