The words “Trolling the Oceans to Combat Aging” headlined a puff piece in a recent New York Times Style Section that crossed my breakfast table. It featured a new skin product, based on ocean algae, and designed to erase alleged defects of the human face.
Normally, matters of style do not slow down my reading of the daily newspaper. Anything against aging, however, grabs my attention immediately. I stand opposed to all forms of anti-aging.
This outlook has been strengthened by reading a brilliant new book, Agewise, written by a longtime friend, Margaret Gullette. An independent scholar and cultural critic, this Newton resident has further raised my consciousness about the many insidious ways American culture misrepresents aging and undermines its values.
Margaret Gullette shows herself militant in exposing the fallacies of aging as decline. For her, current negative views of aging reflect deep-seated changes in American society that have penalized people who are middle-aged and older. Economic powers and other social forces, seeking to protect their own vested interests, have distorted what it means to age.
Gullette insists on reclaiming the life course for all of us. That means breaking with the decline model that is foisted on people of all ages. The author boldly identifies some of the forces behind ageism: capitalism, anti-aging scientists, and duty-to-die proponents.
Margaret devotes a chapter to the sad story of her former mentor Carolyn Heilbrun, a retired Columbia University professor who committed suicide, apparently for reasons influenced by ageism. These reasons likely deepened her long-term depression and made her consider her life meaningless.
In another chapter, the author shows how the tragedy wrought by hurricane Katrina hit elders disproportionately to their numbers in the population of New Orleans. “Of those who died,” she observes, “64 percent were over sixty-five in a city where beforehand a mere 12 percent were over that age.”
If you are tempted to attribute these numbers merely to old-age disability, you should know about the many hidden injustices suffered by these elders. As Margaret identifies them she says: “Human decisions and omissions play huge roles before and after nature does its damage.”
In a chapter entitled “Plastic Wrap,” the author discusses cosmetic surgery in relation to aging. Though more Americans have become distrustful of this response to aging, it still maintains a hold on many who fear bodily changes in mid-life. Gullette sees such surgery as part of what she calls “the uglification industries” that support this country’s cult of youth.
Another chapter Gullette calls “Improving Sexuality across the Life Course.” Its subtitle “Why Sex for Women Is Likely to Get Better with Age” goes with her emphasis on the false way in which menopause is presented as almost a disease instead of a liberation. In this connection she quotes a woman: “Aging cures a lot of problems.”
One of my favorite sections reveals Margaret Gullette as a perceptive literary critic. Here she discusses Jane Austen’s beloved novel Emma. Unlike most other readers, she focuses on caregiving and takes note of how committed Emma, and her husband-to-be, Mr. Knightly, feel about the care of Emma’s father, Mr. Woodhouse.
Gullette’s appraisal of Mr. Woodhouse’s old age is nuanced. Even though a modern reader might be tempted to brand the old man’s condition as dementia, she says, that does not give enough credit to the way he lives. His daughter and her fiancé seem to recognize the many qualities Mr. Woodhouse holds onto that make his life satisfying. And she prizes Austen for exalting caregiving as a way of improving the “faulty self.”
Later in Agewise Margaret cites another of my favorite novels. This one, Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson, also deals with old age and the response of family members to their aged father. I consider it one of the best works of fiction that deals with caregiving.
Refusing a simplistic view of dementia, Gullette rejects what she regards as a false emphasis upon one result of Alzheimer’s disease. Even though it weakens, and can eventually destroy the memory, memory is not the only function of the brain. The person can retain other important brain abilities.
The author introduce this subject by this subtitle: “Why America’s Escalating Dread of Memory Loss in Dangerous to Our Human Relations, Our Mental Health, and Public Policy.” This view will no doubt strike many readers as wrongheaded if not downright incorrect. However, I know at least one medical scientist who holds a similar opinion.
Margaret bolsters her view by citing other gerontologists, one of whom, Susan McFadden, calls attention to “the gifts of persons with memory loss and mental confusion.”
Among the important grace notes Margaret makes in Agewise is frequent mention of her own mother. She credits this woman for being her “first guide in constructing life-course stories.” And she continues to look toward her mother for guidance and wisdom. Margaret’ s taking care of her mother at a time of crisis serves as a fine example of the struggles and rewards of that vital activity.