Croning

More about turning 50.

Some women have marked their passages into 50s with ceremonies of croning. Maybe without giving it very much thought (i.e., unconsciously), I had the idea in mind when I had the tattoo painted on my arm. Even as modern psychology recognizes stages of human development, so the ancient triple-goddess symbol of the triskele signifies a woman's development: child/child-bearer/crone. There would be much richness to draw upon from my own life and study.

I was born into a world populated by matriarchs, and I only knew my matriarchs, because the patriarchs died young, except for my father, currently residing in Alabama. My earliest memories are of, on my mother's side, my great-grandmother, whose husband was long out of the picture, my grandmother, whose husband died in battle in Germany in 1944, and my mother. On my father's side, I only knew my great-grandmother, whose husband died long before I was born. My father's mother died very early in my life, so I never knew her. Her husband abandoned the family when my father was 8 years old; he reappeared in death, by way of a life insurance check shared with my father by his estranged aunt, my grandfather's sister. So, if I drew a genogram, there would be symbols of death or estrangement attached to my male progenitors.

I am the first-born child in my immediate family of birth, and have two brothers (one is deceased), both, of course, younger than me in intervals of three and six years. With such a heritage, how could I not be a strong woman? Somehow, I became the adventurer, the risk-taker, and the tradition-smasher in my family.

There were other women in my family orchard who did not marry and/or bear children. By standards of small-town Southern mores, we were/are "eccentric." A student once jokingly called me eccentric one day, and I immediately recognized that he was right. I am not in the center of anyone's expectations, not even my own.

I recall having many late-night, wine-infused discussions with my mother about my not having children -- no, wait, start with not getting married -- and choosing to pursue a life of the mind. My heart would crack with guilt, I would cry myself to sleep, but I kept on choosing, making in the traveling a path that has become my life. Marrying into my family now, with an eight-year-old in the mix, does not really count, although I think there is something to be said for the exposure to the energy, the adjustment to, as a said previously, a much noisier and busier life.

Some say Chiclette will keep me young. Maybe that means I will not have the extent of eccentricity that comes with the kind of isolation and independence that some have after the child-bearing years have passed. No, Chiclette will not keep me young, but she will have an effect on the nature of my aging, that's for sure.

I think Chiclette's mom is the one who affects my aging the most. I'm sure I could fill another post with the benefits of exposure to her (Oh, yeah.).

The typical understanding of women in my orchard was that we who did not marry or bear children would stick around and care for the elders. So far, my elders have succumbed to disease, or, as with my Dad, remain healthy and independent. In the olde days, I would be expected to drop everything, build a room onto the family house, and take up nursing and housekeeping. This expectation is true in many communities here in the US, still, and everywhere. The extent of my compliance, so far, has been to reassure my father that if he should need me closer, I will always have room for him wherever I am living, and would not leave him to the kindness of strangers.

The embrace of the crone is, for me, a poetic venture. Do I see myself, as captured in my Wikipedia search on the term, crone, the hag, the scary old woman whose chief diet is small children (Hansel and Gretel), or the wise, beautiful elder woman, captured in this site? I would choose the latter, I think, although eventually, I think the former would be powerful, to carry eccentricity around the bend to a place understood by most people as somehow normal by the time a woman attains a certain age.

Croning is understood as a pagan ritual by most. So, what is pagan? Turning again to Wikipedia, I find that pagan, in its least value-laden meaning, obtains to the rural, the rustic, and the folkways of simple people. The negative meaning obtains to the uncivilized, religiously and socially backward, even hostile and anti-Christian.

Now, let's get real. My Christ-haunted life is really, honestly paganistic. I mean, I regularly take part in these kinds of rituals: worshipping a God who is actually three, celebrating feast days of beings who might be less than divine but who have, in death, gained elevated super-human status, and partaking regularly in a ritual of flesh-and-blood eating memorial to a ritual slaughter, complete with an epic mob scene probably more shocking than the public murders of Mussolini and Tito.

I do not kid myself. I live very close to paganism. What is there to prevent having a croning ceremony? I need to think this over. Maybe some will have suggestions?

On Turning 50

Considering that the alternative to turning 50 is pretty bleak, at least on this side of that mystery called "Life," but it's also still shocking to look in the mirror sometimes, I am searching for a way to sustain a sense of deliberate and mindful intent about reaching this age. Actually, I started celebrating turning 50 ever since I turned 49.

The age of 48 was a milestone for the simple reason that Nancy died at 48, and I immediately began to feel as if I were in my 80s, as if I could know what it felt like to be in my 80s. I'm told that is a common feeling, when one outlives a spouse, especially when the death is so sudden and the illness was not known fully until it was all over. And, in a strange symmetry, another important person also died within the year, but my age, so when I turned 48, I realized that not only had I survived, but he did not. Then, in 2001, my mother died too young. I hate Alzheimer's Disease. Then, my brother died at 44, he would have been 45 in September, in June 2005. So, when I reached 48, in 2005, fairly healthy and still standing up, I was sort of surprised. In 1998, and pretty much through 2006, I had very complicated grief.

I did not fear dying or wish for death at 48. Rather, I just had this burden of that age in mind the whole dang year. I made some very difficult decisions in that same year, like leaving a toxic relationship and a toxic workplace. So, after some good work on grief (Thanks to some good therapy and good meds, and in huge credit to PeerSpirit), I went into my 49th year with true rejoicing.

For my 49th birthday, as if to say, "I'm still standing!" I went out and got myself a tattoo, a triskele from my pre-Christian Irish heritage (lots of Irish in my background).

I also bought my vintage Airstream travel trailer (on another post). I went to Michigan to pick it up on a Wednesday, left it in the parking lot at my job, and left on Friday for a week-long retreat for "Isolated Activists" where I met Rachel.

This time last year, Rachel and I were courting and sparking, and I was wrestling with my determination to leave the Midwest and go to Seattle, in the Airstream, after sifting through all of my possessions, finishing my year of teaching, and letting go of tons of baggage of all kinds. But, by Thanksgiving, I think, I knew my move west would be far shorter distance than I had planned.

Let me just say, I made the right decision, to come home to Rachel. I also must admit that, at times, I do wonder "what if" about that cross-country plan to move to Seattle, but those are fleeting thoughts that have mostly to do with my own "stuff" related to my new role as a "woman of maternal influence" and having a suddenly much more noisy and busy life. My wishful thinking about going into my fifties with some gravitas? Forget about it.

Becoming 50 also brings the focus more sharply on the real health concerns that, addressed now, will make for a better body in which to live this noisy and busy life. I get the baseline colonoscopy on Friday. I've had some other tests, routine stuff, and it all looks good, except for the cholesterol. I really want to control that with diet and exercise and not the meds, so I'm going out to the market for dinner and staying away from my nemesis, fast food and having dinner out in restaurants.

Turning 50 needs to be a milestone for me. I am focusing in on it because there is so much good living to continue, so much to look forward to, and I do love my life so much I could shout! I just shouted!