Shelved by Sue Matthews Petrovski

Author:Sue Matthews Petrovski
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Purdue University Press

SEVEN

Reflecting on the Mountain

It is after we get home that we really go over the mountain, if ever. What did the mountain say? What did the mountain do?

— HENRY DAVID THOREAU, IN AN 1857 LETTER TO HARRISON G. O. BLAKE

Reflecting on our thirty-eight months at Planet X, our mountain, has required me to reexamine a myriad of assumptions I have held about life, about aging, and about places like Planet X. I admit that my months of study have caused me to think about what Paulo Coelho spoke of in The Alchemist: living life with “the language of enthusiasm, of things accomplished with love and purpose, and as part of a search for something believed in and desired.”1 As I returned to look once again at my newish home, I wondered if in this last third of our lives there really is any good way for our society to provide a solid backdrop where those older members who desire to do so might, perhaps for the first time, discover Coelho’s enthusiasm, love, and purpose in their lives.

My first assumptions about living in a senior center were typically skewed. Even though I had old person experience from my parents’ last years, my life’s book did not include the kind of useful information I needed to evaluate how today one can successfully and fully live that last third of life, especially in a senior residence. It certainly did not tell me what tomorrow might bring for the baby boomers.

Here at Planet X I have met those, some of whom have found their personal legend, as Coelho calls it, who are peacefully getting old and following the precepts they have been taught by their church or by example, while others have self-discovered the secret to finding purpose and enthusiasm for living their life thoroughly till the end. As in any communal setting some here are discontent, but given the encouragement of friends and staff, perhaps there is a chance that they, too, can find peace and meaning in these last years. I am convinced that these years have a purpose, but it is always a personal challenge for each of us to embark on a singular journey to find meaning in our own life. If our mountain, Planet X, could talk, it might say, “Here is a place where you can work out your dreams, care for your illnesses, have understanding and help if needed, and live or even discover the final meaning of your life if you have the desire to do so.”

That is the dream, but how does one weave it into his or her life at Planet X? I can credit my friend Henry Thoreau for describing how we can look more intelligently at the mountains we experience in life. He encourages us to, after the climb, look carefully at the complete experience, mull it over, and then try to apply what we have learned to the remainder of our life. I know that I’m sincerely pleased that I took

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