Today marks my first day as a pensioner: a pension from a previous employer begins from today. I’ll still be working for many years to come, but ‘pensioner’ has a strange ring to it- it is me, but is this me?
I have no desire to hide the label: it’s part of life, and even though I’m likely to be working until I’m 67, it’s the beginning of a different phase of life and a different sense of self: ‘I am a pensioner’.
Even though it’s just a label, I am much more aware of the passage of time; this life does not – as it seemed to when I was younger- go on forever There is mourning in that, but also joy: this day, this hour, this moment is so alive- it will never come again and is so precious.
I’ve noticed that I’ve become much more ruthless about the passage of time: I’m less likely to invest in things that do not bring me life. As an example: ten years ago my evenings were full of church meetings; in the last nine years I’ve been to maybe three or four- whilst I love church and the people around it, I’ve no desire or energy to do the same again. In the things I’m invested in in my ‘spare’ time, I tolerate meetings and make them short and rarely attend others. Conversely I’m much more interested in spending time in things that involve people and relationships with them.
The Sex Pistols sang ‘anger is an energy’- it’s not. One of the -largely, but not exclusively wrong- cliches about middle aged/older men is that they become ‘Meldrew like’. Some of that I note in me; I’ve become strangely pedantic about- in no particular order- poor grammar, stacking dishwashers and meaningless management cliches.
I guess there’s a tendency among my tribe to be angry about things like the loss of youth and the perception that your dominance is declining- social media is awash with barbed, nostalgic memes about how the youth have it easy & I’m sure that parts of the right wing drift in the ‘culture war’ are fuelled by our anger. Maybe it is better for me to resist by cultivating habits of gratitude: gracious acceptance of what has passed and awareness that those who are younger and assuming dominance are facing their own battles. I think the world still needs grace filled and gracious elders who are attempting to strive for wisdom and have wearied of the treadmill of attempting to be relevant.
I’m determined to continue to rediscover the attitude of a child- to ask curious and appreciative questions and to become less defensive: this is not easy, although a sometimes grudging awareness that I’m past the age where I need to get a sense of self by somehow ‘proving’ myself may be a useful companion.
And as for faith, well that’s harder to write about although I’ve changed a lot- maybe not for the better- faced by my perception of the increasing anger of many those who hold my former label. Theological debate now means little to me: Grace, love & finding what I hold in common with others means more. As ever, Martyn Joseph puts this better than I ever could:-
‘There’s no promised land, just this journey
I raised my white flag a long time ago
But with you I feel weightless, with you I feel worthy
With you there’s no ending, only hello.’
(‘You’re still here’ 2023)
The President of the professional association for healthcare chaplains that I belong to ended one of his emails by reflecting on the sudden death of a valued colleague and said it was ‘yet again, a wake call for me that we need to share the love, and the joy of life and our work with each other- and share the private pain when it is there too’ . I think that is more important than anything else right now.
Amen
BTW Today is also my birthday; there’s no ‘0’ on the end of it, but what once seemed a long way off in terms of age can now be glimpsed on the horizon in increasingly sharp relief…
Wearily Hopeful 