Henri Koetser: We Grow Old (c. 1900 - c. 1905)

"Not one of us seems to be getting any younger…"

The Muse has always visited her OldFolks when returning to her home country. Her family took the biblical ‘Be Fruitful and Multiply’ exponentially, so there was never any shortage of OldFolks to visit. When we first connected decades ago, there were more than a dozen surviving aunts and uncles, not to mention innumerable cousins, for each aunt and uncle seemed to have left behind at least five children. The Muse could remember all those kids’ names, in birth order, too, as well as odd anecdotes about each family: where they lived and how. I had an odd uncle and aunt, both my dad's step-siblings from different remarriages, but The Muse had an almost intact history.

She would find her way over to visit them in the way that they would have visited in their time. Then, people would 'just stop by' with little more in mind than shooting some breeze and catching up. Kids in tow, the broods would find something to do while their folks drank coffee and visited. One of The Muse's grandmothers traveled between her kids’ homes, stopping to stay in each for a few days, through her final years. The Muse, too, would drop in as Carol and John's daughter, an adequate credential to gain an audience and their confidence. Now, of course, the choices have been slimmed down to two remaining aunts: one, a retired nun now nearing a hundred years old, and another, the widow of her mother's mischievous youngest brother, over eighty.

Sister Jo couldn't remember The Muse, or me, for that matter. Her thoughts were scattered over a long lifetime of service, where she had been the epitome of patience and kindness. She never forgot to send a Christmas card with a personal inscription, and we'd visit her at her nunnery every time The Muse returned "home." Her nunnery was torn down this year, and she'd been moved to a nursing home. We just showed up and asked the staff where she lived, and were directed to a door just off the lobby. Inside, a severely shrunken likeness of the aunt greeted us with warmth and confusion. She remained the sweet and tender lady she had always been, but without a memory. The old family pictures on her wall helped her frame her past, but she never once connected us to anything she could grasp.

Her other aunt was in the middle of organizing a class reunion and had a garage full of boxes she was expecting herself to sort through to preserve family history. She wondered who would care what she found there. She invited us to visit on the driveway in front of the garage since her brother was recovering from open-heart surgery inside. "Not an ideal living situation," she remarked before quickly changing the subject. She was lucid and filled with stories about her relatives The Muse had never before heard of. We listened patiently, interested, if only in the cadence and structure of her stories. These were largely tales of times long before ours, of windstorms and a loving father. The OldFolks tend to retreat into their far distant past as their future shrivels.

I realised that this aunt was fewer than ten years older than I. I had been wondering where the supply of OldFolks might be refreshed once this diminishing crop of them has disappeared, and caught myself peering into a mirror. I have not quite conceded that I might have achieved OldFolk status yet, though I'm sure that my grandkids see me as ancient, just as I once saw my grandfather when he was younger than I am now. The inheritance was always inevitable. We visit our old people because we know we're inexorably destined to become one. It's foregone. Before they're gone, though, we can at least show some respect; show up, even if we're not remembered. We fondly remember Sister Jo and reassure her that she's remembered and loved, even if she can't for the life of her remember us.

We might have another decade of toodling left in us. More or less, nobody ever knows for sure. It seems likely that Sister Jo will have passed by the next time we visit here. She confessed as much to us with a laugh. Already, The Muse's brother's family has been fledging, with his youngest relocated to The Twin Cities, a destination from which few ever return, and others off to college and their first remote work experiences. Only six remain resident in his old home place. His might be the last generation of his family to exponentiate. Not all of them will choose to procreate. One of The Muse's older sisters celebrated her fiftieth wedding anniversary, which prompted our visit. She promised she would never celebrate a second fiftieth, and she seems certain to deliver on that promise. Not one of us seems to be getting any younger and will, if lucky, eventually become OldFolks ourselves.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #FollowingChapters, #PureSchmaltz