Do we really have to grow old disgracefully?
I can’t make up my mind about whether I admire or
deplore the image of Joan Collins in That Outfit, or Barbara Windsor or Cilla Black in
theirs.
 A corset thing that sticks into your ribs and pushes bits
in and up, flesh coloured support tights under fish
nets. I mean, what’s it for? Joan and Co
obviously do it for the publicity, as well as to prove there’s life in the old girl
yet, and even perhaps to show that they have a sense of humour. I hope they
realise that never for one moment do they convince anyone that they are firm and curvy
under the armour. (Let’s face it,
they look fascinatingly terrible and rather uncomfortable.)
What worries me is that there have
been a couple of features in the media showing ordinary woman of 50 or 60-plus decked out
in whalebone or its modern equivalent, thus making it OK and normal and de rigueur, and even suggesting that we - you and I
- might do it in the privacy of the bedroom for the entertainment of self and a
significant other.
Even worse, there is a bit of me that says ‘I
wouldn’t mind trying it , to see the effect.’
Just for a laugh you understand. I
could then, in my mind, join Joan and Co and think of myself as being feisty and gutsy and
a good sport - those stereotypical phrases used in relation to older women. I could be part of the growing-older-disgracefully
brigade.
 At this point, sanity kicks in. I don’t particularly wish to subscribe to the
stereotype. I
don’t want to grow older behaving like a rebellious adolescent. Why did anyone ever think that was a good idea?
No. Give
me dignity and growing older gracefully any time. When
the laterlife generation complains that younger ones don’t respect them, you begin to
understand why. Let’s stop trying to
emulate the young and hold on to our own identity.
Remember, it
was liberated women who at one time threw away their corsets.
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Talkback is a regular
feature in laterlife.com run by journalist and author Helen Franks. 
