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08/06/2015 12:01 AMI think a lot of us Baby Boomers are in denial that we’re growing older. We’re still tuned in to the cool music of our youth—as well as current music. We’re working and staying active until much older than the previous generation. We take risks and challenge ourselves with new vocations and avocations up into our sixties and beyond. Some Baby Boomers have had children later, and while still dealing with teenagers, are simultaneously caretakers for elderly parents. Not much time to think about their own aging issues.
It’s also hard for us to acknowledge that we’re quickly becoming the oldest generation.
As a result (of course there are exceptions) we’re putting off such practicalities as living wills, health care proxies, and even purchasing cemetery plots or leaving our wishes in writing for our own funerals, burials, etc.
It seems like the Greatest Generation was more focused on these things and even more matter-of-fact about it all.
For example, even though it made us uncomfortable because we didn’t want to think about her dying, starting in her 60s my mother-in-law would tell us very specifically what she was leaving to whom—even labeling the lamps, pictures, furniture, clocks. This went on for more than 30 years, since she ended up living until she was 100.
My great aunts and uncles bought family cemetery plots early since New York City cemeteries were overcrowded, and, as was the custom, ordered headstones engraved with their names and birthdates, followed by a dash followed by a blank for their “death dates,” which really creeped me out as a kid.
We’re also not leaving our legacies for our children because oral storytelling from one generation to the next is becoming a thing of the past, as is writing letters. Yes, there are more memoirs being published than ever, but for the most part they’re by professional writers or celebrity’s ghostwriters. And people often don’t even print out what’s in their computers, so what will we leave our kids to read about us, our lives, what we believed, what we cherished?
In his new book Having The Last Say: Capturing Your Legacy in One Small Story, Alan Gelb addresses the importance of aging Baby Boomers leaving a piece of family history for the generations that proceed us.
Gelb came up with the idea of the book when he began attending close friends’ funerals, which happens more and more at our age. While he says he was moved by the people who got up and shared their memories of the deceased, he also felt he was missing the presence of the person being eulogized.
He writes in the book, “ I wanted that person to be in the room with us, and I wanted him or her to have the last say.”
He also says Baby Boomers (like himself) now in their “third act of life” who have experienced Woodstock to Watergate to the walk on the moon—are part of a generation that embraced experimentation, individualism, and activism—don’t have the right vehicle for sharing their thoughts in a life review, now while they still have sharp mental acuity “and even some wisdom to go along with it.”
Until now, that is.
A writing coach and author of the popular Conquering the College Admissions Essay in 10 Steps, Gelb’s new book gives the novice writer—or even non-writer—all the tools needed to write a 500 to 1,000 word “Last Say.”
“Why so short?” you may ask.
“There are two reasons,” Gelb says. “First, it is a length that is easy for a layperson (i.e. not an orator) to deliver orally, as one might be called upon to do at a memorial service. Secondly, it is a length that the unseasoned writer can feel comfortable working within, but still lengthy enough to allow the writer to be able to achieve truly meaningful expression.”
The book explains in simple language everything you need to know to write your “Last Say” from understanding the narrative voice, to finding your topic and point of view, to writing a draft (or two or three), to polishing, and pulling it all together.
Even though I write all the time and my poor family will be left with a million tear sheets and computer story links when I die, I never thought of writing a life review and I think it’s a terrific idea.
It’s a wonderful way to give a shape to what we believe, fought for, learned, dreamed of, made come true, struggled with, overcame, during this journey on earth, and perhaps, most importantly, to express gratitude and love for our family and friends.
Gelb, who has coached people on writing their “Last Say,” has found overall, “There’s the satisfaction of going through the act of life review with real courage and candor and then the satisfaction of making and giving a beautiful gift.”
And, if you haven’t written your “Last Say” in longhand (if you even remember what that means), remember to print it out after you’ve typed it on your computer because who knows how soon paper will become an antiquity that we only see in museums.
Having The Last Say (Penguin Random House) by Alan Gelb is $15.95, softcover.
Amy J. Barry is a Baby Boomer, who lives in Stony Creek with her husband and assorted pets. She writes arts features and reviews for Shore Publishing newspapers and is an expressive arts educator. Please email your responses and ideas for future columns to aimwrite@snet.net or at www.aimwrite-ct.net.