Introduction to “Poetry a Centenarian Remembers”, published by Fine Line Press
“My history is a long one! Have you got all day?”
I first met Thelma McLean in 2011, when I was reading poems to a group at the Country Lodge Rest Home in Waikanae, New Zealand. Keenly interested in the poems, Thelma would often recite lines as I read them. Sometimes she would start saying a poem out loud even before I began.
Thelma is over 100 years old. She often recalls her schooldays, her teachers, her family and social events among the farming community in Central Otago, where she grew up. As a schoolgirl during the First World War, she says, “I remember my Mother giving me a red tea towel to wave to the soldiers on the train going to war; they were on their way to the training camp, probably at Trentham. They leaned out of the windows and waved back to me.” Her father was a railroad engineer working on the Otago Central Railway which opened in 1921. She would refer to it as “Dad’s Railway”. For two years, in the 1950s, Thelma and her husband owned a hotel in Roxburgh, Central Otago – “We had some amazing times at that hotel, good fun … there was the ‘six o’clock swill’ back then; you were supposed to stop serving at six o’clock but that was really only in the bigger towns.” When the young Queen Elizabeth visited during her Coronation year of 1953, Thelma, as president of the region’s Plunket Society, was invited to a royal afternoon tea in Dunedin. There was severe rationing during the 2nd World War years: “There were no butchers; all the meat went towards the war effort … but we had a big garden, we ran some sheep – I remember lambs hanging from branches in the trees behind the tennis court.”
Thelma was living in her own home and looking after her garden until she was 99. Her daughter, Rae, visited one day in pouring rain; Thelma was digging a trench to protect her flowers from the flooding. Soon after that she went into the Waikanae Country Lodge Rest Home on the Kapiti Coast for an easier life. In March, 2014, I began visiting Thelma regularly by herself, a few times a month.
The conversations, the poetry
This book is a collection of dialogues inspired by conversations with Thelma. I chose to present our time together in the form of dialogues because I wanted to stay close to the way Thelma spoke, true to her quirky turns of phrase, her enthusiasm and appreciation of poems. A straight prose form would not have done justice to our conversations and the way Thelma expressed herself. For example, when she read some of the glowing parts of this Introduction, she said, “Oh, it’s good to make some things up a bit, some poetic license is all right. You don’t have to pose it as Biblical correctness … oh, what am I saying? I mean you don’t have to take it as gospel.” I’ve read that some old writers like to improve on the past, turning it into a preferred version. Only occasionally did Thelma indulge in this, and it was wonderful, especially the time she said she played the piano in the bar of the hotel she and her husband owned – a permissible embellishment for a centenarian. Thelma has a quick mind, a witty way with words, and ability to produce a ready comment, particularly in appreciating poetry, all of which makes her great to talk with.
If I sound a tad condescending in these dialogues, I count myself fortunate to discuss poetry with a centenarian, someone who has been in this world 45 years longer than I have. I realise I’ll be lucky to get to within 20 years of her age, so I trimmed my oral sails and applied an extra measure of pleasantness. It’s a way of speaking I adopt with the very old, the hard of hearing.
Most of us will have no idea of what it would be like to recall our lives looking back more than 100 years. Our memories change over time, and there are many alterations and deletions over such a long period. However, there was always the feeling with Thelma, in her ability to access vivid memories, prompted by some of her favourite poems and long-remembered lines, that they gave her a deep, and even sustaining pleasure.
“Poetry brings me back.”
“I haven’t read this poem in … oh, it must be a hundred years!”
Thelma’s talk is peppered with the extraordinary, such as seeing her Maker, going to the convent for piano lessons, being chaperoned by her brothers at dances, claiming that she had played piano for their hotel patrons, keeping the “killing sheets” for her husband’s work, and other long-ago memories. Her memory of distant events is generally lucid; she delights in twice- or thrice-told-tales. I heard her use “front name” several times instead of “given name”. She often told me that our sessions made her “sparkle”. She knew that my wife was in hospital recovering from a brain haemorrhage and asked after her. When I said, “She’s still with us, thank you,” she said straight out, “But is she still with it?”
In these dialogues I have stayed as true as possible to what Thelma said, how she speaks and what she feels, especially about poetry. I wanted to draw out different and more information at times. There are subjects I would have liked to elicit more about – politics, religion, the state of the world, social issues and longevity. Probing questions would simply receive, “Oh, it was a long long time ago; I wouldn’t want to tell you any lies.” Her favourite memories, apart from poems, were of family, friends, school days and general activities, such as gardening, cooking and hobbies.
“Poetry was my passion and whenever I saw a poem I grabbed it … I was always reading poetry; I was a bit emotional, a dreamer but I had to work hard too.
Thelma has a heart-warming interest in poetry to the extent that she can still recall poems from her childhood. She takes great delight in reciting them almost word perfect. She often fondly remembered her teachers way back in the First World War years and into the 1920s. Back then there was certainly more emphasis on memorising whole poems, a good exercise for the mind, and something which has been a gift for one’s whole life – in Thelma’s case for sure.
Each conversation about a poem in this book contains several gems of information or comments from Thelma, either about the poems or her life long ago. The conversations are worth reading for these observations alone, giving insight into how Thelma views life, the poems and the poets. I asked her one day in February, 2016 about the effect of reading a favourite poem. She said, “It brings me back.” We agreed that apart from the obvious recalling of the past, this also meant something wonderful to focus on. She is able to experience getting lost in the feeling and delight of a poem. It was always easier for her to talk if the poems were known to her, if she recognised one like “an old friend”. She would always try to appreciate an unknown poem, though.
“You know, I often think that many people like everything to be very plain and straight up and down … but poetry helps you to feel differently, to feel things much more.”
A long life
Thelma’s life as presented here is not a celebrity life; rather, it’s a celebration of a fine life lived long and well. It’s not about a life of awe-inspiring or superhuman achievements; it’s about an ordinary life filled with family, siblings, long-ago memories, hard work, friends, music, gardening, pleasure, books and poetry – in short, a life of service. It’s the sort of life that many New Zealanders can relate and aspire to. There’s a difference though. Thelma McLean’s life is longer than most people’s; she can say literally, “It was a hundred years ago I read that poem.”
Early on in our meetings I learned just to turn up. Very old people live in the moment; appointments and times don’t impinge, the present deserving of full attention – wisdom in this, I should say. Usually Thelma would be concentrating hard on the daily crossword in the Dominion Post. Sometimes she would be attending the weekly church service or having her hair done, or in winter, sitting by the fire in the lounge playing cards; occasionally she would be out for a drive and lunch with her daughter.
Some people abhor the idea of going into care, and with Thelma’s active life, it’s possible she would not have taken to greatly reduced private space. Happily, Thelma has thrived. She has special qualities, possibly those of people who live much longer than the average: an uncomplaining way, a super-positive attitude, an appreciation of people, a healthy life well led, and perhaps above all, a rich store of memories in which she takes joy. The industrious carers in her rest home have plenty of work to do looking after the residents’ physical needs. Thelma often says how kind everyone is and how pleasant it is living in the rest home, appreciating all the help her carers give her. Her positive attitude to life shines a light and sets an example.
They say inhibitions reduce as we age, so we become more daring in things we say. It was always interesting talking to Thelma because of her refreshing candour, often produced in simple one-liners. This may not apply to everyone; many older people I’ve known become more guarded about their speech. However, many older folk become freer in their speech; for example, my Father in his later years would say the strangest things, causing listeners either to join in happily in the bizarreness or chide him for saying something eccentric.
“We’ve got to appreciate the moment, live now and at the same time recall the past – that’s poetry! The great poets taught us how to think.”
Thomas Perls, an expert on ageing, said, “Centenarians disprove the perception that the older you get, the sicker you get. They teach us that the older you get, the healthier you’ve been.” Recent research on dementia shows that there’s a reduction world-wide as people lead better lives and look after their health. Further, in July, 2015 research was published by Otago University about different rates of ageing among young people, the first of its kind. Researchers followed 1000 people born in 1974, recording their state of mental and physical health at the ages of 26, 32 and 38. They found quite large differences in the rates of ageing of people unrelated to their actual years. Clearly nature gives some people a short life and some such as Thelma an inordinately long life, over 20 years above the average life expectancy for women. An increasing number of those ancients also have a good quality of life.
These days it is not uncommon to live till well over 80, and people generally expect and hope for that. Then there’s seriously old, over 90, where we’d wish to feel at least healthy and certainly in possession of our faculties. Now there’s another group, one that’s increasing in number, the over-100s. How do you get to be seriously old and comfortable? How do people get into their 11th decade? You can do all the right things and flop off the perch at 50. You can do all the wrong things and still get into your 90s.
I heard recently about a Spanish vintner, Antonio Garcia, who imbibed four bottles of red wine a day, albeit with food at lunchtime and dinnertime. However, for most people 30 units a day would be life threatening; for the old wine-maker it was life enhancing because he managed to live to 107. He was probably also a winner in life’s genetic lottery. Owning a vineyard would have given him easy access to the vino, but the lifestyle would have been a big factor: hard work, fresh air and probably less stress; a social network and good local market food – all constants in communities of the long-lived in Okinawa, Sardinia, Greece and other places with many ancients. Factors that they all have in common are close social ties, keeping active, eating healthy food and drinking wine, which would contribute to joie de vivre.
“I hope you’re not writing this for all over New Zealand to see … a kind of memoir? Thelma Mildred McLean! – My brothers called me Milly; I hated that!”
In this book there’s no great revelation about Thelma’s longevity, except what comes across in the interesting stories she tells about her life, spoken with vitality. She knows that she has been granted a long life, and is grateful she still feels well and comfortable. She is able to go for daily walks, does a crossword every morning, notices things going on around her, and makes lucid, witty comments. She reads, plays cards, enjoys visitors, converses easily … especially when her hearing aid is in place! I’ve heard that a contributor to longevity is not having to deal with the stresses and strains of life because a person has had the good fortune of others taking care of humdrum things. An example of this is the world’s oldest person – Jeanne Calment was 122 when she died, never having to work, living a life of leisure. (See “Jeanne Calment” in Notes). If one aspect of Thelma’s life contributed to her longevity perhaps it was that she’s had a good life and been well looked after – there were three older brothers. Thelma’s daughter said, “She’s never had to mow the lawns, that kind of thing. There was always a maid or helper.”
However attractive it may be to think there’s a way to living long, in the end it’s most likely in the genes, in your stars, the luck of the draw – no major right or wrong way to stretch out your life. We may come “trailing clouds of glory” with an allocated amount of energy and use it up at different rates. Perhaps it’s to do with joie de vivre, having a spirited and joyous attitude to life, leading a good life. That would certainly be Thelma.
In New Zealand as of 2011, there were between 400 and 500 centenarians – in early 2016, three of them were in Winara Resthome in Waikanae (the oldest is 102); three in Parklands, Waikanae (the oldest, 103), and three 99-year-olds at Seven Oaks in Paraparaumu, may turn one hundred this year. In May, 2016, Thelma will join a much smaller group aged over 105 – there are fewer than 40 in New Zealand.
On life
I wonder if we can ever get used to the ending of the natural life of family members or friends – not easy if connections are deep and we have just a couple of close relatives. Thelma has survived all her ten siblings. She would say, “Bill is no longer with us … at least, I think not. Oh, certainly not, he was older than me.” It’s great to find a personal strength to adapt and carry on. Funerals are tough though, unless like my Father, you can enjoy them. He was an old farmer from the rolling hills south of Edinburgh, Thelma’s contemporary, but he departed this world almost 30 years ago. At funerals he loved meeting old friends over glasses of whisky. He would arrive home and say, “Now, that was a grand funeral!”
Rae Dobson, Thelma’s oldest daughter, is almost 80. Rae visits Thelma three or four times a week, making sure that she’s well looked after and has all the essentials such as crackers, cheese and a cask of Country Medium white wine for her substantial mealtime glass. Rae told me that it was wonderful for her mother to have a conversation with someone different, to take her out of herself. It has been my privilege to share poems with her.
“Your visits make me sparkle.”
Thelma herself said about being very old: “I’m very lucky; I can eat and I have few physical problems. I had a sensible Mother, you see, she fed us well. I don’t remember yesterday but I pretend that I do; it’s my way of coping. We get by in that fashion; we can moan away but it does no good – people listen to me but it’s in one ear out the other. I’m over 100 I know because I was born in 1911 and I remember seeing the soldiers go off to war in 1914.”
Perhaps living a long life has no secrets, no special conditions, no magic modus operandi, but in talking with Thelma, there is one thing I have noticed – a spirit, an enjoyment of life, a desire to keep going. In addition, in Thelma’s case, there’s a huge appreciation of poetry and people. In fact, at the time of writing this, only a few weeks before her 105th birthday, the pleasure she derives from poetry and doing the daily crossword is as deep as ever.
Graham Bathgate, May, 2016
“Come again soon, won’t you? And remember to drive on the right side … I should say the left side.
“What are you writing there? It’s not for the newspaper, I hope, or my obituary!”