Now that death is the last spook to come out of the closet, a fascination is setting in. People want to talk about a subject that has been tabooed for centuries. And actually, it's a fascinating subject. Like most taboos, it reverberates with many levels of meaning and emotion; whenever someone dies, whenever we contemplate our own death, we are elevated for the moment into the arena where the eternal lurks, now stripped from the shroud of mystery that usually keeps it from sight, stimulating right-brain contemplation of what our lives are all about. So long as death remains unspeakable, then some of our most profound thoughts must be held in solitary silence, only to vanish like wisps into the twilight.
What then is accomplished by talking about it? We come to realize that we are not alone. Pretensions and masquerades fall to the wayside as we explore who we are in the face of the infinite.
Talking about death is an opportunity, then, to become more intimate with one another, and even to process our deepest fears.
Two years ago, Jon Underwood started something called the Death Cafe, where strangers come to talk about their experience, "To increase awareness of death with a view to helping people make the most of their (finite) lives." Since then, Death Cafes have been springing up all over, in a variety of locations, even online. Comments at the web site suggest that people who attended the most recent event were quite satisfied by the experience, and that it encouraged greater intimacy and authenticity.One has just formed here in Santa Fe, in a nice little restaurant just down the street from where I live. I'm planning to attend next month, and I'll share my experience with you here.
Last week, on June 6, I went to a meeting at the Academy for the Love of Learning, a uniquely Santa Fe sort of place, where classes wed intelligence and consciousness for the purpose of transformation, "to build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete," to use Buckminster Fuller's words.
The Academy has a lovely website and is located on an equally lovely 18-acre property just outside of town, that once belonged to the conservationist Ernest Thompson Seton, who erected a castle there as his home. The castle burned down in 2005, unfortunately, but the Academy built an entirely new facility there, following green building principles throughout.
The Academy has just launched a "community conversation" on the topic of creative aging. Its first meeting was promoted as a discussion of life's "third stage." Molly Sturges, who helps very old people compose their "lifesongs," was one of the facilitators, and Acushla Bastible, a multidisciplinary theater artist, was the other.
Right off the bat, the conversation headed toward the topic of death, dying...and the critical question of care as we approach the end of our lives.
After a bit, I started to squirm. I don't object to the topic, but it wasn't what I came for. My interest was in the whole question of how people age, and how to do it wonderfully instead of sinking into the armchair of decrepitude soon after retirement. I'm one of those who wish to see aging re-imagined and redefined, a new model that will make the old one obsolete, as Fuller said, and that's what I came to hear.
Illness among the "frail elderly" and the inevitable ending are fine topics, but I am "staying alive" right now by focusing on living. There is still quite enough to be concerned about -- maintaining one's health, a demanding topic and a full-time practice in itself; taking care of finances, even more difficult for me; relationships with adult kids and with each other; geopolitical issues that confront our aging world; and, you know, having a bit of fun, when possible.
So I said, "When I moved to New Mexico, I was 62 years old, and one of the first things that happened was that I realized that getting old was not just something that happened to other people. It was happening to me. And I was not prepared for it."
I talked a bit about confronting that reality, and with it, the reality of death. "But you know," I went on, "once you go through that tunnel, the one that leads to your own death, and you deal with that, it's transformational. Afterwards you don't feel the need to talk about death -- at least for awhile."
I realized that I had come to understand what some of my older friends had told me in the past when I wanted to talk about the connection between death and aging. They wanted to focus on living. Death would come of its own accord fast enough.
I'm happy to say that conversation shifted after that, and many fine insights were shared.
If we are serious about transforming the experience of aging, we need to talk about the many ways that old ideas, fears, and expectations color our attitude to this time of life. Dying is certainly an important topic, but it's the prospect of dying, the reality that it lies just around the bend, that challenges us to grow in our lives, to live while we are alive, and to find joy in life despite the limitations that accrue with age. That's a big enough challenge to conquer, and its fruits are profound, for the vitality that results from living fully in the present is surely one of the great gifts of age.
I'm interested in your comments! Please do say what you feel, below.
And I'll be back -- after the Death Cafe, if not before.
