The two of you have truly been an inspiration to me (as daughter to Vicki and cousin to Carol). I’ve watched you both emerging courageously from the emotional devastation and physical exhaustion from care-taking your dying, life-long husbands, to find new meaning and rebuild your lives with determination, strength, and verve. I’m beside myself to see you sharing your thoughts, experiences, and ongoing journeys on this platform.
In wrapping up the final touches in my book for publication, I landed on the concept of reinventing cultural legacies, which is actually what I see you both doing here. Our culture is due for an overhaul of the legacy of old age (a category the two of you seem to defy, only because of the lingering deficiencies of the current model). Also, because of the fact that spouses are roughly 20% (60% for care-giving spouses) more likely to die soon after their mates, that tells me that a forum for connection and support at this overwhelming time of life will be a boon (possibly even a life saver) to a great many people.
Karen, I so appreciate your comments, especially the words, “reinventing cultural legacies. ” for I feel that it is part of what Vicki and I are trying to do, each in our own way. And, not looking only at our aging but all of the interests and concerns we talk about: Living more lightly on Mother Earth; and the challenges of communicating in positive ways our ideas, concerns, hope and vision.
ReplyDeleteOne of our challenges is communicating so the other understands our meaning, the intentions of our words. The ease of being defensive which then blocks understanding the other, recently came up between us and, because of our commitment to our path, we worked out that particular difficulty and then raised the issue of why we ~ why are so many people ~ defensive and (for me a “biggie”) how do we continue past that roadblock to communication.
Vicki journal-ed about it and I asked her to let it become a blog. If you are interested in this topic, check out our new label “Building Community”.