The Futile Utility of the Cell Phone

Thursday morning I woke up and found that various family members had been texting and calling all night (my cell phone is set to stop ringing at 9:30). My mom had been on the couch watching the aftermath of the Capitol riot like the rest of the country, gotten up for a glass of water, and tripped on a throw rug. Bottom line:

minor to medium medical emergency, she's in the hospital and doing well, expecting to come home today and heal up.

Yesterday, I reacted by spending some time changing settings on my cell phone, and telling everyone our land line number. The cell phone can let selected numbers ring 24 hours a day, so now my mom and sister and aunt will be able to get through. This isn't very practical, since I can't DO anything in an emergency. I won't get to Wisconsin any quicker if I am summoned up there at 2 am vs. 7am, I'll just be less rested when I get there! But immediate family can now reach me whenever they feel the need.

Toshio Odate told a story about the death of his mother. He was teaching at Pratt Institute in New York, so couldn't get back to Japan on a moment's notice. His brother considered this, and when their mother died, didn't call until after the funeral. Toshio was angry at first, but then grateful: If they had called him immediately, he would have been tearing his hair thinking about how he couldn't get to Japan fast enough for the funeral. Instead, he went through an extra 5 days assuming his mom was still alive. "So I had a mother 5 days longer than the rest of my family," he said. Years ago I shared this story with Mom and she saw the logic right away. "That's why I never give you a specific itinerary when I travel!" she said. "If something happens, I'll be too far away to get back before the crisis is over, and how does it help anyone if I'm stressing out 5,000 miles away?"

Changing the settings on my phone violates that principle, a principle I agree with. But in talking it over with my sister, I saw that the approach of retirement means I will be assuming a new role for my parents. Sometimes it might be helpful even if all I can be is a reassuring voice at the other end of the line.

 

The way I've just described this makes it sound like progress, or forward motion: stepping in to a new role. But it's also a step back. A couple of years ago, as my younger kid was finishing college, I spent some time thinking about my transition out of what the Hindu tradition describes as the "householder" phase of life and into a less worldly-involved, less responsible phase whose name literally translates as "forest dweller." The forest dweller, having raised a family and earned a living, turns away from that and devotes more attention to the shape of the world, and understanding humanity's place in it. Their action vis-à-vis others is advisory rather than engaged. Read about Vanaprastha here.

Here in the early 21st century, our parents are often still alive and in need of more physical care when we reach the age where we might become forest dwellers. Some of us loop back to become quasi-parents to our own parents. I mention this to a friend, who nods in recognition. Among her peer group it's widely understood that taking care of parents in their old age takes as many years as raising children to adulthood. The part of me that longs to fade into the forest dim and contemplate Flora recoils and says "a sordid boon!" The more reasonable (or should I say, accommodationist?) part of me placatingly offers this thought: do you really think the four life stages of the ashrama system are rigid, self-contained units that apply to the life of a contemporary American man? Maybe your life isn't a series of four rooms, each with a door locking behind you as you pass through! Maybe you should just think of forest-dwelling as something to be aware of as you orient yourself to your world.

Last night that same friend called her dad in the memory care unit where he is in hospice. He told her that he and 3 or 4 others are leaving tomorrow. When she asked where they're going, there was a long silence followed by "Back where we came from!" Every day, he offers a different theory about where he is and what he's doing there, but this one seems quite apt. Aren't we all going back where we came from? Why worry about the order in which we pass individual landmarks? I hope I can be content to compare a few maps against each other as I travel, for enlightenment and enjoyment, and remember that the maps and the terrain are different things.