Morrie Markoff didn’t reply immediately after I emailed him lately, which made me fear a bit. So, I reached out to his son, Steve Markoff, who reassured me that his father was high-quality.
And about to rejoice his 109th birthday.
“He’s wonderful,” Steve mentioned. “He watches CNN, and we discuss politics. He has a stable grasp of what’s going on.”
I met Morrie a decade in the past, when he despatched an electronic mail inviting me to have a cup of espresso with him on the L.A. Division of Water and Energy cafeteria throughout the road from his downtown condominium. Since then, we’ve stayed in contact and he’s been busy.
At 100, the retired machinist and equipment repairman had his first artwork present when a gallery proprietor found his assortment of scrap steel sculpture. At 103, he completed a memoir titled “Maintain Respiratory,” his reply to anybody who requested him the key to a protracted life.
Morrie is a shot of inspiration for me, and for anybody who needs to consider it’s doable to maintain pushing again towards the inevitable. However on the similar time, I don’t know if I’d have the braveness or need to final into triple digits. The privilege of growing older doesn’t come with out compromise and loss, and I doubt I’d be superb at both.
California is about to be hit by an growing older inhabitants wave, and Steve Lopez is using it. His new column will give attention to the blessings and burdens of advancing age — and the way some of us are difficult the stigma related to older adults.
UCLA psychologist Stephen Sideroff says that because the inhabitants of growing older folks swells, we’d do effectively to contemplate how we reside along with how lengthy we reside.
“We don’t need to merely lengthen outdated age if it means extra years of incapacity and dementia,” Sideroff mentioned. “Growing one’s well being span, not like life span, means staying wholesome and functioning … so long as doable, and lowering the time on the finish of life the place you might be disabled in a method or one other.”
Morrie is blessedly beating the chances, nonetheless comparatively wholesome and sharp. However the man who used to get pleasure from world journey and touring Los Angeles, by bus and on foot, has bodily limitations now. He’s misplaced a lot of his listening to and has round -the-clock care from a workforce of aides.
Steve, who’s approaching 80, and his sister Judith Hansen, 81, watch their father flip the pages of yet one more calendar and discover themselves reflecting on their very own longevity, high quality of life, and the prices of rising outdated.
“While you see somebody you already know and love getting outdated, and also you see what’s occurring to them, that opens up discussions I’m having with folks my age and older,” Steve mentioned. His personal short-term reminiscence isn’t what it was, Steve advised me, and he’s coping with prostate well being points, like so many males his age.
Even for individuals who reside a healthful life-style, luck is essential and decline is assured as you age, and Steve finds himself reflecting on the nonnegotiable nature of mortality.
“An necessary matter everybody needs to shove underneath the rug is the price of retaining any person alive,” he mentioned. “And do they actually need to reside?”
Morrie actually does, and fortunately he saved and invested effectively, and an inheritance helped pad the retirement fund. That’s a great factor as a result of his in-home care prices roughly $14,000 a month, Judy mentioned. At that worth, most retirees gained’t find the money for to get them to 89, not to mention 109. So the place will they go, and who will take care of them?
“There are such a lot of elements to this complete factor of getting outdated,” mentioned Judith, who lives in Seattle. “I don’t need to need to rely on somebody 24/7. What I would like is a few type of group residing … the place everyone seems to be related someway.” ”
Steve, who lives on the Westside and visits his father as soon as per week, has an identical view.
“Do I need to reside like Dad, who’s sort of trapped in his condominium? I don’t know,” he mentioned. “I’d quite be in a spot the place a bunch of different persons are residing, though a variety of them can be dying day by day.”
Morrie used to reside in a nursing facility in Silver Lake, alongside together with his spouse, Betty, who died in September of 2019 on the age of 103. Then got here COVID, and Steve and Judith pulled Morrie out when the virus tore by way of the power, killing plenty of residents.
However Morrie, a New York native, simply retains adapting to vary, and even embracing it. The world, in all its insanity and glory, fascinates and infuriates him, simply because it all the time has. He will get up within the morning and reads the L.A. Instances, and later within the day he watches the information on tv.
“He’s considering on a regular basis,” Judith mentioned.
And infrequently writing down no matter pops into his head. A few years in the past, after I advised Morrie I used to be writing a ebook about growing older and retirement and requested for his ideas, he mentioned he’d choose to reply by letter. Not lengthy thereafter, a fats envelope arrived at my home. Inside I discovered three separate, folded handwritten letters answering my questions.
“He has this intense curiosity about every part, and to me, that’s what retains him going,” Steve mentioned.
Throughout Steve’s weekly visits, the routine was for Morrie handy over his writings and Steve would have them typed up and added to Morrie’s weblog, which coated every part from a fond reminiscence of a favourite waitress at Canter’s Deli to a withering indictment of Vladimir Putin. A former caretaker as soon as advised me Morrie was up in the course of the evening, writing concerning the George Floyd homicide.
“At some point I picked up 42 handwritten telephone book from the earlier seven days,” Steve mentioned. “In handwriting you might truly learn.”
Steve famous that Morrie is writing much less typically of late, and he’s a bit involved about that. However after I dropped by Morrie’s 109th birthday celebration on Jan. 11, he appeared just about just like the man I had final seen at his 108th birthday celebration.
Morrie wears headphones, and I spoke right into a microphone so he might hear me. I congratulated him and we caught up on mutual mates — this and that. He took my hand in his — it was a great stable squeeze — and launched me to his caretaker, Rosario “Charito” Reyes.
“His degree of dealing with frustration within the face of life occasions is gigantic,” Reyes mentioned. “He enjoys each breath.”
Steve and his spouse, Jadwiga, had been on the social gathering , together with Morrie’s granddaughter Ellen and grandson Chris. The household held up gold balloons within the form of a 1, 0 and 9. They posed for footage with the blue-eyed birthday boy, who smiled and gave a thumbs up.
Earlier than he’d completed his lunch, Morrie wished to get to the primary occasion. Reyes helped him seize maintain of his walker, and Morrie had the gang fall behind him in a conga line. He circled the desk counting out the rhythm — one, two, three, with a kick of the left foot. One, two, three, with a kick of the fitting foot.
Steve later advised me his father will not be inclined towards philosophical conversations about growing older. He’s extra snug sprucing a reminiscence, providing an unvarnished opinion on the information of the day, or penning a poem to Betty as if to show that absence really does make the guts develop fonder.
I took a spin by way of Morrie’s latest weblog posts and located each a celebration of life and a nod to mortality. After he’s departed, he says in a single, “Don’t cry for me. I’ve had a full life.” In one other he says, “I hope within the subsequent life I’ve the identical household.”
Final August, he wrote this:
“As a sensible, man, I do know on the age of this writing, 108, I don’t have far to go.
“Like Betty, I hope to depart this world with a smile on my face.
“My daughter Judy says, ‘Dad, you’ve lived some life.’
“I certain have.
“Prefer it or not.
“I’ll go away footprints within the shifting sands of time.
“Tens of millions have finished so earlier than me.
“Good luck.
“Morrie.”
