Sun City and Old Age

I always believed that the most depressing city in the world was Calcutta, India, where I spent a few days about thirty years ago.? I was wrong, although it is stunningly poor, crowded and hot.? But the worst city on the planet is Sun City, Arizona.

It’s a retirement community sixteen miles from Phoenix.? You can’t buy property or rent a home there unless you are over fifty-five.? Every younger person who works there must live in a neighboring town.? The population is about 40,000, 98% White, 50% married couples over sixty-five.? Just about every resident has white hair.? There are eight golf courses.

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Most of the city consists of prefab homes that all look alike, one-story and gray. Almost no green foliage. The land is dry, flat, dusty and gray like the homes.? The winds blow constantly.

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The only serious business in Sun City is the huge array of medical buildings: The Banner Boswell Hospital complex which seems to consume almost every inch of colorless earth; dental and dermatological offices; psychiatric facilities; rehab centers, on and on.? There are few restaurants and no movie theatres.

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I was there a few weeks ago with my husband Tom to visit his brother who lives in the area and was ill in the enormous hospital. The daytime temperature was 114 degrees, 98 degrees at midnight. One afternoon, between visits to his brother, we drove to a shopping center to have mani-pedis, to escape into an activity that was frivolous and wasn’t medical. Everybody in the shop, manicurists and customers alike, had white hair.? Some were in wheelchairs or walkers.? Why did the men look so much younger than the women, I wondered.? Everyone was White and old. Were they all trumpies, in this heavily trumpie state?

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The whole experience had me thinking about aging, my aging, Tom’s aging.? Not that I don’t think about it in my normal daily life, I certainly do, but I’m not surrounded or obsessed by it.? No, I won’t tell you my age here.? I will tell you that I’m shocked by how old I am, I don’t really believe it.? None of my friends or little family believe it either. The number sounds so ancient, and we all have our fantasies about what my age should look like and be like. Now you’re wondering how old I am, aren’t you??

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I’m physically healthy, mostly of sound mind.? Well, I do frequently forget the plot of whatever Netflix series we’re watching, I often yearn for a twenty-minute nap late in the afternoon, and I can’t remember the recipe for turkey meatloaf, which I’ve cooked 853 times.? I’ve had a knee replaced recently, a sure sign of advancing age.

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My hair is curly blond, I’ll never let it go to white.? I intend to write and also produce theatre until nobody will hire me anymore, or I can’t remember my curtain speech or the name of the star.? I don’t understand retirement, unless I owned a yacht or a summer home on the isle of Capri. I plan to get deeply involved in our upcoming election. I wonder if much of my future life will consist of shorter- and shorter-term projects.

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I certainly spend more time at doctor’s appointments than I ever thought possible.? The last time I left my physical therapist’s office after he maneuvered my funky back, I saw a woman getting out of an Uber to come into his facility.? She was frail, stooped over and needed help getting out of the car. I wondered if I looked like that and if she is older or younger than me.? I wonder about those things often.

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I was shopping in Costco recently when I dropped my keys. Before I could reach over to retrieve them, a young woman walking next to me picked them up, smiled and handed them to me.? I said thank you, but I didn’t appreciate it.? Did you think I was too old to bend over to get the keys, I thought? Did I look too weak and delicate?

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We’ve given up adventure traveling on bikes, hiking in the Swiss Alps, schlepping around Cambodia.? Now we work out with trainers at our gym, ride stationary bikes and I do a Silver Sneakers class on Thursday mornings.? My walks with our beloved pup have gotten a bit shorter as have walks on our beach by the shoreline.

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We also take cruises, which we never did earlier on.? And we love the combination of adventure (a recent trip deep into the Amazon), relaxation during days at sea, and visiting churches and cheese farms. Most cruisers in our experience are old.

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We go out with friends for dinner or LA Phil concerts or the theatre about 3 times a week. I’ve always been determined that our lives should stay social and not get buried in our beds streaming Amazon every night. But at about 5:00 on the nights we’re scheduled to go out, I don’t want to go, I want to curl up in bed with no mascara and pull our perfect gray and white quilt over me. We never cancel plans unless they involve driving to Northridge or Orange County, and even though we have to eat the cost of any tickets, we’re both so relieved and comfortable at home. I always say” why did we think we’d want to do this”? And our only answer is “it sounded like fun at the time.”

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There is clearly the question of fear and fragility.? The New York Times Opinion Section of Sunday, July 7 had a piece by a geriatrician named Rachael Bedard on the truth about getting older.? She wrote mostly about clinical frailty.? “As we age,” she writes, “everyone accumulates wear and tear, illness and stress...for young and middle-aged people who are not chronically or seriously ill, these types of insults don’t usually change the way we function in the long term.? This is not so for frail elders.”

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I’m afraid of falling, as is Tom and everyone we ask. Sometimes I notice that he stoops over a bit when he walks and when I mention it he says he’s worried about losing his balance.? I always think I need to have a banister to go up and down stairs comfortably.?

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Rachael Bedard writes: “Getting older often means accumulated wisdom, experience and even happiness but it also means slowing down.” I often ask myself if I’m wiser than in my earlier years, and I don’t see it at all. I can’t remember if I’m happier. ?I have to admit that I’m a frail elder.? Falling is a larger fear for me than disease, oddly enough.?

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I will soon write about loss, an inevitable accompaniment to aging.? We’ve lost several friends over the last few years, have a few now with chronic conditions of one sort of another.? But that’s for another day…

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Today I ponder if I’m too old to have a facelift?? Definitely.? Do I have to change some habits of my youth, like having many drinks at a party or staying up until the wee hours?? Of course.? Will I be as jolly and cute at ninety as Carol Burnett?? I’m hopeful.? And I vow never to live in Sun City, Arizona.

What's the worst place you've ever been? Comment below.

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“Marcia Seligson is one of the funniest, most original, and irreverent people I know, and her book carries all those qualities. She can make anything funny, from a Peloton bike to a 40-hour brisket cookery. And she can be touching, deep, and bracingly honest. My advice to readers is make sure you have unbroken time ahead when you pick up this book. Each time I did, intending to read for ten minutes, an hour went by before I looked up. And I’d laughed out loud at least twice.” Sara Davidson, Writer NY Times bestseller Loose Change, Head writer for Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman??