Kindness

Decades ago, I was at the home of an older woman. She said, “My husband will be 70 this year, and we’ve started thinking about how to finish well.” This stuck with me, even though, at the time, I was comfortably middle-aged. This couple was well known in Christian circles. They had authored books and planted churches. And yet, they were thinking about next steps. At their age.

We tend to think of people unlike us as “other.” This keeps us safe and apart from what we dread. Older people are, for most of our lives, “other,” though it is inevitable that we will become those people, barring death. This “otherness” enables us to comment on how “cute” an old person is when he is trying to use a new technology for the first time. I was “othered” recently by a doctor who, entering the exam room where I waited, greeted me with, “Hello, young lady.” If I hadn’t needed his expertise, I might have expressed my disappointment in his patronization. I am not cute, and I am no longer young. I am other. 

I have wanted to achieve so much in my life. I have been a wife, mother, speaker, writer, teacher, and a leader. I’ve wanted to spread out, to be more effective. As I age, my aims, and even my world, have gotten smaller. 

When I was childless, I knew my babies would sleep all night and quietly go everywhere with me. My children would be trauma-free, grow up, and come over for dinner every week. And when I was young, I knew I would get old, white hair and a few wrinkles covering my vibrant body. Then life happened, and my babies kept me up all night, eventually enduring the trauma of living in a broken world with broken parents. My white hair and wrinkles clothe a body that sometimes aches and doesn’t recover from activity quickly. When we are young and have pain, we wonder when it will go away. When we are old and have pain, we wonder if it is permanent.

I have seen older people double-down on the beliefs, attitudes, and judgments they adopted when they were younger. The fear of having been wrong for so long is real. They become, at times, caricatures of themselves. When I was very young, I overheard my great-uncle, one of the religious patriarchy, state, unironically, that he had not sinned since 1947. I assume he is now better-informed.

I know this fear of being wrong. And I know I have been wrong, about many things, for a long time. The damage I have caused is unfixable. I also know that doubling-down on my wrong-headed beliefs will not make them less wrong. If I am going to be better-informed, let it be now.

I open my mind and heart, fearfully, to receive more truth; to make amends, where possible; to listen, and think, and change.

When I was young, I wanted to be chosen and cherished. In middle age, I wanted to be effective and respected.

Now, I just want to be kind.

A close friend, one who prays for me often, gave me a word for this year: Epiphany. As I consider the goals for the rest of my life, I realize I have only one great desire: to be kind. I have been known as clever, funny, and a truth-teller. But kind? That is arguable. This is my epiphany. 

My earlier goals focused on the opinions and actions of other people. I thought if I tried hard enough they would see my worth and do the things I told them to. Most of the time, they didn’t.

This is the gift of my old age. It is an open-handed shrug; it is being an observer of others and of myself. People are who they are, and who they are needs kindness. Not niceness, but a gaze into their eyes and sometimes their hearts, knowing the difficulty and goodness of the world create pain as well as a beauty. 

Kindness is costly at times, but I am no longer spending my emotional nickels in an effort to get others to change. Kindness alone is healing. I am not trying to “finish well.” I am shedding the goals of my earlier years, the exhausting efforts that accomplished very little.

There is a stereotype that older women are freer because they don’t care as much about what others think of them. Truthfully, I have learned that people think very little about others at all; they care about how others make them feel. I want to make others feel that they are worth kindness. 

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Marcia Thomas lives in sunny Arizona with her husband of 42 years. She has raised four handsome, self-actualizing sons. She has found healing in exploring her story in the presence of others and treasures the opportunities she has to be that presence for others. She is surprised and pleased to find that the glad work of healing does not have a retirement age.

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