When they were my age, my grandmothers would not have dressed the way I do, because it would have been totally "improper", and un-lady-like. In fact, were they to see how I dress at this time of life, they would have a true hissie-fit. These were women who did not own a pair of long pants, much less five-pocket jeans, and a trip to San Francisco required hat and gloves. Neither of them was a fashion plate, but they adhered to the modes of the day – and they didn’t question them.
Black and white photographs of my grandmothers show middle-aged women in print cotton dresses, with bodies that had been re-formed (perhaps deformed) early on by tight-laced corsets. They are wearing sensible shoes on their small feet, and their hair is either in a net or in tight curls close to the head. No running shoes, no tee shirts, and little or no make-up. Yet they somehow seem comfortable with themselves, and that is how I remember them. Looking back, I wonder if they weren’t more at home with their bodies and with their roles as older women than are my counterparts, and I, in our modern frantic world.
Today we are dragged, kicking and screaming, into old age. Our grandmothers, on the other hand, seemed, at least in the perceptions of a child, to go willingly through each transition, enjoying the roles dictated by every decade of their lives. I’m sure they had difficulties with their aging bodies, but their self-image appeared to be only loosely tied to how they looked. It was more a matter of who they were to their families, and their roles as matriarchs, which, in those days, was a worthwhile status.
I remember a grandmother’s lap being comfortable to sit on – sort of like a soft pillow, designed especially for kids. Many of today’s grandmas’ laps aren’t like that, though, especially if they have just come from the gym, or jogged a few miles. Modern grandmas may have more muscle tone and their cooking and eating habits are probably a lot better, but I’m not sure which generation was more "healthy."
For one thing, we try to do too much and we worry too much. In between trying to juggle work and home, we search the mirror, hoping we haven’t aged since yesterday. I catch myself pinching the flab on my arms or tugging at my sagging jaw, and I suspect my grandmothers spent very little time doing that. A few droops here and there didn’t seem to make a lot of difference, and I would swear that neither of them ever entertained the idea of plastic surgery. They just weren’t obsessed by their bodies, the way we are, even if they did lament the lines.
Who knows. Maybe underneath the clothing of the day, all people feel and always have felt the same about aging, but if my grandmothers really did have a better outlook, I should buy myself some cotton print dresses, toss the bathroom scales, and stop fussing.
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