When your mother enters her ninth decade, you make a point of being a little extra vigilant for any signs of decline-memory loss, bouts of repetition, or a general acceleration of age-related deterioration.
Thankfully, my mother has been blessed with good health, and her mental faculties seem to have remained largely intact. But when she got inked after turning 80 last September, I had to wonder.
To celebrate Mom's landmark birthday, we were planning a large party-but then, of course, everything had to be cancelled because of COVID-19. After all, her entire social circle is high-risk, composed as it is of septuagenarian and octogenarian friends from her book (wine) club, her garden (wine) club, and her church. Instead, we arranged an outdoor family lunch at our lake house in Quebec.
My mother looks just like many grandmothers. She is short, plump, and white-haired. She's rosy-cheeked and jolly, and when she laughs her eyes almost seem to disappear behind those chubby cheeks. She comes from an old, traditional Catholic family. She was a career civil servant. In short, she didn't do crazy stuff.
That all changed a few years ago. She began to surprise my older brother and me with bouts of what she described as “independence? At the time, we merely saw them as examples of irresponsibility and possibly age-related questionable judgment.
This story is from the May 2022 edition of Reader's Digest India.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the May 2022 edition of Reader's Digest India.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
THE UNBELIEVABLE MR RIPLEY
The creator of Believe It or Not had an insatiable curiosity about strange and astonishing facts
HE OPENED UP THE ARC TIC
\"You don't just sit and wait for adventure to come,\" famed polar explorer Knud Rasmussen liked to explain.\"You go out and make it happen!\"
Discovering Babasaheb
This Dalit history month—which also marks the 134\" birth anniversary of Dr B. R. Ambedkar, we recount four momentous incidents from his life
Lion in the Living Room
Five decades after two young men brought a playful cub into their London home, the tale has touched a whole new generation
The Many Roles of SUNIL DUTT
Through many personal tragedies, this favourite matinee idol finds strength and solace in helping others
AGATHA CHRISTIE MURDER BY THE BOOK
More widely read than any other English writer, she baffled the world with masterly tales of murder and remained something of a mystery herself
THE DAY WE MADE Flying History
Ona sunny September day in 1913, the author set three world records ina homemade flying machine
THE COMMANDO WITH THE TATTOO
Ganesh Dhangde was just six years old when he got lost. Twenty years later, his mother had a visitor
MARILYN: HER MAGIC LINGERS ON
The real Marilyn Monroe was nobody you'd look at twice—unless she wanted you to
I Think, Therefore, I Spam...
...has become the way forward for too many e-mail pests. Here's how I deal with them every single day