{"id":41817,"date":"2024-07-20T01:00:57","date_gmt":"2024-07-20T08:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=41817"},"modified":"2026-06-05T11:36:03","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T11:36:03","slug":"older-im-not-keeping-busy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/older-im-not-keeping-busy\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting Older: I’m Not ‘Keeping Busy’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"older<\/a>
I’m getting older and I’m not ‘keeping busy.’ I’m just busy. Right now, I’m getting ready to rerelease my book, “Wrestling with God.” This photo , from 2014, shows me doing some last edits\u00a0 before sending the manuscript off to the publisher. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“You’re keeping busy,” the young woman said.<\/p>\n

It was a casual, back-and-forth conversation, struck up with a stranger. I’d been telling her about my book projects and bathroom remodel, and that was her comment. “You’re keeping busy. That’s good.”<\/p>\n

No, I wanted to say. I’m not keeping busy<\/em>. I’m busy. I’m doing stuff that’s important to me.<\/p>\n

Keeping busy — it feels patronizing. As though, if I’m an old person, my doings must be mere busy work, something to keep my mind off things while I wait for the Grim Reaper to show up.<\/p>\n

I’m Getting Older and I’m Not ‘Keeping Busy.’<\/strong><\/h5>\n

It’s true. Old people are old. They move slowly out of respect for their creaky joints. They can’t keep their hair from turning gray, or white, or frizzy, or from falling out altogether. They take their time finding certain words, especially the names of things, especially the names of people<\/em>.<\/p>\n

You gotta feel sorry for these old people, it seems. They’re not young any more. Help them out by telling them how good it is that they are keeping busy in their reduced state.<\/p>\n

I have this to say to the not-yet-old: do not feel sorry for us. Thanks to our years and years on the planet, we’ve got something that you don’t have, something that you don’t even know you don’t have. Equanimity.<\/p>\n

(Except on the days we don’t have equanimity. On the days, for example, we bark at the canvasser ringing our doorbell, asking us to donate to a non-profit we’ve decided is a scam\u00a0for sure.)<\/p>\n

More Words for the Not-Yet-Old<\/strong><\/h5>\n

When my father and my father-in-law were still alive, the two sat at a table together at a family restaurant dinner. My father was retired. My father-in-law, not yet.<\/p>\n

“How are you liking retirement,” my father-in-law asked.<\/p>\n

“It’s the best piece of life so far,” my father said.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, to busy or not to busy? <\/strong><\/h5>\n

Some old people are busy, very busy, with more items on their to-do lists than they can tick off in the years left to them.<\/p>\n

Others of us — and this includes my boogie-boarding friend Steve — are not particularly busy. Steve tells me that he doesn’t “do” much. He welcomes each day as it comes and does whatever stuff needs doing. He does not look around for big projects.<\/p>\n

Yet the two of us, Steve and I, have this in common: We are here. We are alive. We are here.<\/p>\n

\"older:<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

More about my father at\u00a0“Wisdom From My Father — Or, How to Sweep the Kitchen Floor.”<\/a>\u00a0More about my father-in-law at\u00a0“The Little Tug That Could — Cross an Ocean With Scott Newhall.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

My next big project: Patheos.com, the publisher of my book, “Wrestling with God,” has shut down its book publishing arm, and now it’s up to me now to create my own imprint and keep the book in print. More about that project — coming soon!<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"older:<\/a><\/p>\n

I’m getting older and older. I’m not ‘keeping busy.’ I’m busy, which is not the same thing.\u00a0 Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48725,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,50],"tags":[103,2883,34,2884,518,2885,53,575],"class_list":["post-41817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-case-of-the-human-condition","category-on-writing-reading","tag-aging","tag-david-falconer","tag-dont-miss","tag-keeping-busy","tag-scott-newhall","tag-work","tag-wrestling-with-god","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41817"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41817\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48727,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41817\/revisions\/48727"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}