Earlier this year, I turned 72. And so far, I am not doddering, although I expect that will come soon enough. But when I mention my age to people바카라and at this age there바카라s none of that reluctance about revealing your age that, as young people, we might have had바카라they react with surprise. They tell me I don바카라t look 72. But what does 72 look like? Old? What does old look like? Grey? But grey (hair I mean) is fashionable these days and one often sees silver/grey/white highlights in what is otherwise black or brown hair.
Wrinkles? Even those are not unique to older people. And some don바카라t have them at all. The other day I was talking to a friend who is two years short of 80. She바카라s glamorous, spry, and beautiful; not a single wrinkle on her smooth face. Meanwhile, the woman who sweeps the street outside our office, young at 35, has a deeply-lined and creased face, also beautiful in a different way, but one which tells a story not of age, but of hardship and struggle.
So what does 바카라old바카라 have to do with it? I바카라m not sure. Although there바카라s no doubt that once you cross the given thresholds of age바카라which have very likely been put in place for administrative reasons바카라you become more conscious of your age, and of ageing. Forty feels like excitement; fifty, like maturity and stability; sixty, like a line has been crossed, and at 70?
To me, most times it doesn바카라t feel very different바카라in my head I am the same person I always was, older and wiser yes, but that comes with every year and every decade you put on. But all around you there are reminders that tell you something different.
As an 바카라바카라older바카라바카라 feminist I am conscious of the questions that younger feminists raise about our practices, decisions, and yes, our mistakes. This is one of the advantages age gives you: you have a sense of history.
For example, feminists of my generation came into the women바카라s movement in the early and mid-seventies. We cut out political teeth fighting on the streets against dowry, violence against women, invasive contraception, rape. We campaigned, printed leaflets, marched in the streets, took petitions to parliament, stormed police stations, painted over sexist ads and so much more. And we forged deep, lasting friendships.
But for the new generation of feminists, many of our ideas are passe, many of the things바카라limited victories admittedly, but for us, important first steps바카라we thought we had gained, are compromises. And while we sometimes scratch our heads and wonder why they don바카라t understand, we also know this is as it should be. As things change, as society changes, as the environment changes, the horizons also shift and struggles become different.
As an 바카라바카라older바카라바카라 feminist then I am deeply conscious of the questions that younger feminists raise about our practices, our decisions, and yes, our mistakes. This, I think, is one of the advantages age gives you: you have a sense of history, you have hindsight, you have a long trajectory on which you can look back and see what lessons it has to offer. Whether you learn from those lessons or not is another story.
Sometimes, sadly, the relationship between older and younger feminists바카라as between the old and the young anywhere바카라becomes contentious and fraught. There바카라s little point in denying that, and I often think back to the time when our mothers, women who were part of the nationalist movement, brought a different feminism with them, and how critical we were of it. Now, looking back, we realise how much their feminism was shaped by their time, just as ours is. I바카라m reminded of a book Zubaan recently published called The Feminisms of Our Mothers. It바카라s by young feminists in Pakistan, who look back at their mothers바카라 generation바카라sometimes with anger, sometimes critically and sometimes with love.
In fact, the young play a major role in keeping the old young, if one can put it like that. For the last several years, I have been teaching courses in feminism at different universities in Delhi and elsewhere. And the interaction with students, the challenges they put before you, those too help to keep you on your toes and keep away the arrogance that may sometimes come with age. Many of the 바카라바카라old바카라바카라 think they know it all, but truth to tell, we don바카라t.
Of course, neither do the young, but then that is another story.
One of the things that happens with age is that you start asking yourself different questions. Time, temporality: you become very aware of these, and you start asking yourself: do I have the time to do this, or should I be doing this at this stage? For example, I바카라ve always had a love of languages and I learnt some when I was young. But there are others I want to learn바카라Urdu, German, Spanish, Japanese바카라and I have to weigh the time that one or all of those will take in order to decide whether to do it or not.
Most of the time, decisions such as these are negative. When you바카라re young, putting off a decision to do something, travel somewhere, learn something, means you바카라re simply putting it off for a limited period and can and may return to it when you바카라re ready. When you바카라re old, you know you바카라re putting it off forever. The chances of returning to it are few because, well, because your time is limited.
Indeed, time comes to acquire a different meaning. When you know that the major part of your life has already been lived, you바카라assuming you have the luxury to do so바카라start to look at everything through that prism. As a single woman, living by myself, I look at the possessions I바카라ve amassed over the years and wonder why I did all that useless spending. People who don바카라t have money don바카라t have to think of these things, and that makes you aware of your own privilege. And to ask, whose task will it be to deal with the debris you leave behind?
There바카라s also a much sharper awareness of mortality. You can no longer pretend this isn바카라t going to happen, and that then influences much of what you want to do바카라run headlong into things and do everything that you바카라ve not done, or take it easy and let things take their pace.
Old age means different things for different people. I said earlier that inside I am still the same person. That is true, but I am older, sometimes my body tells me that and sometimes my mind, and at other times, it바카라s my students or my colleagues who remind me of that. No point denying it.
But what most people don바카라t acknowledge or believe until it is upon us is that age is inevitable and it can sometimes be beautiful and you can actually enjoy it. For me, when I look back on my life of 72 years, I cannot believe that I have had the good fortune to be able to do something that I love for so many years, that for me the personal, the political, and the professional, have meshed and overlapped in ways that not many are lucky enough to have. At 30, I wondered if such a life was possible; at 50, I was living it; at 72, I acknowledge the joy of having lived it.
(Views expressed are personal)
Urvashi Butalia is the founder of Zubaan Books
(This appeared in the print as 'An Experience To Cherish')
