The Living Years

I was standing at the kitchen counter doing some chopping of vegetables. In my ear were classic 80's music that transported me back to my teenage years. Make fun of that decade all you want, but the 80's are an iconic era.

I was humming along happily to New Order, Peter Cetera, TOTO, and Crowded House, when suddenly this song started playing: The Living Years by Mike + The Mechanics.

Over the last 6 months, I have been living under my parents' roof. My mother is 77 and father is 80 years old. Both are relatively healthy and independent, which is a blessing. But, they are also more frail, slower, shockingly stubborn, and increasingly becoming shadows of their old selves. As parents, we marvel at how our children grow up. As adult children, we look on with concern at our parents aging before our eyes.

I'll be honest and say that it's been a strange experience living with aging parents. They are still my parents and still sometimes treat me like I am 15, not 51. Helping them with things like emails or doing their taxes or deciding if we should buy a new soap dispenser is an odd and challenging set of interactions. Did I mention they are stubborn? Granted, they've had about 80 years of life under their belts, so it's not surprising that my mother and father like things done a certain way.

As I listened to the song's intro and the first lyrics...

Every generation

Blames the one before

And all of their frustrations

Come beating on your door

I know that I'm a prisoner to all my father held so dear

I know that I'm a hostage, to all his hopes and fears

I just wish I could have told him in the living years

Crumpled bits of paper

Filled with imperfect thought

Stilted conversations

I'm afraid that's all we've got

...I was soon leaving tears on the cutting board. I cried silently in the kitchen while my parents were in the living room watching their daily Youtube news.

In truth, some of the pain felt when listening to a song like this is due to the difficulty of making our living years meaningful. I sometimes drive my parents crazy and vice versa. I cry when hearing Mike + The Mechanics' love letter back to all of the missed opportunities to be kinder, gentler, and loving.

I am indeed one of the blessed ones to still have my parents and to have a relationship with them, not to mention I get to see them each day.

Today's article is a reminder that we don't all have and won't always have living years with our loved ones.

Make them count!