When I was little, I used to eat bologna, cheese, and mayonnaise sandwiches. So maybe that’s why I think of bologna when I hear talk about the sandwich generation – these middle-aged years where you care for children and aging parents. I suppose bologna is a good-enough metaphor considering the spectrum of variables that make up this stage of life – a little bit of meat mixed with more mystery than an Agatha Christie novel. Meaty, because raising children and honoring the parents who raised you is a chance to simultaneously pay it forward while also paying it back. The mystery varies from whether today’s jack-in-the-box will mean a pop-in visit to the ER with a parent or a pivotal conversation about college plans with a child.
The middle years involve wearing so many hats that you have no idea when the dull silvery thatches of gray hair sprouted. You only know you don’t have time to do anything about it and hope that everyone else’s vision has gone as bad as yours, so that the wiry threads will be mistaken for some hip new hair trend. There are days when I feel more like a parent to my parents and other days when I’m reminded that my children’s increasing independence was always the goal, even if it feels counterintuitive to maternal instincts that want to hold tight. There are no more trips to the zoo to ogle the long necks of the giraffe or marvel at the colorful beak of the Toucan like when they were younger. While they inevitably spread their wings, I reimagine my own nest. What do I want from these years between parenting and parental caregiving? These years that feel like a maybe, a chance to begin adulthood again – this time wiser, more merciful, and without the bulleted list of things to acquire or achieve. The middle years are another chance to ask myself what I want to be when I grow up, and hope my answer is even more fantastical than whatever I imagined as a child.
There’s a sweetness to these years that is nothing like bologna. I’m privy to the spectrum of life’s stages and can see more clearly how oblivious time is to our idiosyncrasies; our fixation on the past; our big plans for the future. We can mourn it, endure it, or celebrate it. Either way, time marches on. Its indifference is both maddening and liberating. Yet, sandwiched between two generations, I can see firsthand that I can’t afford to waste time with meaningless pursuits. Aging and death may be inevitable. Life may be full of challenges and have an unavoidable amount of suffering, but it has a miraculous quality. Forgiving, healing, and practicing mercy towards others transforms our hardships into something surprisingly beautiful. The human heart’s resilience to life’s challenges epitomizes hope and encourages compassion. This encouragement was passed to me and others in my life stage from a generation that is now struggling with life’s physical limitations. It’s the same encouragement we can offer to a younger generation by our example of care for the elderly.