You know, there are all these people foreclosing on their houses. Still. I feel badly for them, even though many of them bought into Disneyland with predatory brokers who didn't give a damn whether they could hold up their end of the bargain as long as they got the loan on their books and then bundled it off to become someone else's problem. People like Bernie Madoff were only the tip of the iceberg--the staggering lack of accountability, the nastiness, the greed--it knows no bounds when people get on the fantasy gravy train. I was on my own fantasy gravy train, it seems.

I wasn't investing in houses or vast holdings or anything like that. I took the last little bit of a family inheritance and bought myself a car and invested in a graduate education that I thought was going to make my life better and open up more job opportunities for me. I didn't count on ageism. I didn't even see it there or see the tsunami coming--I was literally blindsided in 2007 when I graduated and lost everything I owned. When my children packed up my remains and I ended up on my oldest daughter's couch here in Chicago. When my children basically lost whatever vestiges of respect they ever had for me. When I became the ageing geriatric joke of the family--the butt of snide, sarcastic ridicule--the useless mom that couldn't make it in the "real world." When I realized I wasn't a bellweather, I was an aging idiot in a black hat. When I lost whatever false shred of self esteem and confidence I ever possessed--when I became what I had never thought I would become--the matriarchal joke. 

I never paid attention to the signals, even though they were all around me. I was the exception, I told myself. I wasn't like those other geriatric ageing wrinkled prunes I saw all over Tucson, playing golf and enjoying their "golden years." I was ambitious--I was a writer with a vast, glorious portfolio of work; I was going to conquer the world and become a female Phillip Roth or a female Saul Bellow or a female William Faulkner or something like that! The novel I had just completed in graduate school was going to wow them at the publishing houses--my editor would consider me the next great "find" of the publishing world! Book tours! Festivals! Films! I would lose the 30 pounds I gained in graduate school. I would get back to the fit level I was in Arizona when I hiked the grand canyon in 2006. I would wear my size 8 Gap jeans again! I would have those guys eating out of my hand! What was I thinking?

I came to earth with a thud and a plop. That four-month stint (2008) in the shelter for homeless Jews pretty nailed that last nail in the coffin, but if I didn't get it by then, I sure as hell got it when the recruiter from the University of Chicago asked me what I wanted to be when I "grew up.." or when I sat at dinner with my children while they ridiculed me mercilessly, then accused me of having no sense of humor when I didn't laugh along as the butt of their cruel jokes. When I watched my children succeed in life while I failed miserably. When I found living in two rooms not "going green" as I lied to my friends (acquaintances--I have no friends) but stifling and lonely and terrifying. When I gave up my car and realized that was my last bit of freedom from total annhilation. When they thought I might have cancer last summer and I was sick for 3 months. When it turned out to be a uterine polyp and the kids dropped the concerned solicitation like a hot potato. When the bed bugs came and came and came and they are still here, although with the help of constant laundering and Rose Pest Control they will eventually go away. When I spent Christmas dinner having my youngest daughter say she has no mother to a group of young thirty-something's who make more money in a year than I've made in a lifetime. I was sitting there. I should have said something like "honey I love you no matter what." I just thought it. I just don't measure up to her definition of a mom.

When my oldest daughter and soon-to-be-son-in-law go on their well-deserved vacation to Mexico, I get to stay in their place and sleep on her posture pedic bed! That's the most exciting thing to happen to me in 3 years.

I came to earth with a thudding halt when I realized that I had basically ignored all the ageism in academia because I was so hell bent on acheiving my dream--what was that dream anyway? I can't even remember it. It seems rather hazy now that I reflect on it. Something about an education, fun times, a decent job experience and publishing? Who knows? I have a good teaching job and I love the place I teach for, but last night I sat next to a young man with a Masters (like me) from Harvard, however, and only thirty-something. He teaches 2 classes at another institution, makes a 6-figure salary and he's taking his girlfriend on a 10-day winter wonderland vacation to Vermont! Oh the life. Here I am slogging away teaching at $25 an hour. If I teach 3 classes a week I will clear $1200 a month before taxes. Whoopee! We're all gonna die, as Country Joe and the Fish once said. And if that song reference ages me, too damn bad. 

I spent my youth in a holding pattern until I could take my rightful place as an elder. All the people making all the decisions were in their 50's and 60's. I told myself when I got there I'd be in a position of leadership and I would do a better job than they did. I never imagined I would be sideswiped, sidelined and put out to pasture! Lord knows I am grateful for the energy and health I now possess, but what to do with it? And after all, a week of teaching makes me want to crawl under the covers for an entire weekend. If only those dying bugs didn't make me itch all over. All least they're dying. 

One of the most liberating moments of my recent life was listening to Ajahn Brahm , my best friend whom I've never met, who is actually the head monk of the Buddhist Society of Western Australia, (they broadcast all of his guided meditations and talks: www.bswa.org) talk about how liberating it is to realize that everything in life is suffering so it doesn't matter what path you are on or what you are doing, it's all suffering anyway! You might as well like the suffering you've got rather than wish you could trade it in for the suffering you don't know! Whew. I feel so much better now. It must be my imagination when I see these young thirty-forty-somethings having so much fun, right? It's just an illusion, right? So why do I feel so alone?

I didn't see it coming.

I hit 60 and suddenly the playing field was closed to me. I was told to slink off, stop complaining, shut up and watch the banquet roll by. I feel like that poor sucker Dorothy Parker talked about--sitting in the midst of the opulent dinner party unable to eat a thing. I am starving to the death in the midst of glamour and fun and riches! I want to be glad my kids are doing better than me--we all want the next generation to be an improvement, right? But let's be honest. I don't feel that way. I want to have some fun too. I just don't know who to have it with. Those young kids don't want the likes of me around. I am a reminder of what happens when you age. I am a reminder of death around the corner. I am a reminder of failure and non acceptance and all the ugly things of life.

But for me, I don't see it that way. I see that the society I live in has, indeed, shut the door on most of us 60-somethings. If you aren't Meryl Streep or something you're me--working for an hourly wage and hoping that when you die, at least your kids will come to visit.