To Be Old,or Not to Be.

Fuentes-Rivera

K. Fuentes-Rivera

Essay 1

To Be Old, or Not to Be.

Imagine walking into a yard with banana trees, clothes hanging from the clothesline, the scent of rich tropical foods cooking, load music, lots of sand, and your grandmother sitting on a rocking chair drinking some home-made piña colada. For me, this isn’t a dream, but a reality. I go back to my home in Puerto Rico and this is how I find my grandmother 90% of the time. She and the abundance of old folks in this same neighborhood is why I don’t fear aging, and believe that one should accept it.

Many people in the United States fear aging and what it brings. Seeing the cultural attributes that the old are given here in the states I can see that reasoning. When there are constant barrages of commercials for “helping” the old, the security of the young can quickly die with one night of infomercial watching. There a numerous commercials that can make anyone fear the aging process. Viagra, the motorized scooters, and we can not forget grandmother’s plea for help, because she couldn’t get up. Not only does the media portray this stereotype, but commercials and TV shows constantly reinforce the idea of being old weakens the human. In some cases yes, this does happen, but it is usually due to what one has put their body through.

I was fortunate enough to grow up in a climax that appreciated the elders in our community. Unlike my peers, I grew up seeing old ladies smiling and doing their shopping in the mornings, the old men would be sitting at the local café playing dominoes and drinking their choice of beverages. I saw these people not as miserable people who can’t wait to die (with broken hips such as our TV grandmother), but as people who began to live a new phase in their lives.

In Puerto Rico, you do not see commercials for the old. It’s possibly due ...

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In Puerto Rico, you do not see commercials for the old. It’s possibly due to the fact that you really can’t get around a motorized scooter when a lot of the roads are still dirt and sand. But it is possibly because of the traditions and the deep sense of community that is imbedded into the Puerto Rican Culture.

“Growing old in Puerto Rico doesn’t mean wrinkles, it means love: Love for the family, love for your friends, and love for your life (Perez),” This was the answer my grandmother gave me when I asked her how she felt growing old. “Americans see life making them old. They go to work-they get old. They have family problems- they get old…In Puerto Rico life keeps you young. You work and stay strong, and loving life keeps you even younger. So even though I’m old, because of how I live MY life, I will stay young. (Perez).” My grandmother is like the ship in Malcolm Cowley’s essay “The View from 80.”

“In his new role the old person will find that he is tempted with new vices, that he receives new compensation…Chief among these is the heroic or merely obstinate refusal to surrender in the face of time. One admires the ships that go down with all flags flying and the captain on the bridge (373).”

That is my grandmother and her fellow compatriots of Puerto Rico, the ultimate cruise liners that if they go down, they will with fireworks.

I see myself in my grandmother and many like her, People who have lived life. They are like the writer May Sarton, “But I do not feel old at all, not as much as a survivor as a person still on her way (381).” You look forward not back. This is the problem many Americans have, and why they begin to feel old at such young ages.

Now that I’m in that states I can see why people would fear growing old. With rampant Alzheimer’s, and kids who are perfectly willing to put one in a home for the elderly, and infomercials galore stereotyping what it is to be old. If the cultural stigma didn’t exist here in the US, maybe people wouldn’t fear growing old.