7/12/23

 Wednesday, July 12, 2023

In bed at 10, awake at 5:07, and up at 5:25.  63℉, high 70℉, a cloudy day ahead, AQI=23, Good, wind ESE at 6 mph, 2-10 and gusts to 17 mph, rain expected late afternoon.  Sunrise at 5"23, sunset at 8:31, 15+8.

Patio time.  I haven't enjoyed morning patio time for a while.  The weather kept me indoors for some of the days, especially the humidity.  This morning I went out at 7:15 for a half hour or so.  Merlin heard the cardinals, a blue jay, a chickadee, a robin, a house sparrow, a red-bellied woodpecker, a red-winged blackbird, white-breasted nuthatch, a brown-headed cowbird, a grackle, a goldfinch, and, mirabile dictu, a tufted titmouse, rare!  It was a bit chilly out there with more wind than I had expected causing the big windchime to make lovely, soft music.  I was struck, as usual, by the beauty of the ornamental pear tree, even after its snow and wind caused damage, and took a photo of its limbs stretching out.  The white noise from the freeway was soft as was the sound of the cars and trucks passing by on County Line Road, neighbors leaving for work, tradesmen arriving for service calls.  I watched a lone seagull soaring in the cerulean sky under very high, thin, and feathery clouds.  A single chickadee flew back and forth from the pear tree to the platform feeder.  I checked the feeder and found that the sunflower kernels in it had caked from rain or humidity, not good.  After I had been out for a while, I noticed that not only was my hearing more acute, picking up more bird calls and songs, but I could actually smell the greenery.  The fragrance was subtle but unmistakable.  'A poor life this if full of care we have not time to stand (or sit) and stare (and listen).

The Curious Personality Changes of Older Age: When people lose the ability to control their circumstances, their selves sometimes evolve instead.  An article by Faith Hill in today's The Atlantic.

- Psychologists have identified certain major, measurable personality traits called the “Big Five”: agreeableness, conscientiousness, extroversion, openness to experience, and neuroticism. And they can track how those traits increase or decrease in a group over time. To the surprise of many in the field, those kinds of studies are revealing that the strongest personality changes tend to happen before age 30—and after 60. In that phase of later adulthood, people seem to decrease, on average, in openness to experience, conscientiousness, and extraversion—particularly a subcategory of extraversion called “social vitality.” And neuroticism tends to increase, especially closer to the end of one’s life.

- In truth, personality can likely be nudged by our environment and our relationships—our commitments to other people, and their expectations for us—at any age. But before older adulthood, people might commonly be less pressed to change themselves; they can usually change their habits and environments instead. Brent Roberts, a psychology professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, told me that “we construct our world to avoid” personality change. But if you can’t take yourself to the grocery store, much less move to a different city, you might need to adapt. Once you lose control over elements of your life, Bleidorn said, you may alter your personality instead.  Granted, old-age personality changes don’t always result from a sense of helplessness or an endlessly shrinking life. Research has shown that when people get older, they commonly recalibrate their goals; though they might be doing less, they tend to prioritize what they find meaningful and really appreciate it.

- Loneliness—which affects roughly 43 percent of Americans 60 and over—can be a particular challenge for older people who, depending on their health and living situation, may have a hard time mitigating it. Older adults commonly experience friends dying, or have to move farther from friends to enter care facilities or be closer to family; health issues can make socializing physically harder, especially for those who can’t safely drive. 

- There’s a stereotype that older people are grumpy shut-ins—withering away inside while yelling at some kid to get off their lawn. That judgment is obviously sweeping and unfair, but perhaps it’s also emerged, in part, from some real tendencies—tendencies that might be better understood as justified reactions to a harsh and inaccessible world.

. . .

So of course I wonder whether my "personality" has changed now that I am unquestionably "an old man."  The author appears to accept the "Big Five" characteristics as the components of "personality", i.e., that which somehow defines our character and our approach to life.  I don't know that I have changed so much in terms of general 'agreeableness; although I certainly have days when I am pretty testy, 'out of sorts,' or kind of miserable.  Ditto re 'extroversion though I live a semi-reclusive existence.  I"m not sure what 'openness to experience' is but whatever it is, I can't imagine that I have undergone any radical change in it.  I also don't think I am nay more or less concientious than I was earlier in life; if anything, I've become prone to scrupulousness in terms of complicity with all that's wrong in the world and in life,  which does make me wonder about the last trait, neuroticism.  I have become more cynical than I used to be and have a darker view of the world and of the human species.  I have a sense of hopelessness about the future, a deep fear for what my grandchildren will experience in their life.  Maybe that fear is neurotic; I hope so.