The Privilege of Aging
The is an adapted excerpt from the book, The Privilege of Aging: Savoring the Fullness of Life, reprinted with permission from the author, Kamla K. Kapur.
‘I feel young enough to burn some rubber,’ I tell my husband as I recount my dream about driving a red convertible sports car on winding roads, wild grey hair flying.
‘Let’s go to Idyllwild. I need nature.’
Idyllwild, in the San Bernardino Forest, a place of pine trees, boulders, high mountains, snow covered peaks in winter, is one of our favorite places to vacation. And it’s only two hours away by car.
‘Yes! Let’s go for your birthday!’ I love the spontaneity of it. We have lost quite a bit of it lately, perhaps as a symptom of aging. My husband is turning 75 and I have had trouble thinking of what to get him. He dislikes parties, they are too much work. I agree. He dislikes getting gifts. I bought him a pair of expensive slippers because he had complained the cheap pair he bought were not comfortable. ‘I don’t need any more things!’ he said, when I gave them to him. Then he went into a diatribe about consumerism, stuff, plastic, packaging, carbon footprint. The next day when I put the new slippers where he keeps the old ones, he slipped into them, smiled, and said he liked them. A few days later he complained they had no arch. So, I ordered him another pair of black leather slip-ons. When they arrived, he went ballistic. ‘You don’t understand, I want less, not more!’ I swore to him I would never buy him anything again. I told him I would return them, but he wore them to the New Year eve party, and later complained they were a little big. His reaction to my gifts used to annoy me because I love giving gifts to those I love, till he explained that his mother gave gifts to her children instead of love. And the gifts were tied to conditions.
‘Ten days in Idyllwild will be my birthday gift to you,’ I say. He accepts graciously. There is nothing dearer to him than nature.
In the evening we watch TV, my head in his lap, our squawks and squabbles, the gold together with the black, braided into one. At night he strokes my head and I drift off to a long, dreamless sleep, waking and staying in bed, just touching, for over nine hours.
__________
My husband booked a getaway to Idyllwild, but the forecast predicted rain the entire time, just like our previous failed trip to Desert Hot Springs. I craved solitude, only to learn he invited his friend and wife to join. I was reluctant, as I value my personal space. While my instinct was to say no, I decided to go with the flow.
I have noticed that whenever I am reluctant about a social event, the Universe obliges. His friends backed out. I was thrilled. This left me guiltlessly free. I have suffered too long the ‘Indian wife’ syndrome I inherited from my mother, my culture, my gender.
I have never wanted to be in the traditional role my mother very unwillingly had fallen into. I would see her sweet, social face when interacting with house guests – there were so many of them when I was growing up! It is an Indian thing – and see an entirely different, grumpy one when she turned away. She did it so perfectly that towards the end the mask cracked entirely, and she let herself become the harridan that she had repressed all her life. Because she did not allow herself to express her shrew in small ways, she burst out in full force, in what Freud calls ‘The Return of the Repressed.’
My husband, who had a single working mother, a feminist, a founding member of NOW, has never expected me to be anything but myself. I wouldn’t be with him if he had. My relationship problems have always come from my own expectations of myself in my many roles. What I think are his expectations of me are mostly imaginary. I recall a day when we were both eating a meal we prepared together – a soup into which each of us threw ingredients, broth, vegetables, quinoa, persimmons, apples, nuts. The kitchen was a mess and while we were eating, I said, “I’ll put all this away in a while.” And he replied, “Nobody’s asking you to do anything.”
He has since taken over the clean-up whenever I cook, and I appreciate his attention to and participation in domestic detail.
Disentangling myself from what I am expected to be and who I am is my ongoing work. For me, individuating means distinguishing between values that my Indian culture imposes on me and my true needs. The former come from historic, collective standards. Sometimes the two coincide, but where they chafe and constrict, I endeavor as gently as I can to molt out of them, leave the tight and crusty chrysalis behind. Not as easy as it sounds, but hell, at 72 I have the time, the leisure, the space to sift through myself, and consign the chaff to the winds.
Kamla K. Kapur was born and raised in India and studied in the United States. An award-winning playwright, poet, and author of 8 books, her writing has been featured in anthologies and journals such as Parabola and The Sun. A former literature professor at Grossmont College, she and her husband divide their time between the remote Indian Himalayas and San Diego, California. kamlakapur.com