On turning 70: I’m a speeding train wondering where the journey ends | Opinion
I turned 70 on May 3. I never imagined an otherwise fine spring day could be fraught with so many emotions.
Angst? I’m trying to fight it off. I’ve written enough obituaries of people younger than me to appreciate that I have my health. I also have hearing aids (God bless closed captions), a CPAP machine and bum shoulder from tripping over a grandchild’s toy late one night in a darkened kitchen. Kids’ stuff relatively speaking.
Blessings? I count them all the time. I found the love of my life in 1976 in Morganton, N.C. The first time I asked Sharon for a date I was proofing newspaper copy in the back shop. We have two accomplished children with wonderful spouses (all in Charlotte!), four grandchildren and the eagerness, time and intestinal fortitude to take them through the McDonald’s drive-through whenever they ask.
Boredom? Not yet. I play senior (some of us call it “old man”) softball. I muse on life with my men’s group. I organize group lunches with Charlotte Observer colleagues from 20 years ago. I heed the advice that Dr. Charles Edwards shares in a book I edited, “Much Abides: A Survival Guide for Aging Lives.” I don’t obsess over money, worry about technology or swim (drown) in the poisonous waters of cable TV news. I watch my blood pressure, get enough sleep (that one’s easy) and keep up with friends. Social connections are crucial. On a more cosmic level, I accept the fact that time will eventually run out. I do not have forever to say what needs to be said to enemies and loved ones.
Fulfillment? I found my calling telling people’s stories, then capturing their legacy in death. The storytelling continues, only now I’m my own boss. How must it feel to trudge to work for a job, however lucrative, that leaves your heart untouched? I’ll never know.
Fear? People ask me all the time whether I’ve written my own obituary. The answer is no. Death frightens me. So does the uncertainty of what comes after, if anything.
Seventy, as you can see, has been doing a number on me.
I look back frequently, not only to milestones but to small moments that loom larger with the passage of time. The Beatles’ “Michelle” comes on the radio and I recall the party at my friend Michael’s house in 1966. I was 13. Um, enough details on that one. The anniversary of the Kent State killings on May 4, 1970, rolls around and I think about my father breaking the news to me that four students were shot dead in Ohio. There in my dad’s car a block from home I felt the first tug of wanting to put words to loss. I was 17. I remember a Wednesday evening in April 1975 when the weekly newspaper arrived at Terni’s store in tiny Millerton, N.Y. It held my first byline, a story about the bicentennial. I was 22 and I’d discovered my passion.
I sometimes Google old friends, a where-are-they-now? exercise that doesn’t always end well. Michael, the party host, became a documentary filmmaker. He died in a fall at his home in 2020. He was 66. Now when “Michelle” comes on, nostalgia is laced with lament. A college buddy, Joe, with whom I shared pick-up basketball games and late-night pizza in the student newspaper office, is a therapist in California. Among his areas of expertise are issues facing older adults. I’ll send him this column. I suspect he’s heard it all before from clients.
Love, loss, blessings, sorrow, gratitude, fear. They are all rolled into 70 years. It’s like I’m on a train bound for the future. I try to enjoy the ride, to savor every memory, every emotion, every stop I’ve passed along life’s way. But it’s hard. I wonder what that new pain might be. People ask me if we’ve put our names on the waiting list at Sharon Towers. I scan the obituaries for peers I know.
The train is speeding down the track — yes, time flies — and there’s no stopping now.
At 70, I wonder where the journey ends?
At peace, I hope.
Ken Garfield is a freelance writer/editor who focuses on charitable causes and obituaries. Reach him at garfieldken3129@gmail.com .
