Another Country
   Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders
   Mary Pipher, Ph.D.
  1999 Riverhead Books/Penguin Putnam Inc. NY USA
   ISBN: 1573227846


If old age is Another Country, then we must all learn to speak its language. This is a field guide to this foreign land - a help & resource as our elders age &we must talk with them about medicine, hygiene, dependence, selling the car, loneliness, love.

This book jumped into my hand because it's all about what we're doing right now - taking care of our 89 year-old Poppa in his final years. While Poppa's son speaks his father's language & can mostly get his frames of references there are over 40 unknown years before his son was a twinkle in his Poppa's eye. Meanwhile I have only a smattering of references with this plodding mischievous fellow who avoids saying yea or nay & comes at everything from the oblique. He also has an endless well of stories about anything, these should be told to a bevy of youngsters at his knees - all his great-grandkids are thousands of miles away. I also know now that we are not at fault for his oldness nor is it our job to make him happy. Only he can do that. It is our job, however, to keep ourselves happy!

Another Country has greatly helped me bridge that gap which makes communications between us like yelling across a freeway at rush hour. I know the hardest role that's come down to me is the one of The Nag. We remind him of the things he needs to accomplish, hanging signs in front of his tv, on his mirror. I now realize how important it is for us all BEFORE we age to have learnt new things, started new hobbies/activities which will keep our bodies & minds alert.

"Many old people are living in a world designed for young people." How true - make remotes like those big-buttoned telephones! Can't drive, can't negotiate buses. No public facilities. Can't handle stairs & elevators are confusing. The well of compassion we tap in raising children must be re-visited in caring for our elders.

When ministering to someone from another generation the hurt feelings come from taking personally problems that are cultural or developmental. I know that one well. While I'm philosophical about the "hard lot" Poppa suffers in his golden years: fading hearing, sense of touch & taste, an allergy to exercise, daily aches & pains; boredom & solitude, I know I'm brittle when I feel he's blaming me for his life choices. Old age, unlike infancy, is ahead of us all our lives - start preparing for it now!

"Right now we are in a crisis. We lack the housing arrangements, social structures, traditions, and wisdom to make the last years of life manageable. No one wants to die surrounded by hired help. No one wants their parents to be anxious about money and in pain their last years. Yet these things happen all the time. There is an enormous gap between what we believe is right and what is practical."

People in retirement homes or their own homes/apartments have almost no contact with anyone other than contemporaries and/or their caregivers. Meanwhile, all over America we have kids hungry for "lap time" & older children needing skills, nurturing & moral instruction from their elders. We have street gangs of ten-year-olds, & old-age ghettos in which our elders are isolated from the real world.

Mary Pipher states her goal: "...to map out the terra incognita between old people and their children, to help each generation understand the other. The last years of a relationship are important ones. Sadness and conflict are inevitable, but much pain can be avoided with better information, empathy, and planning. Those last years can be difficult, but also redemptive. As we care for our parents, we teach our children to care for us. As we see our parents age, we learn to age with courage and dignity. If the years are handled well, the old and young can help each other grow.

While Another Country is a concept with which I work well, I missed seeing ideas about personal hygiene & false dignity, letting go of poise & becoming bumps on a log, retaliation & foibles. Notwithstanding oldsters' bouts of crabbiness, "know-it-all-ness" & blank-mindedness, Another Country presents an interesting, encouraging & enlightening handbook. I do thank Mary Pipher for putting it into words I can use. I intend to give my copy to my children, so they may be so well-versed when it's time to care for their aging parents.

More from Mary Pipher, Ph.D.:
The Shelter of Each Other; Reviving Ophelia; Hunger Pains.
(08/08/99)

Rebecca