Later life Talkback - 23

It’s not often that you get Ruby Wax sitting on your lap, but it really did happen to me. Ruby’s researcher for her daytime BBC1 show had got in touch with laterlife asking for people to go on the show to talk about ageing. Guessing that more than anything else,  they wanted stuff on dating and sex in later life, I suggested they would like to speak to laterlife writer Jeanne Davies, who in January wrote about her experiences with a dating agency. Yes please, they said, so off we went to the studios in London’s Camden Town.

One of Ruby’s guests was Mariella Frostrup, television presenter and writer, bemoaning her status as a forty-year-old.  Most of the audience was somewhat older and could look back with nostalgia at that youthful time in their lives, but never mind, it was clearly a problem for Mariella. 

She worried about the insecurity of working for television, her body, her ability to attract younger men, her desire to go clubbing.

These are not the worries and preoccupations of most people at forty - couples with children, single parent mothers, those suffering redundancy, being alone - but the underlying fear is universal. In an ageist society, where youth leads and age has no authority, it’s tough.  And tougher still for women.

What’s ageing like for people who are older?  Ruby asked at one point. Different, we, the audience, said, different at every decade. But that doesn’t mean bad.  There’s no cut off point for experience. There’s more time for oneself, gains in confidence and self-knowledge, having grandchildren, time for holidays, concessions on cinema tickets and exhibitions, free or cheap travel.

We inevitably got onto my pet irritation - that stuff about growing older disgracefully, as if it really is fun to behave like a three-year-old at seventy. In truth, only eccentrics and those with Alzheimers conform to the desires expressed in Jenny Joseph’s poem ‘When I Grow Old, I Shall Wear Purple’.  Yes, it’s a delightful poem and I loved it when my children showed it to me many years ago. But I, like the poet, was in my thirties at the time.

Now, I know that the best thing about being older is maturity, having a cooler take on life and relationships, feeling less sensitive for myself and taking more interest in others. Being able to give compassion and show love. I’m not against the occasional aberration, but I’d rather not behave like my grandchildren on a bad day.

As for Jeanne, she said lots of interesting things to Ruby which you cannot, alas, now see on television (the show was transmitted on January 17), but you can read about in her feature for January laterlife.  And - oh yes - there was just a glimpse of me impersonating a chair.  ‘You’re not going to sit on my lap?’ I said, as Ruby edged along the row.  ‘Why not, what’s wrong with your knees?’ she replied.

Of course I gave in.  Like everyone else in the audience, I was completely enchanted.