Many people my age and older are keys to a win-win proposition. We have the time to give to groups gathering around common interests that might be uncommon, and those groups are sustained by us, in terms of participation and membership. We are “sub-group sustainers.”
Did you know that the Sarcocaulon Pattersonii, a native plant of South Africa with an inch-and-one-half trunk, prickly spines, and tiny leaves is in the geranium family? Neither did I. But the regulars at any meeting of the Inland Empire Cactus and Succulent Society do. Sculpting the Sarcocaulon Pattersonii into creative bonsai shapes adds to the wonder of particular specimens, making some worth lots of money. And a lot of those folks are in my age cohort.
Did you know that the four parts in a barbershop quartet are bass, baritone, tenor and…lead? I learned that at a rehearsal of the Sandblasters, a barbershop chorus in Palm Springs, California. Most of the singers remember the Truman Administration.
How many Rotary Clubs and similar service organizations have a median membership age around 60?
Bowling Alone, the title of a book by Robert Putnam that was popular a few years back, asserts that participation in political meetings, civic associations and other forms of community-building organizations that add to “social capital” are in decline. He wrote his book before flash mobs and social-media-organized demonstrations. Putnam’s thesis did not go unchallenged even then. The liveliness of the Cactus and Succulent Society and the Sandblasters would refute his thesis, too.
We pledge “one nation, under God, indivisible” but we willingly divide ourselves into myriad groups that focus on countless interests. Thanks heavens for such divisions! They are a strength in our society.
Several years ago, I attended the Annual General Meeting of the Jane Austen Society at Chawton, England, surrounded by those who could recite whole passages of Northanger Abbey and a few who seemed old enough to have known the author personally. One greeted me, “I say. You’re American, aren’t you? I’m Tony Trollope.” (A grandson namesake, I learned, well past his eightieth birthday but Anthony Trollope, for Pete’s sake!)
I’m lucky. I enjoy allowing myself to absorb the mini-culture of sub-groups. Each speaks its own jargon. There are distinct markers of accomplishment (e.g. the gent observing “this is the 12th AGM I have attended”) that the membership understands. Often, the sub-groups find different ways to be exposed to the wider world. The joy of success, however defined, is common.
The enthusiasm for the cause is contagious. At the end of the Cactus and Succulent Society meeting, I was ready to sign up for a trip to Madagascar to see, in person, the giant euphorbia, some amazing and spectacular in size and shape and all amazing for how they survive in barren terrain, that had been the subject of the speaker’s power point presentation.
After the Sandblaster’s annual concert, “Coney Island Babe” was the worm of a song in my brain.
People of a Certain Age carry an important responsibility at this stage of life. Younger people often suffer the fatigue of fractionation. Hard work does not tire one nearly as much as the challenge of doing so many things that the opportunity to give any one task the time it needs is impaired. Social media and other technology only complicate matters. I applaud those who are not retired yet taking on leadership roles and active participation in societies like the ones I visited.
Before I retired, I met many in this privileged status who spoke of being so busy now that they did not know how they had managed to hold a full-time job. I can relate. My list of engagements might be unique to me but the time demands are the same. My age peers are in interest groups, active in church or service clubs, on somebody’s board, a volunteer at a non-profit, ushering at community art events. Some managed to work in golf and other hobbies. I’m still working on that one.
These people define active retirement. The main difference is that they—we—are engaged in activities they want to pursue, not ones they have to for economic reasons.
Our responsibility is to go, do, mentor, join, attend; in short, those who have the time can take the time to fill in the memberships that sustain the subgroups that are the backbone of our social order and pass along whatever wisdom we might have acquired along the way. There is no age restriction to this privilege.
Daniel E. White
May 12, 2015