The Invisibility Myth part 11: Coffin Dodgers Bus Tour

Advantages of Age Bus Tour. Photo Elainea Emmott

“Excuse me love - are you on the coffin dodgers bus too? Says the pink haired lady with a rubber duck headress… I have arrived at Sloane Square London and it is buzzing with exuberant self-expression and colour. The Advantages of Age dynamic duo of  Rose Rouse and Suzanne Noble

Suzanne Noble. Photo:Elainea Emmott

Rose Rouse. Photo: Elainea Emmott

have got together this event funded by The Arts Council held atop a vintage London Routemaster Bus. Us folk are invited to celebrate what it is to be from the baby boomer generation. Oh what a joyous life-affirming ‘OutAgeous’ sight greeted my arrival; Flamboyant Ladies and a spattering of Chaps 40-80 years young, dressed to thrill, draw attention, be visible, connect, make new friends, greet old ones, grow empowered.  Rose and Suzanne are the vanguards of a zeitgeist global movement of ordinary extraordinary older people who are showing that there is no time between now and infinity to waste with your feet up. Rose and Suzanne - you Ladies sure do lead by example!

 Worlds End

the invisibility myth

I dug out this photo of my East London Grandma and her sisters in the 1950’s.

 They would have been roughly the same age as this shit kicking group and it made me squeal out loud: Fanny-Eliza, Saphire-Matilda and Charlotte Louisa would be horrified by such behaviour… They would have seen us as a group of brazen hussies as we waved and screamed from the open top bus as it caroused around London, making stops to strut our stuff, have photo ops, drink fizz, dance and LAUGH - oh how much laughter there was. Good job I have a strong pelvic floor, or the summer rain wouldn’t have been the only thing running across the floor! Embracing 60 plus for me is about living a life far removed from Fanny, Min and Lil, whilst acknowledging that they were the pioneers of the freedom I never, ever take for granted. I love them, they are my roots, but…… 

Shrinking violets...

Lets be honest, through financial necessity many of us will be working in some form or another till we attend our own funeral parties, (Flamboyant Funerals as one FB thread suggested) hopefully doing what we love, so why shouldn’t we be having as much fun in our own way as the young ‘uns? This world needs hashtags like: livefastdieold, advantagesofage, notdeadyet, ageingcanbefun, theinvisibilitymyth. With the challenges that we face as we grow older, we need this diverse, inclusive global community network of our own, with it’s shared ethos of supporting each other whilst endeavouring to live our individual lives to the fullest. My flame has not dimmed with age, it is roaring, occasionally with the need for medication, but still… I strive to empower the young people in my life by being a role model who is visible, opinionated, empathetic and hopefully a bit wise. They should be seeing that there is much to look forward to in their own dotage if they keep on keeping on.

This highly visible, glorious movement is not just colourful, entertaining fun, it’s also about connectivity, community and support, so I say it again: Fuck Invisibility!

The Invisibility Myth part 10: The Handmaid’s Tale - reality in the shadow.

➨2017 - I thought my generation had scored the winning goal in terms of general equality, which bought about the fulfilling birth of my Invisibility Myth project. It’s mission is to show that we older women never had it so good and that the hard work of the women’s movement, is an unstoppable global force that will only move forward. I felt I could relax a little, knowing that my daughters daughters will be equal to all - at least in my sphere of society. 

However, a couple of things have rattled me and sounded alarm bells this year.

Freedom is a dream by SAM

➨I was visiting a somewhat subdued New York the day the new POTUS (who’s name I cannot bring myself to write) was inaugurated in Washington.  The infamous Women’s March that overshadowed his day was awesome to walk with and witness, but I confess to becoming a tad irritated by the “This pussy bites” placards etc as I felt it was showing an unnecessarily aggressive mannish attitude.    

Revolutionary Suit by Jae Jarrell

I had failed to grasp the full validity of their concerns, and did not get the “Gilead is not an instruction manual” references.  I had last read The Handmaids Tale back in 1984 when it was published and I had retained the feeling and atmosphere of the dystopian world Margaret Atwood created in the book, but not the detail.

 It didn’t take long for me to see the bigger picture of what was happening right across America: - the sexist rhetoric, the rooms full of men making decisions about women’s issues, the new bills being signed off by POTUS and his man gang. The general rise of everyday sexism being brushed off as a lot of fuss about nothing, or fake news by so many men and women. The attempt to suppress freedom of speech and the free press, which continues to this day was beyond my understanding, outside my life experience….I initially parochially back-burnered it, as I focused on the UK's own issues with the attacks on our home soil,the General Election and Brexit Negotiations.

➨...Then The Handmaid’s Tale aired on British TV - Oh. My. Word. “We sleep-walked into this” says the Offred handmaid portrayed with such chilling conviction by Elisabeth Moss , after a flashback scene to when the normality of her life started to be undermined and unravelled …Shivers ran down my spine as I saw how easily society can slip backwards and find our hard won equality and freedom curbed, and in the worse case scenarios removed.  A definitive wakeup call as I tuned back in to our friends in the USA. This was coupled with unsettling Government imposed restrictions on the general public after a spate of terrorist attacks on my beloved home City of London.  

Injustice Case by David Hammons. B1943 

My eyes opened wide once more, peripheral vision restored, switched back on. If invisibility is to remain a myth, then I/we have to keep on the ball, questioning, talking, challenging.  If I/we don’t, then there is a real possibility that Gilead could happen - is happening in societies around the globe...Fertile women corralled - aka Handmaids - aka breeders in a society that sees armageddon fast approaching via infertility. Only today I read a real study headline stating that sperm counts among western men have halved in the past forty years...(www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/jul/25/sperm-counts-among-western-men-have-halved-in-last-40-years-study)...  

Jaffa beach September 2016

➨ Oppression, power, control...I think back to the beach I daily visited in Jaffa, Israel in 2016: in 36 degree heat, women were having to wade into the sea fully clothed in their black robes, unable to do anything other than stand within the billowing fabric.  When they struggled ashore, and tried to shower out the sand from their salt water sodden garments, they were looked at disapprovingly by their shorts only wearing menfolk as if they were being somehow provocative. My love child and I observed this, dressed as we normally are on a beach, with a sense of righteous anger on the women’s behalf.

My Jaffa Beach outpouring 2016!

 It was clear there was no personal choice or freedom as their male dominated society dictated this protocol to them. They were Handmaids and it was little wonder that they looked at us with sad resentment.  

➨My determination to live my own life in the fullest possible way, clearly has to include an ongoing responsibility to carry on fighting injustices wherever and whenever I see them, otherwise there can be no justification in my pursuit of and belief in The Invisibility Myth.

 ➨Step up and back into the fray time Jeanie, no napping! Love and peace 💟

The Invisibility Myth part 9: The canvas of my own life

➨60 years of time has slipped away, both real and imagined.  My life canvas is a work in progress, now entwined with The Invisibility Myth.  Third coffee of the day drunk and replenished. I am parked in the welcome shade of an ancient maple tree in  France, newly emerged from the blancmange-type fug that has enveloped me on and off for the past week or so. The only harassment comes from a couple of money spiders cruising around my chair, insisting on using my arms as part of their trail, oh and the occasional tortoiseshell butterfly landing on me to fan itself away from the growing heat…. 

I'm gathering my thoughts about us humans - specifically, where i'm currently at as a woman. Sorry if this all sounds a bit me, me, me, but sometimes I find it’s good to share and vent!  

➨As usual with me, the struggle is real to find a thread... 

I’m drawn to the opening line of Patti Smith’s M Train, which reads; ‘It’s not so easy writing about nothing’. Patti is not someone I would believe could ever be at a loss for words, but clearly even my heroines have creative hiccoughs and lack of direction on occasions, which is comforting music to my ears!  She writes at such times in painterly detail about the minutiae of her life:  feeding her cats, hastily dressing to walk to her preferred NYC cafe, her regular order she places of coffee, brown toast, olive oil.  So intimate it’s easy to feel that I know her.  I metaphorically walk alongside her words in M Train, a complete stranger, a voyeur observing and imagining her life.  This is what I seek and enjoy most from interaction with my fellow humans - the detail.  Honesty and detail is what I crave, my key to connecting and understanding the motivation of the extraordinary ordinary human existence.

➨I embrace every opportunity to meet new people, however i’m coming to feel that in new social situations I should wear a badge bearing the words: ‘FUCK THE SMALL TALK, SHOW ME YOUR SOUL!’  I want to know how people see and interact with the world, not just what they do as a day job climbing up the monetary greasy pole (unless it’s relevant to the conversation of course).  Bit much do you think?  Bit intimidating? Bit off-putting? I know, I know, it isn’t that easy for some people to dive straight in - but I am good at encouraging and listening, plus I am genuinely interested…..Truth is, my 60 year old self has less and less tolerance of every day, barely polite small talk, but my interest in observing and endeavouring to understand us humans is growing.  Please, please forgive me. Cut me some aged-related slack, I cannot help it if my mind wanders off when faced with polite insincerity, thinking about my next man and dog/cat snuggle with coffee or vodka and tonic  in hand…(hmmm-mint/cucumber or citron garnish?) ...  Bombard me with a bit of the real, unexpurgated ‘real you’ and you will have my undivided attention!!

➨The reverse dilemma is the internal agony I experience when a new acquaintance asks me the standard, stock question; “And what do you do?”…

Well, how long have you got? We are talking sixty years here after all... 

Past?  Present?  Future?.. 

Do you really give a rats arse?..

Sometimes there’s a sense that I have only a couple of minutes max to hit the right chord, before the questioner glazes over, starts to panic and their eyes wander round the room for a get-out-of-jail-free card! Not everybody wants to have a real conversation straight off the bat it seems…

In my twenties this would have bothered me.  Now I find I am either indifferent or vaguely irritated…

➨According to marketing agency SuperHuman - yes marketing - you know, the business that is paid to tell us what we already know we are doing/feeling, but want to see what field of monetary exploitation is to be had from us,  found in a study of 500 women that 80 per cent felt society’s assumptions about middle aged women do not represent how they live their lives, but while older celebrities and models are more visible than ever before in adverts, older women in general still feel ignored……..At odds with the same article that labels us no-age barrier 'Perennials who are ever blooming, relevant people of all ages who know what’s happening in the world, stay current with technology and have friends of all ages. We are involved, curious mentors of others, who are passionate, compassionate, creative, confident, collaborative, global-minded risk takers.’  WOW - aren’t we the awesomest! Now, this is worth a chewing over don’t you think?…..Any takers?  Or are you glazing over in a confused mind-fuck of mixed messages?  Does this wanting to get straight to the things that matter to me make me a body-swerve sort of guest?  Should we of a certain age be content with conversing about that magnificent obsession of oldies past of death, disease and the lavatory? Or should I just shut the **ck up?  Yeah but no but, that isn't going to happen with my generation...  I think we all need to get out and shout our lack of invisibility more and more in the interests of research and clarification…..

➨Truth to tell, the reason for this particular outpouring,  is that I have been spending way too much time beside hospital beds in the past year.  The hours/days i’ve spent observing and listening to the comings and goings in A & E and Elderly Care Wards, has galvanised my awareness of making the most of what is important to me while I am able.  My accumulated passions and beliefs matter to me, as does leaving behind a truthful, honest legacy of who and what I am. I feel the need to bathe in joy and soak away the pain whenever possible between now and - frankly, who knows when.

➨Right, who is inviting me my big heart and opinionated gob round to theirs for a chin-wag then?💋