We’ve said for several years that we are prepared to travel less. Whether its about the guiltiness of affluence, the burdens of the road, the ache for extended comfort, the throngs at all the favored and best places, the growing realization that the wealth of the world is outpacing my once meaningful edge or just the creeping in of the dreaded “been there, done that” syndrome, doesn’t really matter in this moveable feast of an aging/retirement crisis. When we travel to Europe in September, it will have been nine full months without a Global Entry. We made a few visits here and there (Florida, Salt Lake City, Death Valley, San Francisco, etc.) and have a few more yet to do (Delaware, Ithaca, Catalina and Wabash), but they are, by definition, visits and not really what you can call travel. We’ve even upgraded our luggage, but it sits quietly in the closet, waiting to be called into service. We have often observed and still believe that its important to have things to look forward to, but maybe its even more important to adopt a greater degree of serenity about the times in between the travel. We have certainly looked at each other at the end of a long trip and said how much we look forward to getting home and relaxing in our own space. Maybe the next stage we can get to is to start being present enough in our comfort zone to just be happy with the serenity of being at home in our routines with or without the ping of the next trip.
Then there is the issue of what we do while we are home. We have examples all around us of people of similar age and what they do with their time in the normal course. Obviously, we ignore the examples of people who are still very much in the workaday chase. It is noteworthy that they too make noises about wanting more leisure time while being afraid of what they may or may not find themselves doing day in and day out. Generally, they are more focused on the grind and the desire for more freedom and I am quick to remind them that they had better plan their activities agenda least they get too much of what they wish for. Leisure is surely overrated, even if serenity os not. I’m the other end dog the spectrum are those who, for various reasons, fall into disrepair. I sense that there are at least three versions of this and I will not name names, but readers will certainly recognize someone in their coterie that fits these descriptions. There is the person with some version of a physical limitation. I will call this in on my prior self and note that the most common is some combination of excess weight and bad fitness that leads to the sedentary life that we have all known to some degree. It’s not right to throw stones given that we all have our glass houses and have some dysfunction or another to blame for this foundational inadequacy in ourselves. I suspect that the key to this one is either to find a way out of the hole or accept the consequential restrictions it carries with it. Those are the only paths to serenity of some sort.
The second version is relationship-driven and therefore either circumstantial or from some psychological wound. The most obvious at this stage of life is the loss of a loved one. It can be the loss of a parent, which is the way of nature and therefore more about the wounds and finding the healing path, or the loss of a child, which is less natural and either has an exit or not. Either can become life-defining and therefore leads to little serenity if no path is found. The more troubling and yet common one is loss of a primary relationship, and here I find sympathy, given my view of the primacy of this need for a happy existence, but I also feel strongly that it is more natural than unnatural and therefore it requires the determination to find a path forward. And there’s the thing…time is precious, especially at this age…and processing towards resolution must be swift or the forces of nature will calcify one’s spirit and lead to a one-way path away from any semblance of serenity. The third version is all about underlying psychology and the hermit and anti-social life, whether a core characteristic or developmentally created, is a choice that may well be the only serenity (of a sort) available to that person. I have no advice to give for that version and am certainly not qualified to pass judgement.
We all want and need serenity, whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. We may even call it by different names, but troubled souls are troubled souls and they probably all need some form of serenity to move comfortably through the ether of life and beyond. Pets are probably the biggest palliative for this purpose. This morning, Buddy noted my early stirring and come up to my head to say good morning. He, like me, is a morning being, who starts the day in a positive frame of mind. He announces my choice to arise to remind me that I need to consider his existence in my plans as I prepare for my day. He waits for me to head towards the exit of the room and then makes a fuss to remind me that his job is to stay by Kim’s side but to remain fully situated about my plans in and around the house. As I sit and write or read, he seeks attention quietly but with the purpose of certainty that he will find the good in the day. He patiently awaits Kim’s puzzle time, knowing that breakfast lays beyond once Wordle is conquered. When its time to kinetically start my day, Buddy shows the excitement that reinforces the notion that activity is a good thing even though change brings uncertainty. Buddy has a love/hate relationship with change, just like we all do. He wants a full day, but he wants down time as well. He is a model for the search for serenity. He always needs it and yet always finds it. We need to take note of this very simple and very basic formula. In fact, I believe he finds serenity in the balancing of hyperactivity from over-attentiveness and abject lack of responsibility. He moves effortlessly between the two.
I am learning to be more like Buddy and to settle for serenity through balance. As a bigger-brain mammal, I do not have the luxury to operate just from my brain stem like Buddy does. I have to think and overthink, ponder and write about my sense of how to find that serenity that we all need.