Lloyd Den Boer

We lived busy working lives when we were employed . Our work gave meaning to our lives , and it was demanding . Then we retired . Almost suddenly , the unremitting pace and grave responsibilities of our former jobs fell away , giving us more time to shape our lives around other activities that we love . What we love to do is a long and varied list . For some of us , nothing is better than a well-earned pause on a high mountain trail , a pause when a stunning vista springs into view . For others , immersing ourselves in cities and cultures that we have long wanted to experience is the best thing . Still others treasure time to gather family members or friends in rooms bursting with laughter . Many of us volunteer . Serving others serves us with human connections and a sense of consequence in the world . Some of us pursue our hobbies — whether gardening , quilting , carpentry , or many others — more intensely than before . For many of us , more time to curl in a favourite chair , lost in yet another absorbing book , is the best gift that retirement can give .

Retirement brings big changes , including new opportunities . New opportunities are of less use , however , without full capacity to use them . Accordingly , seniors are cautioned against drifting aimlessly through their golden years . Instead , the best advice urges us to take charge of our health and to age well . Aging well requires the healthy mental , emotional , and physical functioning that form a foundation for active engagement with life . Sound advice for aging well includes plenty of exercise , a healthy diet , good sleep , varied interests , and an active social life .

However , despite our efforts to age well , as years go by , our capacities begin to fail . Most of us notice the vigour of our middle years fading , and a few will suffer consequential health events that accelerate decline . Some of us are gradually enclosed in more separated worlds as our sight or hearing dim . Others

may lose easy access to activities that they love as they lose their capacity to move independently . Memory and cognition grow weaker for many , gradually withdrawing aspects of our selves from us . In time many of us lose our partners , leaving us alone when we had long depended on being together . Should we grow very old , we will also lose the relatives and friends in our age cohort , leaving us isolated on an island of time that few share . As we age , each of us walks along our own path , but , for most of us , it will be a path marked by losses .

How should we face these losses ? In “ Sailing to Byzantium ,” the Irish poet W . B . Yeats portrays a man determined to abandon his love for the things that aging was taking from him . The ordinary world with its “… young / In one another ’ s arms ,” is “… no country for old men ,” he says . In the ordinary world , “[ a ] n aged man is but a paltry thing , / A tattered coat upon a stick .” Accordingly , the poem ’ s speaker proposes to leave the ordinary world with its “ sensual music ” behind and to set sail figuratively for an exotic land beyond the indignity of aging . His destination is the world of the mind where , he believes , life among great works of art and intellect will insulate him from time .

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