Perspective

My best friends are ages 89 and 87.

Jess Kaisk
Jul 22, 2017 · 5 min read

It might seem strange for a 29 year old woman to have such old friends, but it’s true. It’s a strange demographic I occupy, a young married women, with no children. I don’t like to be in the bars, but I also don’t have any children to hang out with other young married women. It’s almost as though its another kind of unicorn, possibly with shinning blue hair and a silver horn with gold hooves. If I could I would draw it for you, but no one wants to see that chicken scratch.

So it is I find myself spending most of my time with an 89 and 87 year old married couple. Yes, they are my grandparents, my Oma and Opa. You see, I live with them, its the four of us living together. It was supposed to be a temporary situation, when my husband and myself moved back from NY, but it turned into a normal thing. I balance their check book, pay their bills, put their groceries away and help with the landscaping. Each time my husband and I have discussed buying a house they get upset, and it took us six months to realize it was because they don’t like being alone anymore. So, with a sigh, I sorted through our boxes and gave away a lot of my own home furnishings that I was saving, stored the rest, and settled in.

It takes a lot of patience, living with others, especially when the generation gap is so large. They don’t understand healthy eating, or plant based diets; don’t see the point in exercise or desk jobs. They come from a generation of farmers from Yugoslavia, World War II survivors, concentration camp survivors. They are the healthy German stock that is slowly dying off in America, the generation that built companies and communities from nothing; starting over in a strange land with nothing. The real American Dream. I haven’t met anyone my age with that level of perseverance, strength, determination, frugality, or sense of family. I truly believe its the downfall of civilization when these values are traded for luxury, foundation-less wealth, excessive spending, narcissistic friendships.

While they irritate me with things only old people can irritate you with; endless “Where are you going?” questions, the constant need to save every scrap of anything, the persistent screwing around with things that are not broken and do not need to be fixed, there are things these annoyances have taught me. For instance, I hate how they save everything, from paper to food. Nothing is thrown out unless expressly needed. Why?! Why save all this paper? “I like to compare prices over time of things” Oma tells me, and for a moment I step back, realizing that her love of history and reading is what keeps her doing this. She likes to go back and see the inflation of every day items, much the way a historian would do when writing a book on a particular subject. Perspective. Or the way they save even the tiniest bit of food, and are insistent that they can cut out the moldy parts of cheese and still eat the rest, when I would have just thrown out the whole shebang. “We never throw it out, we never knew when we would eat” Oma explains. How many times had she told me this story, of walking for miles and miles from Yugoslavia to Austria during the war dressed as a boy to avoid the Partisan? How is it that I just made the connection between their food hoarding and their lack of food in their youth? Perspective. Or the way Opa always claims he can fix it.

“Don’t throw it out, we might be able to use it for something later.” Opa says.
“For what? It’s a broken tool.” I’d retort.
“I don’t know, but its metal, and we could use it for something.” He’d reply.

They’ve also taught me a lot about marriage and family in a time when the nuclear families cut themselves off from the extended family. Oma has taught me how to be patient, and wait for the future gain of my hard work instead of expecting immediate results. Opa has taught me the value of sweating, taking care of the land and physically showing my love for my family by doing things for them, even when I don’t want to do it. The importance of silence; Oma has many times shown me that silence during anger is better than proving points for pride. These lessons would be things my husband and I would have to learn on our own, probably over years. We now that the privilege of learning from a hardworking, strong couple who have 60 years of marriage under their belts. Michael and I have definitely used these lessons, and can honestly say our marriage has been better in the last year than it has in the last 4 years. Resilience.

So many people might think it’s odd, living here. Many families though around the world live this way as the standard, caring for the elderly within our homes, not as a burden, but as a blessing. Their stories, lessons, perspectives, histories, are so important, so integral to our families and society, and yet they are shoved aside in an age of immediate gratification and fast pace living. Slow down is my advice. Put away the phone and computer. Get your hands dirty and learn something “old fashioned” like sewing, cooking, or farming. Fix things. My best friends are 89 and 87, and what’s better, they are my husbands best friends too.

Jess Kaisk

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You're lucky if I put my book down…

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