Autumn XXIII. A reckoning

Intro & Preface & Contents

Previous: Autumn XXII. Older writers

As I walked to-day in the golden sunlight -- this warm, still day on the verge of autumn -- there suddenly came to me a thought which checked my step, and for the moment half bewildered me. I said to myself: My life is over. Surely I ought to have been aware of that simple fact; certainly it has made part of my meditation, has often coloured my mood; but the thing had never definitely shaped itself, ready in words for the tongue. My life is over. I uttered the sentence once or twice, that my ear might test its truth. Truth undeniable, however strange; undeniable as the figure of my age last birthday.

...I... may perhaps live for some years; but for me there is no more activity, no ambition. I have had my chance -- and I see what I made of it.

The thought was for an instant all but dreadful. What! I, who only yesterday was a young man, planning, hoping, looking forward to life as to a practically endless career, I, who was so vigorous and scornful, have come to this day of definite retrospect? How is it possible? But, I have done nothing; I have had no time; I have only been preparing myself -- a mere apprentice to life...

Nevertheless, my life is over.

...A man's life can be so brief and so vain? Idly would I persuade myself that life, in the true sense, is only now beginning; that the time of sweat and fear was not life at all, and that it now only depends upon my will to lead a worthy existence. That may be a sort of consolation, but it does not obscure the truth that I shall never again see possibilities and promises opening before me. I have “retired,” and for me as truly as for the retired tradesman, life is over....

... Life is done -- and what matter? Whether it has been, in sum, painful or enjoyable, even now I cannot say -- a fact which in itself should prevent me from taking the loss too seriously... Destiny with the hidden face decreed that I should come into being, play my little part, and pass again into silence; is it mine either to approve or to rebel? Let me be grateful that I have suffered no intolerable wrong, no terrible woe of flesh or spirit, such as others -- alas! alas! -- have found in their lot... Better to see the truth now, and accept it, than to fall into dread surprise on some day of weakness, and foolishly cry against fate. I will be glad rather than sorry, and think of the thing no more.

Alpha.

I'm not sure Erikson would be entirely satisfied with this evaluation of his Wisdom stage of life.

[from Wiki]

Wisdom: Ego Integrity vs Despair

- Existential Question: Is it OK to Have been Me?

As we grow older and become senior citizens we tend to slow down our productivity and explore life as a retired person. It is during this time that we contemplate our accomplishments and are able to develop integrity if we see ourselves as leading a successful life. If we see our life as unproductive, or feel that we did not accomplish our life goals, we become dissatisfied with life and develop despair, often leading to depression and hopelessness.

The final developmental task is retrospection: people look back on their lives and accomplishments. They develop feelings of contentment and integrity if they believe that they have led a happy, productive life. They may instead develop a sense of despair if they look back on a life of disappointments and unachieved goals.

This stage can occur out of the sequence when an individual feels they are near the end of their life (such as when receiving a terminal disease diagnosis).

I suppose “I will... think of the thing no more” is actually the way most people deal with all this, but I'm not sure how they do it. I view my life, my career, as Erikson would have it, as having been a long strange trip. I might wish it had been more interesting, that I had lived more deeply, experienced more, but, then again, I see it as having been the only life I could have lived, being the person I am. To have lived that more interesting life, I would have had to have been a more interesting person -- someone not me.

I even have mixed feelings about the line, “Let me be grateful that I have suffered no intolerable wrong, no terrible woe of flesh or spirit, such as others... have found in their lot.” Just a few sections ago he was wishing “some calamity” on young writers-to-be as protection against “degeneration of the soul.” I would not wish for it either, but perhaps my life would have been richer, more meaningful with a strong dose of calamity. Though it doesn't seem to turn the majority of sufferers into obviously better people.

To refer to Georges Bataille's concept of The Accursed Share, it occurs to me that the economy of the aged in developed nations is a striking example of non-productive activity or waste. How often is all the wealth people have accumulated over their lives consumed in their pathetic spiral to the grave? It serves no productive function, but look at how many people drink at this well. Hospitals, doctors, nurses, a legion of care-givers and service providers. Taken all together they must constitute an important percentage of the total economy and, as with a Potlatch, people spend lavishly, throwing money away hand over fist.

Just today I was reading about a man Ezekiel J Emanuel who has maintained for many years that people should end their lives at 75 because by that point they had lived long enough. Reading about or observing the death experiences of people in their 80s and 90s, I have to admit that I've wondered what the point of such long lives is. But now I also have to ask what the economic consequences of a world where people didn't live past 75 would be. Would the benefits of wealth passed on to younger people or to charitable causes balance all the jobs in the medical and care-giving sectors that would vanish?

Though I am over a decade older than Ryecroft (or Gissing,) I do not feel quite so “over” as Gissing expressed it -- though as it turned out, he was quite right about that. There are still things on my horizon, but in many ways this passage does resonate with me. The possible lives (and loves) you idly imagine for yourself are mostly vanished by this time in your life. There will be no dazzling final act in which the hero finally lives up to the potential he was always told (and sometimes even believed) he had. Mostly there will be a, with luck, gradual diminution. A steady narrowing. A shutting down.

Or maybe not. Perhaps there will be an opening up, not in this world and life, but in a transcendental sense. A tuning into the previously ignored underlying connection among all things. A becoming conscious of the harmony of the strings of String theory. I definitely want to “think of the thing” some more... a lot more.

Next: Autumn XXIV. Waking too early.