some thoughts on oldness

there is an 'assisted living' home around the corner from the pub i work at. 

so i see a lot of old people.

there is bernard

who calls from his bed for a six pack of carlton draught

and only wants it to be delivered by young, handsome men.

there is the lady with the tiara

who leaves presents for us in the toilet.

coat hangers, hair clips, cleaning products,

a lamp shade, a shoe, a notebook 

detailing all of the public toilets she has used in the city of melbourne.

there is john.

who was from northern ireland once

and drank a lot of whiskey.

now he drinks vodka, neat, like water

so the nurses can't smell it on his breath.

there was ted

with the crooked spine

who was very angry that his son had taken all his money and abandoned him 

in south melbourne with all the other old people.

(ted is now dead.)

there was hundred and two year old man

with his sydney swans scarf

who shouted at me because i don't wear a watch

and shouted at me when he fell over and he didn't want my help.

(hundred and two year old man is also now dead)

there is joan

who looks like she is made from dough.

her voice is just a whisper now

and her laugh rattles with phleghm

but she still hands over fifteen dollars ninety for a pack of peter stuyvesants

(the light blue ones)

even though she tells me she's not allowed anymore.

i'm not going to be the one to say no.

and there is ian

who does daily laps of clarendon st

(the cricket club, the limerick, max brenner's, seven eleven,

but definitely not the french cafe down the end, 

oh no, not since it was taken over by indians)

ian likes cider and being racist

and spitting out food

and my breasts.

and they make me sad.

all of them.

some of them have families

and some of them have families who still visit them.

but as far as i can tell

this place that they are in

(and i don't just mean the hostel)

well it is not where i want to end up.

it's like they have been put away 

to get old and unpleasant 

and lose their grip on the bodies and the brains that have carried them 
through the last sixty, seventy, eighty years.

lose their grip in a place where they will inconvenience and offend

as few people as possible.

i'm not judging.

and i don't have the answers.

(i'm not even very nice to ian these days -
with all the racism and the spitting it's just too hard
so who am i to judge?)

i'm just saying it makes me sad.

michael parkinson was on channel nine the other night

talking about an interview he did with professor jacob bronowski 

in nineteen seventy something

when professor jacob bronowski was what we would call

an old person.

michael parkinson finished the interview by asking him

why we should listen to anything that he said.

and professor jacob bronowski said this:

"should you listen to me?

yes, you should.

not because you have to believe a single thing i say

but because you have to be pleased that there are people who have lived 

happy and complete lives,

who feel they can speak out of a full heart and a full mind

all in the same frame."

that is the kind of old person i would like to be,

if i get a say.

full heart. full mind.

somebody still worth listening to.