During my recent, biannual house cleaning, I came across a blue-lined sheet of paper from my childhood, where my friend Laura and I had played a few rounds of the game MASH, which stands for mansion, apartment, shack, and house — designating which type of dwelling we would one day inhabit. We would arrive at the answer Eenie, Meenie, Miny, Mo-style, scratching off things until only one was left. There were other categories in the game, such as our future profession, name of husband, color of house (or other dwelling), type of pet, number of children.
I was incredulous that in one of the few rounds on this particular sheet of paper, my answers had lined up with the way my actual life has turned out. Partner: David. House color: silver. Number of children: one. Profession: writer. I didn’t get the pet right (I’d put dog, but I have two cats). And I can’t make out my handwriting for place to live — though I’m pretty sure it’s not Florida, as Florida was nowhere on my radar screen as a child. But still, as random fortune-telling goes, our game was pretty accurate.
Living in such a measured society makes me anxious. I’d rather be like the octogenarians in the Italian piazzas, still drinking a bit of wine and maybe getting my hair done once a week.
The arbitrariness of the game was what made it so fun. That, and the constant kindling of a dream. Who would we be one day? What lives would we grow into?
The middle-aged version of this game is more sobering. The categories and their attendant questions have shifted. Where will I move? Will I live to see grandchildren? What contribution will I make? What medical conditions will assail me? I first began ruminating on some of these questions about a decade ago, when I entered my forties. I remember writing a poem titled “Middle Age,” inspired by a visit with high-school friends that felt both warm and competitive, albeit in a more veiled way than during adolescence. The last line of the poem was: One wonders: will we compare/ the birch box of our naked dreams?
I suppose at some point, the gratitude to just be eclipses our desires. More recently, the question about potential medical conditions has been on my mind, since I’ve been reading about bloodwork diagnostics. New blood tests have enormous predictive powers, discerning one’s probability for various illnesses. On one hand, this bodes well for preventative medicine. But it also comes with the risk of false positives — and a great deal of anxiety. As a lifelong hypochondriac, I find that my first instinct is to run from these kinds of tests. I told my partner, who wears a WHOOP device to monitor everything from his quality of sleep to the number of steps he does in a day, that I don’t want to grow old here, meaning the U.S. Living in such a measured society makes me anxious. I’d rather be like the octogenarians in the Italian piazzas, still drinking a bit of wine and maybe getting my hair done once a week.
But I also understand that accessing such information is empowering, and I’ve always had a deep curiosity for things medical, even as I fear them. For this reason, I became a health reporter, award-winning, mostly because I asked questions shamelessly, losing my ego in the hunt for information. More recently, I’ve nursed a small desire to actually be a medical doctor myself, driven by my desire to know as much about the body — rather, my own — while it is still healthy, so that I can more peacefully accompany it through future hardship.
I realize that those of us with children naturally deflect these mid-life ruminations by surrendering to our children. Our children’s dreams become our own, even as we continue to dream independently of them. For me, having a daughter was itself a midlife dream come true: a surprise pregnancy at 41, considered a “geriatric” age by medical standards. It’s true that my daughter’s life has, so far, been the only other life to which I have successfully latched. Perhaps this is why I get a lump in my throat when I watch her perform ballet on stage. It’s partly that I have my own soft spot for ballet. When just a few years ago, I felt divorced from myself, ballet brought me back to my body. But I am also moved watching my daughter because she is mine. And because she is good. Ballet might be her path — or one of them. And I feel so lucky to have a front-row seat.
Kristine Crane enjoys the whirlwind of parenthood from a “front-row seat” in her daughter’s young life.
