THE OLD AND FAMILIAR

Watching my nonagenarian mother lose most of the people she has known intimately has humbled me and made me think seriously about what is considered old and familiar and how it affects all aspects of our lives.

Familiar people and things are less threatening and reduce the amount of effort put in interpreting things in our surroundings. Naturally, mere exposure to people and things endows us with familiarity which itself makes us comfortable.

By observing my mother, myself , my eldest son , our thirty year old helper, and my grandchild who has just turned three years old, I would say that the old and familiar may have a few constant elements like family but as one grows and gets exposed to different people, things and products, the strength of the sense of familiarity becomes  variable. Exposure affects our choices, attitudes and behaviour.

At ninety-three, my mother still clings to the old and familiar.  Inevitably, she has lost most of her relatives, peers and friends. She is very much aware that she could be the next one in the firing line. She has never come to terms with the death of two of her children including the youngest.

Her eyes light up and she speaks with an excited tone when she is in the company of her children, grandchildren and some people she has known for a long time, irrespective of their age. At that moment in time, she is less tense and can crack a few jokes and laugh heartily. When unfamiliar faces surround her, she becomes agitated and at times she just withdraws into her shell.

The passage of time and the technology wave of the time has made the familiar unfamiliar to her.

 In a world transformed in many ways including traditional things like how people dress at weddings and the huge entourages at the Introduction ceremonies, she cannot understand how a groom in a suit wears trainers at his wedding!

“What happened to a fine and soft pair of leather shoes?’’ she keeps asking.

Three months ago, the helper who had lived with us for four years left us to try her hand at self-employment. The cost of her four children’s school requirements had gone through the roof.

The new one, almost thirty, has two children whom she has entrusted to her mother. She comes from a rural area in the central region of Uganda about 150 kilometres west of the capital city. She could not go beyond primary seven after the loss of her father. Her prospects were capped by an unintended teenage pregnancy.

For her, the old and familiar was growing staple foods in her mother’s small garden, collecting water from the village well, using a kerosene lantern for light at night. In her small village, everyone knows everyone and almost every adult has a basic phone.

She found herself in a gated big house with her own room, drawing water from a tap and using a flushing toilet, using electricity for lighting while cooking on a gas cooker. 

She was utterly overwhelmed by the new people, the routine and use of domestic utensils like an electric kettle and microwave.

My mother initially considered her too young to take good care of her.

Three months down the line, spending time with each other has opened them up.  The helper has shown genuine interest in my mother as a grandmother. I would say that one familiar thing that has significantly joined them together is their Catholic faith. They pray together and listen to radio programmes on Radio Maria on my mother’s old radio. On Sundays, they are both glued to the TV for the 10 am Lubaga Cathedral church service. Gradually, my mother trusts her enough to do more things for her; she tells her of her complaints and the helper is patient with her. A great affinity has developed between the two. Mama is less stressed and easier to handle. The parish priest outreach prayer committee arranges with the helper when to visit them.

“Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.’’ Stephen Hawking

I for one, a senior citizen, I am forced by circumstances to sober up fast.  Since the COVID-19 pandemic, familiar faces are disappearing at a rapid rate.  My friendship circle is shrinking fast!

Things that I used to take for granted like time, are now limited and very precious to me.

Sometimes I find it necessary to recreate the good times by gathering childhood friends for a glass of wine to reminisce about the past, laughing at all the crazy things we used to do.

At the same time, I have to learn fast as new technology disrupts old ways of doing things including computer systems programmed to learn and work as humans – Artificial Intelligence.

In a noisy and busy world, the familiar is quickly disappearing as technology runs most aspects of our lives and keeps changing. Staying closer to earth has become a challenge.

“To master a new technology, you have to play with it.’’ – Jordan Peterson

My eldest son is in his early forties, a millennial, and cannot imagine a world without the Internet and computers. The internet shrunk the world into a global village and made it highly competitive.

  “ Man cannot discover new oceans until he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.’’- Andrew Gide.

 In this fast-paced global village; things are changing rapidly by new advances in science and technology, keeping his generation vigilant. In today’s workplaces, there are apparently no more permanent jobs!

To remain relevant and useful in this highly connected world, he has to keep exposing himself to new skills, knowledge, new experiences and connect with diverse people to become more open-minded.  To his generation, sticking to the old and familiar is a disadvantage. The high rate of unemployment in the country demands that he keeps improving himself to increase his chances of employment either in the public or private sector. His generation and those following them have almost all that they need to function on a smartphone or laptop. This instant-solution- generation is living in the online world. An environment of this nature results in daily stress and inevitable challenges that affect their overall health.

 The psychologists advise these young generations to stay grounded in reality by cultivating these basic essential soft skills:

• Self-awareness- having a firm sense of self, being centred and connected to the present. Aware of your thoughts and emotions and physical sensations without being carried away by them.
• Emotional resilience-having a resilient emotional state and positive attitude and recovering quickly from negative exposures.
• Having a balanced perspective- grounded in reality. It enables you to remain mentally and emotionally self-aware.

These soft skills enable the youth to approach life with a sense of purpose.

The psychologists also highly recommend that in this fast-paced work environment demanding for high productivity, beating deadlines and achieving great expectations, workers, especially new recruits, have to be helped to develop mental resilience. To enhance their well-being, their mental health has to be addressed and improved. They should be provided with the tools they need to live their best possible lives.

 A supportive environment should be created to enable them to act within their values, maintain healthy boundaries and open up to different perspectives and seek the truth and understanding other than cling to rigid beliefs.

For my three-year- old granddaughter, the old and familiar simply means her mother’s warmth and smell: Kangaroo pouch-like, her mother’s voice and a ride on top of her father’s shoulders and her laughter as he bathes her. Interestingly, the digital technology craze is slowly creeping into her life through her toys, children’s online games and both her parents’ smartphones and laptops. The exposure keeps growing by the day!

 As we go through life, change is all around us. In this 21^st century driven by science and technology, learning to adapt to changes is key to our overall well- being. It requires creativity, teamwork, time management and adaptability. No wonder my mother’s and my own “old and familiar’’ is slowly fading into the unfamiliar!

“ Good, bad or indifferent, if you are not investing in new technology , you are going to be left behind.’’- Phillip Green

“ Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.’’– Anais Nin“

QUESTION:

Do you realise that we all find comfort in the familiar and that mere exposure makes things familiar and that familiarity impacts our decision-making process?