How to Celebrate a Centenarian

My grandmother is turning 102. That’s not a typo.

The estimated percentage of centenarians (100 years of age or more) in the US population is 0.027%. It seems worth celebrating.

We live on opposite sides of the country, so we don’t see each other much. I used to try to visit every few years, but she doesn’t want visitors for more than an hour these days, so my visits have tapered off. We chat on the phone every now and then, but that’s about it.

Last year, when I called to congratulate her on her 101st birthday, she said, “Yes, well, I guess I’ve decided to start over again at 1.”

So here we are, a year later, and she’s turning 2.

You know how some people are really hard to shop for? This is especially true for centenarians, at least it is in the case of my grandmother.

I used to send flowers, but she doesn’t want them anymore. “Too hard to take care of.”

She also doesn’t want things. “I’ve been trying for decades to get rid of things,” she says. “No more things.”

Nothing digital/electronic. “Too complicated.”

No books, music, or chocolates. A few years ago, she even asked me to stop sending family pictures. “I have nowhere to put them.”

Honestly, these days my grandmother struggles to see, to write, to do much of anything.

“I really just want to nap,” she says.

At the risk of disturbing one of these naps, she does still appreciate the occasional phone call (not too often, mind you).

We’ll chat briefly about the weather, my daughters, and then possibly circle back to the weather again before she’ll begin hinting that she’s ready to get off the phone.

While I’m not yet ready to begin eschewing flowers, books, music, and chocolate, I think my grandmother’s other views are lessons worth heeding. I think she’s on to something. I submit:

THINGS: I very much want to live with less things. At times I feel like I am drowning in things. (Related to too many things, remember when the word “Amazon” made you think of a rainforest or a river?)

ELECTRONICS: The digital world is not only complicated, but it sucks us into a vortex that steals our time lived in real life. (Noting the irony as I type on my laptop to post on a variety of internet platforms.)

NAPS: These have long been underrated. If you have pets, you likely know that animals feel no guilt about the time they spend napping. Humans are animals. Let’s get back to more napping.

INTERACTION: When you’re ready to end a conversation, there should be no shame in doing so. The need to be polite has limits. My grandmother has no qualms expressing this, whether in regard to phone calls or in-person visits. Neither should we. (Let’s not wait until we’re centenarians to take control of our time and on whom we spend it.)

So for my grandmother’s 102nd birthday, I’ll pick up the phone and give her a call. If she’s napping, she won’t answer, and that’s just fine. If she does answer, my family will crowd around the phone and put it on speaker so we can all wish her a happy birthday. Then we’ll likely talk about the weather, what she’s doing for her birthday, and then we might talk about the weather again.

And then, in no uncertain terms, she’ll let me know she’s had enough of our phone call. We’ll say a few rounds of “I love you” and I’ll hang up hoping she spends the rest of the day doing exactly what she wants to.

She could surprise me, but my money’s on a nap.