“These wonderful women represent my ideal of aging and living in the moment with grace.”
– Viewer’s comment on Grains of Sand Youtube channel.
I never thought of aging as something political. It’s just what I found myself doing after having been alive for a while.
But last week I listened to Ezra Klein’s recent interview with Sarah McBride, congresswoman from Delaware and the first openly transgender member of Congress. McBride frames the current political climate as a choice between cynicism and grace – and that really made me think about the politics of aging.
I am sometimes caught up short to realize: if youth is the dominant social discourse, I have slipped into the margins. Regardless of how I feel. And if people see you as old, it is often that they see you as ‘other’ or they don’t see you at all.
Defining groups of ‘us’ and ‘them’ is the foundation of the estrangement and disconnect so many of us experience in our daily lives. How can you build empathy with those who neither see nor understand you?
I was moved to hear Congresswoman McBride talk about choosing respect and grace as the best response to political opponents, even and especially in the face of blatant disrespect. She inspired me by living the risk of a vision of a society based in empathy, a feat that requires enormous strength in its composure and active choice in its grace.
I believe the personal is political. Telling individual stories grows empathy and builds bridges across all divisions. As older women we can change the world by sharing our stories. And as people listen and take note, the world will have become that much more empathetic and connected for it.