Who Do You Want to Be When You Grow Old

 By Richard J. Leider & David Shapiro

Berrett-Koehler     2021

145 pages     Self-Help

“Everyone is getting older; not everyone is growing older.” This is the premise of a compact, but profound look at aging. The authors, Leider and Shapiro, have been friends for many years. They are intrigued by their own aging as well as the concept of aging in general, and offer a guidebook to thinking about the process, without offering definitive conclusions. My husband and I used the book as our morning reading exercise, taking turns reading and then discussing what we read.

If we have fewer outward responsibilities, the authors propose, then we should have greater inner growth. This has been one of the concepts that my husband and I have struggled with for several years. The struggle has never been more pronounced than when we were reading this book. My husband has always felt that he would work at his business forever. Yet, now that he is in his 80s, he has begun to rethink his purpose. Each day, as we read, he considered some alternatives; finally he announced that he was going to stop working on Fridays. I almost fell over with surprise. Now we will see if he is going to follow the plan.

On the other hand, I have been completely retired from my career as a librarian for several years, and this year, I retired from my editing business. The retirement was very short-lived, because family members needed covid-related help with children. I felt lucky that my schedule was flexible enough that I could help out. The points made in Who Do You Want to Be When You Grow Old helped me in my decision-making. One of the authors’ points is that often retirees feel a loss of relevance. Lucky for me, I still feel very relevant.

Finally, the last chapters of the book concern death and dying, and we were able to have some significant conversations about what we still wanted to do, but also how we felt about dying. There are excellent discussion questions in the last chapter: “1) What do you think happens when you die? 2) How would you like to die? 3) What gifts do you want to leave the world before you die?” These questions offered us several hours of thought and discussion. As we read each morning, we felt our relationship grow closer and our conversations become more significant. We would certainly encourage couples to have these discussions. I am very grateful to the authors for opening these doors for us. I appreciated their personal stories as well as the people they quoted. The final discussion questions are excellent.

“The path of purposeful aging is a choice to wake up every day with the intention to grow and give.”

An interview with the authors.

 

The Girl in the Red Boots: Making Peace with My Mother

 By Judith Ruskay Rabinor PhD

She Writes Press     2021

271 pages     Memoir

Can a mother be both loving and selfish? Caring and thoughtless? Deceitful and devoted? These are the questions that fuel psychologist Dr. Judy Rabinor’s quest to understand her ambivalence toward her mother. Her book, The Girl in the Red Boots, was published yesterday. I have been pondering how and why it landed so heavily on my heart and mind.

Each child in a family has a different relationship with his/her mother. Rabinor asserts that the type of relationship you establish with your mother in early childhood lasts throughout your life—particularly if it is a mother-daughter relationship. Rabinor is an expert in eating disorders and many of the stories in the book deal with young women who were her patients as they explored their relationships with food. She discovered that many of those relationships to food were governed by the young women’s  relationships with their mothers. While dealing with them, she was able to explore her complicated relationship with her own mother and relates how she finally came to a resolution after many years of struggle.

She says in the prologue: “Stories are great teachers; they have to power to heal. The tales from my office and my life may help you untangle your stuck places and develop compassion for yourself and, possibly, for your mother.” She begins each section with a story suggestion to guide readers in their thinking as they read that chapter. She guides the readers to look inward as they grow in the understanding of their own relationships and their own family histories. Her narrative is a powerful memoir as well as a self-help guide.

Rabinor remarks that one of her mother’s best quotes was “You’ll be fine! Everything will work out—you’ll see.” Oops! I remember several times I said the same thing to my daughter. She goes on to say that what she yearned for was her mother’s genuine empathic presence. My own mother was very busy and most likely I had moments when I wished for more of my mother’s presence. On the other hand, my mother had a career at a time when most mothers were stay-at-home, and I was very proud of that. If I were to have this discussion with my sisters, I know that each of their stories would be different. Judith Rabinor is just my age, so perhaps the book resonated so well with me because some of our life experiences were similar, although I don’t have as many negative feelings about my mother as Rabinor had about her mother.

In one passage that reverberated with me,  she asked women at a convention to introduce themselves by saying a very revealing sentence or two. Here is an example. “I’m Julie, daughter of Ruth. I was welcomed to the world of womanhood by Ruth, queen of secrets.” After much thought, I created my introduction: “I am Miriam, daughter of Evelyn. I was welcomed to the world of womanhood by Evelyn, whose goal in life was to please her husband.” Much discussion could follow.

I found The Girl in the Red Boots to be a very challenging and revealing book, and I would recommend it to people as they seek to define or redefine their lives. The Kirkus reviewer called it “a contemplative, cleareyed study of family dynamics.”

Judith Rabinor’s website.