Member-only story
There is No Road Map
One senior’s search for a way forward
I’m living in a five-story, 21-person house — a community, a sort of commune in the middle of Boston and though my bathroom (which I share with four others), has not been updated since the 1970s, I am connected, contented, comfortable here — as much as I can be with my anxious genes and my hyperactive mind, which is focused on what comes next.
There is no road map.
For where I go, what I do, and where I will live next. I’m living with a two-year limit; most of my housemates are twenty and thirty-somethings in graduate school, their lives stretched out before them, waiting to be revealed.
There is no road map.
My two years at the House now reduced to one — barely, certainly, almost definitely not enough time for this sixty-plus Senior to figure out what he is doing next.
There is no road map.
No partner, boyfriend, or significant other. At 65, I have no career, mission, higher calling, or belief in a higher power that will show me the way home.
There is no road map.
No Triptik from Triple-A to guide me to my destination: retirement home, Senior housing, 55+ community, tent on the beach…