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Commentary
AGING WELL: Building friendships that cross generations Missy Buchanan, Jun 16, 2010
By Missy Buchanan Special Contributor
My friend Flo stooped over her walker as we made our way to the reception desk at her doctor’s office. Just three days before, we had celebrated her 96th birthday.
Taking our seats in the waiting room, a middle-aged man made a comment about Flo being my mother. Flo and I smiled at each other before she explained that we were very good friends, but not mother and daughter.
In fact, Flo never had children of her own. After her husband died, she had moved into a nearby retirement community, just days before my parents moved in next door. Soon she had become their new friend. After I got to know Flo, she became my friend, too.
Even after my parents passed away, I continued to have lunch with Flo every Tuesday. Together we went to visit other residents who had moved to rehab or to nursing centers.
Whenever I went away on a trip, I always brought her a special memento. Every week she asked for updates on my family. She even had photos of my 1-year-old grandson on her refrigerator.
A few days after the doctor’s appointment, Flo passed away in her sleep. My telephone number was still posted above her bed. When I got the call, I couldn’t help but think that her death was exactly as she would have scripted it: at home and peaceful.
As I helped Flo’s niece plan her memorial service, I began to think of all the things she had shared with me over the last few years. I knew the song she wanted sung at her funeral. The name of the lay minister she wanted to give the message. The yellow roses she wanted on her casket.
I thought about silly things, too, like the way she made a face when the oatmeal cookies had raisins, and how she joked about feeding the wooden pink flamingo I had given her. Even though we were separated by almost four decades in age, we shared time and stories as we made memories of our own.
Perhaps that is the reason why comments made by Stanley Hauerwas, professor of theological ethics at the Divinity School of Duke University, about the importance of reaching across generational lines to build relationships first caught my attention.
In an interview with David Crumm, editor of ReadTheSpirit.com, Dr. Hauerwas talked about the problem that can occur in nursing homes and retirement communities if older adults only make friends with other older adults: They will continually face the heartbreak of having new friends die.
It was like a gong went off in my head. Suddenly my experiences made perfect sense. I recalled how many residents of my mother’s senior residence were stunned when I came for lunch following her death last year. I was surprised to learn they had fully expected me to quit visiting once I no longer had a family member living there.
Funny thing is, it never crossed my mind not to go. These older adults had become my friends. As much as they needed older, late-in-life friends to encourage and support them, they also needed relationships with younger persons.
I thought about a recent outing I’d had with two older friends. I had taken them to spend the afternoon among the vibrant flowers at our local arboretum. One friend uses a wheelchair; another uses a cane.
We rode the touring cart through the grounds and then stopped at the outdoor café for dessert. It was a picture-perfect day. On the way back home, I thought about how these two men have taught me so much about perseverance, courage and faith.
Friendships do not happen without careful tending. They cannot grow deep without a real commitment of time and energy.
Dr. Hauerwas says that the art of friendship is learning how to claim one another as people we recognize will die. It’s all about caring, listening and loving.
After all, that’s what friends are for.
Ms. Buchanan, a member of FUMC Rockwall, Texas, is the author of Talking with God in Old Age: Meditations and Psalms (Upper Room Books). Visit her Facebook page, Aging and Faith.
