January 23 comes again!
I remember a moonlit night. It seems like yesterday, or forever ago. Our chant echoed in the crisp night air. “We are the seniors, the mighty mighty seniors, everywhere we go, people wanna know, who we are, so we tell them, we are the seniors, the mighty mighty seniors…” and so it went, over and over, amidst laughter and joy. The class of ’71, ready to embark on hopes and dreams for unknown adventures just around the corner. We had plans! The future was before us. A few planned to marry soon and begin their happy ever-after. College beamed on the horizon for some, while others anticipated staying to work at home-town jobs. Others thought of trade school while some carried only guarded hopes mingled with fear and uncertainty (we hadn’t heard of taking a gap year.). At that moment, though, we were united in carefree solidarity. (Oh, we knew “hard” —a different hard than we know now, but still hard). But on that starry night, the future lay before us as vast as the night sky, twinkling with promise. We were seniors! The class of ’71!
Since that memorable night so long ago, the earth revolved around the sun 53 more times. 1-2 3 poof! My birthday! 71 again—and still a senior, revised version. Age over class this time. Updated chant: “I am a senior, a mighty mighty senior, everywhere I go, I wanna know, who YOU are, so you tell me, who you are, ……” around and around, like life, in circles. Though forget I may (as seniors sometime do), my longing to KNOW comes not from memory loss, but from an insatiable longing to grasp all the knowing I can—the beautiful mystery that resides within the human soul and beyond.
Baby boomers—class of ‘71—certainly a generation that shares a unique history, as every generation does. We boomed en masse to a world reeling from the tragedy of one war, prepping for the next. Our parents and theirs held the stories. I wish they’d told us more. Now we’ve become the keeper of the stories. It happened so quick.
Then—no cell phones or computers, no instagram or X, dresses only and hose always (for the girls), home economics or shop classes--with gender divide, typing class and keypunch, libraries for research papers and learning the Dewey Decimal System, shopping at JCPenney, Sears, or Montgomery Wards. Big thick catalogs in the mail(box). Amazon was a river and letters arrived with postage stamps. An apple was something we ate and spiders built a web. A man walked on the moon and hippies and Twiggy and flower children and protest filled the news. Kent State. Woodstock. The Civil Rights Movement and MLK (Black lives still matter). Lots of music--vinyl records birthing cassette tapes and 8 tracks and more. Beatles and Beach Boys, the Carpenters, and even Elvis (some things never change). Station wagons and Bugs and muscle cars. No seatbelts or carseats or remote start. Plenty of lead and asbestos. Green meant what matched crayons while flesh-named crayons matched my skin.
The list goes on—and on—and on. New everywhere, anchored by the old. Language with roots, and new all together. The constancy of change. Aways the yearning to know and be known. Immersion in fragments of joy, love, dreams, hopes, curiosity, communication, adventure, longing. Loss, grief, fears—always too much. Wanting to be pretty and wanting to be liked. Asking questions with no answers, and hearing answers without questions. War, wishing it was no more (Where have all the flowers gone?), Then we looked forward to the vast unknown and backward only a few short years- how did it reverse so quickly!?
We, the class of 71, spread wings and flew to the ends of the earth, geographically and metaphorically. Regretfully, I kept in touch with only a handful of classmates. I nested with one—the boy who charmed me with his eyes when we were freshman and still holds my heart. We gather with classmates every few years and have a reunion of sorts, like homing pigeons returning to a time that lives forever in our hearts. Diminished numbers, with fond and exaggerated memories. Every time we meet, another is missing.
I poignantly think of my dear childhood friend and ’71 classmate who later became my sister-in-law who died of cancer a few days before her 33rd birthday, and my classmate and beloved friend who died just weeks ago—and too many others. Cancer, accidents, suicide. diabetes, paralysis, leukemia, transplants, knee replacements, degenerative diseases, dementia, infertility and anguish, mental illness— the stripping away of dreams. (What happened? Can we have a do-over?). Some have buried children, and along with them their own hopes and dreams. Most of us have bid farewell to the ones who gave us life, our baby boomer parents. Most of us are orphans now. All, a new “hard.
As I think back to my first 71—with hopes and dreams and longings of youth—I'm humbly grateful that much of what I hoped for and dreamed of came to be. I am one of the lucky ones. Though not without heartache and loss, my life has been filled with greater joy. My heart is deeply touched by the courage, strength, and resiliency of those who have suffered beyond what I can imagine. My desire for connection remains, growing stronger with each birthday. I want to know and be known, to live with kindness, to communicate and connect in the ways that matter most. I look forward to adventures awaiting.
Someone asked me “how many.” I heard a few gasps, and whispers “You shouldn’t ask that!” (Is asking a man the same question okay?). I laughed. I’ve never hesitated telling my age (except last year—saying 70 to myself sounded old! I'm over it.). I happily answered, “I’m 71!” I acknowledged that every birthday is a gift, a privilege denied to many, and that the ones who live the longest have the most birthdays—so “keep ‘em coming.” (Thoughts absorbed from others—attributions to many!). And what does “young at heart” even mean? I’ve heard it said as a compliment about an “old” person, but when a young person is labeled “an old soul” it’s sometimes whispered with near reverence. Huh?
As I reminisce about that night so long ago, gratitude overflows that we shared those sweet moments and bright dreams to sustain and hold us for all that was to come.
We, the class of ’71, wanted to improve the world. We would not make the mistakes our parents and grandparents made. We would be better, do better. But alas, as we took wing and flew, we encountered turbulence and hurricanes and raging fires and predators all around—but we also found gentle currents to soar on, and peaceful waters to buoy us—always with “olders” and the "youngers” with us—we found we needed all—it’s never been a solo voyage.
I’ve heard it said, “I’d never want to go back,” as though the tribulation of being young would be far too much to bear. Well—not me—I would love to go back—to embrace all we had then, and more. To remember our dreams and aspirations and sweet memories and pursuit of meaning--and never give up.
I’ve also heard it said, “Oh to be young again!, as though being a 71 year old senior today has robbed all that is good and wonderful, relegating "old" to the rubbish heap of time. Not me! I wouldn’t trade anything for the joys and profoundness of love that I know today, nor the precious memories of the 53 revolutions around the sun that have followed--and for the hopes and dreams that remain. Now is my time. My place. My purpose.
Occasionally I wonder “how many more?”, though not often. I know for me there’s fewer revolutions around the sun ahead of me than behind—and that makes me sad. I love living! Who will comfort my children when I’m gone? (I don’t plan going anytime soon!) Who will tell them how much they’re loved and that everything will work out and that God is real and to keep the faith? To be kind and to love each other and that we all belong and it’s okay to cry and laugh and cry again and to remember, to hope and dream, to have fun—and that it’s not the end? Who will tell them? (I know they’ll take care of each other and they'll be under the wings of Love). I know I need not fear.
I’ve still so much to “do”—clean the house, sort the papers, cook the meals, organize the photos, pay the bills, give the heirlooms, hug my children’s children,—and tell the stories. The stories of those who’ve traveled with us amidst the humdrum, the nitty-gritty of surviving in this broken beautiful world, tales of the One called Love and Love’s faithfulness from the beginning, and of the hope before us, of the future when 71 trillion will be but a speck of time in the vastness the universe, and that Love is all that matters and that Love will endure forever.
Always.
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