Turn and Face the Changes

With apologies to David Bowie for paraphrasing his hit song, here are some thoughts on change... Sometimes the smaller, more subtle ones are harder to deal with than big, seismic shifts. I grew up addicted to soap operas, in particular All My Children, which was yanked by ABC a few months ago. I watched the last episode but it just wasn't up to par. The Seventies and Eighties were the heyday of Pine Valley; Erica Kane, Tad & Dixie, Phoebe and Langley, and Richard Simmons' aerobic workouts at the town gym. Another female favorite, Oprah (a late afternoon staple of the days moms aren't shuttling children to every imaginable activity) no longer appears at 4 o' clock.

In 2011, as recently observed with the passing of Steve Jobs, cutting-edge devices and gadgets make their debuts only to be upstaged by "smarter" newcomers within weeks or less. Facebook and Twitter keep the population in endless, frenzied commentary on what's happening to everyone at every moment. No sooner have we adjusted to the "very latest," a fresh take on what we've just absorbed rushes in to alter the previous impression. I find all this institutionalized chaos hard to abide. Sure, I buy into some of technology's split-second sound and sight strobe light. Much of it I avoid, abstain from, or generally disdain. Call me Luddite Lite.

In terms of the Big Picture, change is, as we've all been reminded by parents, mentors and drinking buddies, the one constant. Ain't no getting around it, even if one manages to subvert change or distract oneself from it, you never leave home without it. And home, in both the elemental and Thomas Wolfe way, is a staging ground for the changes we often wish would never come. To wit, how is it that two of my trio of merry pranksters, with skinned knees and uncomplicated dispositions, have grown into what we call, after they hit 21, adults? "Just stop getting bigger," I beg my 17-year-old, remembering the wide-eyed optimist who now wrestles with adolescent angst.

From the vast amount written on the subject of the maturation process, be it a child-rearing guide, midlife crisis self help book, or philosophical tome, one would think Homo sapiens would have mastered it by now, evolutionarily-speaking. Which is not to disregard those who actually have a handle on maturity. Some rare folk are born with a tendency toward it or acquire a knack. But in my humble opinion, a majority of people have few clues. That's why humans have goals like self-actualization or becoming a boddhisatva. Most of us fight change tooth and claw, and are therefore deemed stubborn, while those who embrace it get labeled visionaries. Change is the ultimate double-edged sword. Its benefits or deficits are seldom realized in the short run, making us dodge the unknown with clever or clumsy tactics.

What springs to mind is the psychiatric list of the top ten life stressors: Death, divorce, moving, changing jobs, etc. Nobody sails through any of these unscathed. For those who weather such upheavals with grace, my hat's off to you. For me, I greet many transformational life events with equal parts dread and ecstasy, sometimes simultaneously. At a relatively ripe Boomer age, I've discovered that when we at last surrender to a variegated, thorny metamorphosis, we frequently breath a sigh of relief, pat ourselves on the back and utter, "Well, that wasn't so bad after all." Meanwhile, I admit, since it's Friday, you'll find me anchored to the sofa tonight, surfing through the MLB playoffs and bad cable movies. A mere lump of protoplasm. Tomorrow it's time, as Bowie sang, to "turn and face the strain" of those "ch-ch-ch-changes."