Contrary to popular belief, age does not define us. We can be less dependent on someone else’s gaze and enjoy the time we have. Anthropologist Marc Auger shares his perspective on aging.
Why did you start thinking about old age?
Mark Auger: Because I’ve been living for a long time! So this topic interests me. As we age, we face the paradox of having to face the harsh reality of numbers, even though we don’t feel the change in ourselves.
I don’t think it’s possible to draw conclusions about a person’s way of thinking by their age.
Other factors also matter — sometimes a person is not young, but cheerful, and sometimes vice versa, young, but not at all cheerful. So one should not equate age with illness and infirmity, although, of course, old age always ends badly.
All people age and get sick in different ways, and it’s not just about age. This does not mean that I deny the reality of age or do not ask the question of what it means …
Is it possible to ignore your age?
It is difficult to live in society and completely ignore your age. After all, age has a social dimension: “coming of age”, “pension”… At some point, these restrictions overtake us.
In this regard, knowledge workers have an advantage — they, in fact, do not retire. They can, by keeping mentally active, avoid the too severe pressure of the past years.
As for creative people, primarily artists, in my opinion, the truly great among them are those whose playing follows their age, for example, Jeanne Moreau, Jean-Louis Trintignant… There is something soothing in this, some constancy and fidelity to life — no one could replace them.
Is our age primarily in the eye of the beholder?
There is something in someone else’s gaze that refers us to our age, reminds us of it. When I feel that look on me, I have to think it over, I don’t believe it.
I don’t think age and time are the same thing.
In essence, age is a series of years, an irreversible advance, in which there is also social pressure, and time is a broader concept. It can be an imaginary future, a memory of the past, or a mixture of both. Time is freedom, and age is, on the contrary, our limits, boundaries. In fact, old age does not exist.
What does «doesn’t exist» mean?
Old age exists because we live it, but it does not predetermine either our state of mind or special wisdom that would allow us to look at the world serenely. The description of a person as old is partly an external impression, a social convention.
It’s not about denying age or death
If we have any obligations to each other, they consist precisely in ceasing to define each other through age. In an ideal society, we would all be equal. Not that we are all the same, but at least equal in the face of old age.
It worries me greatly that old people are sometimes treated like little children. Of course, this primarily concerns those who are already very weak, but this side of old age really depresses me. The increase in average life expectancy is also alarming — we are afraid of addiction and disease … There is a paradox in this — we live longer, we are given this chance, but this creates inconvenience in society.
It turns out that we agree to old age only if it looks like youth?
Looking younger than your age is everyone’s dream. But even in this case, the problems do not disappear, they just appear later. To live in accordance with age means to perceive life tragically, as an inexorable fate. But to live in accordance with the time means simply to live. Time is malleable matter.
When we talk about time, we do not think about who we are becoming, but want to understand who we are.
It is generally accepted that the attitude towards old age depends on the culture to which we belong, but in all cultures the attitude towards age is quite harsh. Modern society delays the payment of bills, but only postpones, not cancels. A mature person in good shape inspires respect, but only for a while. So the rejection of old people by society is a universal rule.
You say that with old age life does not end …
Certainly! Of course, death is ahead, but if I grow old, I still live. This is encouraging… When you think about time and old age, you understand that the question of death is generally a false question. Wisdom would be to enjoy time, to play with it like a cat, without thinking about age.
In your opinion, age is not a constant value?
I felt that I was getting old when I was thirty, but then this feeling passed. Since then, the thought of it has not returned to me. I had the opportunity to travel, to write, to think. These activities are time consuming.
Sometimes we are just spared the need to think about age.
For example, when we enter a group on an equal footing with all rights, say, in a choir or in a theater studio. It gives a kind of liberation. In such cases, the question of age simply does not arise, it ceases to be decisive, and in this sense it does not exist.
To live a full life means to live without looking back at age, without paying attention to its requirements. In the end, everyone dies young, and it always happens too soon.