Skip to main content

Derision and Awe

A mixture of derision and awe ...



A couple of years ago a friend and I decided to go have a drink at a new bar in town.  It was trendy and frequented by a young crowd.  Seeing no available table, we situated ourselves at the bar, ordered craft cocktails, and settled in to enjoy each other's company.

After awhile a young man on the barstool next to mine nudged me with his elbow. I turned to him.

"Hi, how're you ladies doing tonight?" he asked.  We smiled and nodded: "Hello, just fine. And you?"

He paused to sip his beer, then leaned over closer to us and continued:

"I was just wondering how it feels to be so old you could be mothers of most people in this bar."  

Speechless for a moment, I grimaced to my friend, who was also dumbstruck.  I laughed uncomfortably but decided to ignore the insult and engage him in conversation   Shortly we discovered that he was a local guy, where he was employed, and, as small town folk often do, we queried a bit more until we found that we knew some people in common, including my son-in-law.  Realizing he was no longer anonymous, he became less smirky, more respectful, and perhaps somewhat uncomfortable himself (perhaps because he realized he was not anonymous any more). While we were talking a fight broke out at the other end of the bar distracting our attention and as it escalated he apparently made his exit.

During the days to come his initial query surfaced in my mind repeatedly, and I thought of other things I wish I'd said to him at the time, mostly amounting to: "How does it feel to be such a jerk?" Although I felt we'd handled things well, I felt stung by the way that he had purposely insulted us by simply stating the truth.  Looking back, I'm sure we were old enough to be mothers of most of the patrons in that bar that night. 

Nobody likes to be seen as out of place.  We're so much more comfortable fitting into a mold that society seems to have prepared for us.

But should that shame us from doing what we please?  (Hell, no!)

Supporting one another in the choices we each want to make is an important part of how we help each other enjoy freedom at every stage of life.

Here's a great example.  A group calling themselves "Very Old Skateboarders" have established a Facebook page since in any given place there are generally few elders in skateparks.  No matter where in the world they might be, kindred spirits can find each other.  As one woman in the video said, "... when we are out an about there is a mixture of awe and derision directed at us ... " 

Very Old Skateboarders https://youtu.be/BAxvJ5-NL1c

Then, here's Meenakshi Raghavan, an awesome woman, teaching sword-fighting in her 70's https://youtu.be/wE7mROEFX4U


And let's not forget Paddy and Nico dancing!  https://youtu.be/hjHnWz3EyHs

All of these people exemplify the courage and focus it takes to ignore the derision and to inspire the awe!

And let's help each other remember:

We don't need to fit into anyone's idea of who we are or can be

We can find inspiring role models to guide us forward.

They may or may not be athletes or dancers, as 
there are many types of courage.

Sometimes we fall,
but when we get up, and step out 
we can rise up.




Comments

Post a Comment

Comments are moderated before posting, generally within 24 hours.

Popular posts from this blog

The Seasons of a Woman: Harvest Queen

Harvest Queen  The  Harvest Queen  represents the Autumn Equinox, also known as the celebration of Mabon.  The light and the dark are in balance on the equinox, and as the days unfold the darkness begins to overcome the light.  We celebrate our harvests, and then come the days of contemplation.  Wisdom emerges from our depths into our conscious minds, and if we fully accept this upwelling of knowing from within, we enter a time of new strength, preparing ourselves as we become, day by day, one who understands grace.    Celebrating the Autumn Equinox    She who has matured through her seasons, from infancy and childhood to maiden, thence to mother, and as she ascends her Autumn Throne, her crops are fully grown.  She has earned her crown. The left half of the painting represents the end of summer, and the fullness of nature, and that of a woman fully matured. The right half of the painting represents the beginning of autumn; the beginning of the fall ... the very beginning of the descen
Post a Comment
Read more

Becoming a Work of Art

Advanced Style:  Girls Just Wanna Have Fun! For many people of all ages that includes playing with one's presentation to the world, to friends, and to oneself.  Yet in our culture, women who are beyond their reproductive years are shamed into invisibility, retreating into clothes they were taught were more suitable for older women.  But not everyone succumbs to the idea that due to being older they should just shuffle off the stage of life, retreating to the comfort of sensible shoes, a cup of tea and the couch.   The photos on this page are from Advanced Style, the work of Ari Seth Cohen. To celebrate the sense of style of some stylish over-age-60 women he'd seen on the streets of NYC,  Cohen used his photography to focus on them and got to know many through interviews and repeated photo sessions.  He eventually published a book as well as a documentary about women who don't give up the self-expression they've enjoyed all their lives just because they are "ge
Post a Comment
Read more

The Shadow Self

  I'm exploring this concept at the request of Kathleen V., who is leading a Crone workshop in which I'm participating.  She asked whether I'd ever written about any aspect of my shadow self in my journaling over the years. I immediately thought of one experience I had in my early 20's.  I had just left a difficult relationship and had moved to a house with two friends near Bass Harbor, Maine.  The small house was rural, built above the rocky shore facing the harbor.  Behind it the forest rose up into the hills.   One winter night I was dropped off on the road.  As I trudged up the lonely driveway to the house through the snow I realized the house was empty.   I had not lived there long, and I had not been home alone before.  I kicked the snow from my boots and opened the kitchen porch door.  As is the case for many farm houses, the small enclosed back porch stored coats and boots and when the outer door was closed an inner door helped protect from the cold entering the
Post a Comment
Read more