sexagenarian youth: four manhattan conversations

CONVERSATION IN UPTOWN BRANCH OF COMMERCE BANK AROUND NOON, THURSDAY 10 JANUARY

(as I hand the young, female teller a check and a deposit slip, she does something on a screen in front of her and then looks up at me)

TELLER: Are you sure that’s your account you’re depositing that in?

ME: Whose else’s would it be??

TELLER: You look so much younger than it says here.

ME: I do???

TELLER: Yes, you look much younger.

ME: You mean, when someone deposits a check, your computer tells you their age?

TELLER: Yes.

ME: [getting interested] How young do you think I look?

TELLER: In your 30s.

ME: You’ve made my day.

TELLER: [smiles]

ME: Can you accept the check now?

TELLER: Yes.

ME: Okay, now seriously: how old do you think I look? and how old are you?

TELLER: Well, I’m 22, and you look lots younger than my mother, and she’s in her early 50s.

ME: Thank you very much.

FROM PREVIOUS POST: CONVERSATION IN UPTOWN WINE-BAR, WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY

I wrote that my Wednesday evening date talked on and on about

how beautiful I am and how I am just the woman for him, when am I going to be free to see him again, etc. He asks me what age men usually think I look, implying that I look much, much younger etc. etc. I say I don’t know because I never asked, but that is a lie: Performer used to tell me in bed that I had the body of a twenty-year-old.

I guess I should have known the relationship was going downhill when Performer told me I had the body of a twenty-five-year-old.

CONVERSATION WITH ROLLY’S SHRINK, MORNING, THURSDAY 10 JANUARY

I went to ‘consult’ with him, so he could hear my account of what went wrong with Dr. J. , my shrink until 2 weeks ago, and get some sense of what I’m like so he could recommend someone else. I watched his face carefully as I told my story, and we discussed Dr. J.’s responses to my evolving romance with Performer (my violinist ex-boyfriend who went back to his wife, having advertised himself as ‘divorced’ and ’single’).

And then, about 10 minutes after we had moved to another subject, I suddenly remembered something:

“Oh! I forgot something important!”

“What was that?” he asked.

“I forgot to mention, that one of the many reasons Dr. J. gave that he dismissed every account I gave of problems with Performer, and that he always seemed to take Performer’s point of view, was that he said he ‘identified with’ me and wanted the relationship to work out.“

At that Rolly’s psychiatrist scowled a bit, and I could tell he did not like what he had just heard. And suddenly I had the illumination I should have had months ago: I realized with horror and a bit of disgust that my psychiatrist had found me attractive, and that had determined all the ‘advice’ he gave me — for which I was paying quite a bit.

“But he wasn’t identifying with me,” I continued. “He was identifying with Performer. That’s why he always said that whatever Performer said was right: when I said that P was being nasty, he said, ‘He needs your support,’ without ever asking me if I was supporting him anyway; and that’s why he said, ‘He doesn’t like criticism’ — who does like criticism? But Dr. J. was thinking of himself. Now I see why Dr. J. is an expert on counter-transference: he was attracted to me — he isn’t much older than some of the men I dated — and that’s why Performer could do no wrong in his view, why he approved and blessed all the things that disturbed me about P, that he wasn’t telling his children the truth, that he was still sharing a bed with his wife, and all the rest of it. Dr. J. was thinking vicariously through Performer. And that was guiding everything he told me — all of it, in the event, entirely wrong.”

* * *

Rolly’s shrink looked at me directly, seemed to nod, but didn’t say anything.

I told him I suddenly remembered that Dr. J still had a book I had given him, and that I realized I wanted it back.

“Maybe I should send him a stamped, self-addressed envelope and ask him to return it?”

“I think it would be a very good idea if you did that,” said the shrink, in one of the few direct confirmations he made. “I think it would be good for you to send him an envelope and ask for it back.”

* * *
HINDSIGHT, FORESIGHT, HAIR

This is truly not the way people have responded to me all my life, bank-tellers and dates and boyfriends and psychiatrists struck with the brightness of my youthful glow.

Well, if these responses are a sign of my continuing marketability, that’s good. I can pinpoint the problem, then: it’s not how I look or act with men, it’s access to new men, more men: that’s what I need.

I’m not vain and I never have been. Au contraire, I’ve always been somewhat worried about my looks: is my hair lying flat (it usually isn’t)? do I look fat in this skirt? am I wearing too much black? do I look pale and puffy (without makeup, I usually do)? do I look tired?

So it’s not vanity but surprise and a bit of bewilderment that I feel, with all these comments and insights occurring in fewer than 24 hours.

* * *

A sour note, as I was strung along by the violinist: I remember in one of our last pre-dump conversations, Performer said something about my grey hair. He said that it made me look ‘older’ — I guess he was distancing himself from my “body of a twenty-year-old,” preparing himself psychologically for the return to his fat, ugly wife, who dyes her hair, which is short enough to allow sight of the ring of dark moles around her neck. He then mentioned a never-married former colleague of mine, a few years older than I, who does dye her hair, and he said that — for that reason — she looked younger than I.

I really doubted that; I know what people think of her, and no one comments on her “youth.” Not a bit. So I was baffled that he would say that.

So you think I should dye my hair? I asked.

* * *

There was a long pause, and finally he said, No.

It’s good you said that, I responded, because I’m not going to.
* * *

With hindsight, I think he said ‘no’ because he knew he was going to dump me, and there would be no point in my dyeing my hair to please him.

* * *
Even if he had said that dyeing my hair was a deal-breaker, I wouldn’t have. You can be sure. In that case, I would have — sensibly — begun to feel some doubts about him.

* * *

Why is youthfulness wasted on the middle-aged?

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