No Such Thing as Perfection: Sue Robin

Sue Robin is a writer who lives in the hills of Los Angeles, watching the hawks soar and the world spin round. She retired from a long, satisfying career as a Marriage Family Therapist in 2012. Retirement has allowed more time to write and murmur with friends, The love for her sweetheart and her family is a constant thrum in the background of all she does.

What do you wish someone had told you about getting older that you are learning now?

I learned late in life to wear sunscreen every morning and a good face cream at night. It took my brother’s first melanoma 20 years ago to get the first one, and the little crow’s footprints showing up around my eyes to get the second.

Teachers come in all sizes and backgrounds. Some teach us what to do, and some just the opposite. I wish I had learned earlier how to distinguish the two before my heart was broken and my world shattered. I am grateful to be better able to make that distinction now.

I wish, too, that I had known earlier on that there is no such thing as perfection. And that while practice does not necessarily make perfect, it gets you damn close.

Had someone told me that I would always feel as young as a child and as old as the hills, I would not have believed them. The aches and pains aside, I feel as I have always felt. I love nature, am timid around humans, and I speak my mind.  There have been, for all 79 years, moments of incredible awe punctuated by moments of great disbelief.

I wish someone had told me that I would not know all the answers when I was old. I still want to know why some people can be filled with hate and selfishness, and others nourish my soul.  I still want to know why people go to war. Well, maybe I know the answer to that one. Power and control, but I so dearly want to know how to make it stop.

What wisdom would you share with a younger person about aging?

I would remind people, young and old, that they may not solve all the problems of the world or in their lives, but they do have the opportunity to take steps towards those goals.

People often say just be yourself, but what does that mean? For me, it means to weep unabashedly when something touches a deep nerve, whether it be a hokey commercial, a passage in a book, a death or a birth, but also, when I see the seventy-something woman standing on the street corner week after week in protest of the government’s policies or the eighty-something man sleeping on the sidewalk. I never want to stop feeling.

To those still in their youth, I would discourage you from worrying about aging. If you’re lucky, it happens anyway. There is nothing anyone can do to stop it. The sagging skin, the lines that have been etched in your face, the ones that crease your boobs and belly. All of them have been earned, perhaps a birth or a surgery, and all come with their lessons. Embrace them all, as well as all the verbal assaults and insults. If you can use all that as a stepping stone to acceptance of the here and now, you will find the ride a bit easier.

Aging just slips in the door. Like a soft breeze, no knocking, and we continue to become more of who we have always been.

What does the next chapter of your life look like?

At seventy-nine, I may have twenty more years or one. No use-by date comes stamped on our bottoms.  There is no way to know what the future brings, whether you are three or eighty- three.

The reality is that we do not know what to expect. There is a modicum of fear. What will the end look like? Will I become incredibly frail and a burden, or be one of the lucky ones who keeps going until the last smile? My goals remain the same as always: be kind, respect others, and be the best human possible.