This is 51: Jacinta Bunnell Responds to The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire
"I think that ideally a layer of uncertainty washes away with each decade."
From the time I was 10, I’ve been obsessed with what it means to grow older. I’m curious about what it means to others, of all ages, and so I invite them to take “The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire.”
Here, multimedia artist and writer and LATCHKEY TOWNSHIP newslettererjacinta bunnell (she/sir) responds.-Sari Botton
jacinta bunnell (she/sir) is a multimedia artist and writer living in the Hudson Valley. She is the author of Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away with Another Spoon Coloring Book and A More Graceful Shaboom. She started a Substack and self-published the anthology LATCHKEY TOWNSHIP this year. Find her at www.jacintabunnell.com, www.queerbookcommittee.com, and Instagram.
How old are you?
51
Is there another age you associate with yourself in your mind? If so, what is it? And why, do you think?
I often find this peculiar thing happening to me—that I feel the same age as whoever I am spending time with. I have a spinning Wheel of Fortune sensation that I am 10, 30, or 95 on any given day, depending on who is around. I sometimes wonder if others feel this way. I love sincere and deeply connected relationships so much that maybe I am subconsciously trying to become more like whomever I am with in order to cement the bond.
When I was young and living in a small town, we were all friends with kids of every age because there were so few children around in general. My aunt and grandmother were two of my best friends. My siblings were all 5-18 years older than I, making me privy, but also susceptible, to a wide range of age-related frames of reference. I was illegally pool-hopping with vulgar teenagers when I was 8. I was an informed card player with retirees when I was 12. I lived in an intentional community when I was in my 20s where everyone else was over 65. We shared meals and chores, created large-scale educational projects, and hosted visitors from around the world. I think all these experiences made me a malleable “age chameleon.”
Do you feel old for your age? Young for your age? Just right? Are you in step with your peers?
I sometimes feel younger than other people my age, perhaps because I chose to not have children. I think some people get quite rule-driven or more rigid because they want to set a proper example for their children. I know I would do that if I had kids— and even did so when I was a teacher. It is also clearly exhausting to be a parent and seems easy to lose a certain youthfulness if you are not careful. There is something about not having kids that every so often makes me feel like I have been left alone for years to fend for myself—like I can eat popcorn or toast for dinner and no one has a thing to say about it, but I might one day get caught and have to go back to eating broccoli full time.
I was illegally pool-hopping with vulgar teenagers when I was 8. I was an informed card player with retirees when I was 12. I lived in an intentional community when I was in my 20s where everyone else was over 65…I think all these experiences made me a malleable “age chameleon.”
What do you like about being your age?
What I have loved about my 40s and 50s is that I am profoundly more sure of who I am than ever before. People say that all the time, but what does it mean? I think that ideally a layer of uncertainty washes away with each decade. If you have people around you who hold you up and hold you accountable, if you go to therapy, if you acknowledge that life is better if you make mistakes, you become more you and less what someone else thinks you ought to be.
When I was in my 20s and 30s, I had several influential mentors. In the last couple years, I have developed tight relationships with younger people who view me as a mentor. It was a wild thing to wrap my head around at first, to shift from mentee to mentor. But now I have settled into it, accepted it. It feels lovely to pass along some of the insights and shrewdness that keep me steady on a path.
What is difficult about being your age?
No one prepared for me the losses that I would accrue just by the very nature of being alive longer and longer. When I was young, I lost a few pets, a great aunt, and then my father. And then so many years went by with no losses at all—I felt briefly unshackled to grief. When my 40s hit, an avalanche of death suddenly crushed my heart. Most of my best friends' parents died, two surrogate mothers and one of my favorite students died, my best friend’s youngest brother, my favorite neighbor and nearly all my aunts and uncles died. Very recently, one of my sisters died. It really started racking up and I had a shift in awareness that dying isn’t just something you stumble over once in a while. Rather, it is a powerful and solid part of who we are. I saw a bumper sticker the other day that read “I LOVE AGING AND DYING” and I was like, “well, that about sums it up delightfully, doesn't it?”
There is a new feeling I have in my body because I have been temporarily disabled by a chronic illness. Some might describe this as “feeling old”, but I don't directly associate disabling ailments with oldness; I have known and loved children who died from terminal illnesses before reaching their 6th or 16th birthdays. My friend and disability activist Robin Smith once said “We are all temporarily abled.” When parts of our bodies start feeling less able, I know it is not always because of age.
What is surprising about being your age, or different from what you expected, based on what you were told?
I grew up swimming in the adage that surviving difficulties gives you spiritual lessons you would not have learned otherwise. There was also the “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” school of thought around me my whole life. Now that I have done my own study of these recordings, mostly because I was brought to my knees by a brain tumor and complex chronic illness, I have to say I don’t subscribe. What doesn’t kill you simply just does not kill you. I can’t endorse the philosophy that you have to experience trauma, accidents, or illness in order to learn sensational life-changing lessons.
I tried to be spiritual for decades. I have visited with shamans, psychics, medical intuitives, and lamas. I have loved each one of these experiences, the way I tend to be in love with and curious about all of humanity, no matter how you pray or what you believe holds keys to the Universe. I have tried hypnotherapy and meditation. I have owned crystals since middle school. I experimented with praying to some sort of collective energy force. It was all beautiful and oftentimes clarifying to my thoughts. I have wept curled up on the floor using the words “God, please help me.” And after all this, when it came to the physical suffering of a chronic illness, I found what I hungered for most was something tangible. It turns out my spirituality is Practicality and Research, a tenaciousness that gets stuff done, makes calls, takes notes, organizes information, tracks down little known pieces of research, and makes action plans.
There is something about not having kids that every so often makes me feel like I have been left alone for years to fend for myself—like I can eat popcorn or toast for dinner and no one has a thing to say about it, but I might one day get caught and have to back to eating broccoli full time.
What has aging given you? Taken away from you?
I find myself feeling very at home with people decades older than I am. I recently took a painting class in my town. I was the youngest by twenty years. I loved every minute of it.
How has getting older affected your sense of yourself, or your identity?
Hanging out with people in their 80s, 90s, and 100s has been a favorite pastime of mine for decades. The slowing down, the intentionality of conversation and food, the lack of any hamster wheel in sight. This is the space I find myself in now as I am healing from illness. This is what I have learned from being close to oldsters.
I recognize that growing older is a privilege that I wear because I am a white person living in a wealthy country with access to excellent health care, family support, and a strong community. If you have any awareness about poverty, colonialism, racism, and wealth disparity, you must recognize that living a long life is not a prerequisite to being a human being on this Earth.
What are some age-related milestones you are looking forward to? Or ones you “missed,” and might try to reach later, off-schedule, according to our culture and its expectations?
I am pretty excited to one day ask for senior discounts everywhere I go.
What has been your favorite age so far, and why? Would you go back to this age if you could?
I loved being a teenager. I was less scared because I didn’t yet know all the cruelties of the world. I laughed easily every day and was surrounded by friends I cherished. But I don’t feel the need to go back.
Is there someone who is older than you, who makes growing older inspiring to you? Who is your aging idol and why?
My mom and stepdad are role models for aging. They work hard everyday, haul in wood to heat the house, and have a lively group of friends they play cards with. My grandmother lived to be nearly 101 and was one of my greatest role models. She taught me so much just by leading her life the way she did. She centered relationships. I don’t see that very often in the world, not the way she did it. She was always making friends with younger people because all of her peers were dead and she still wanted to be active, go out to lunch, celebrate life, take bike rides, take care of her family, play cards, cook, or go to the beach.
There is a new feeling I have in my body because I have been temporarily disabled by a chronic illness. Some might describe this as “feeling old”, but I don't directly associate disabling ailments with oldness; I have known and loved children who died from terminal illnesses before reaching their 6th or 16th birthdays.
What aging-related adjustments have you recently made, style-wise, beauty-wise, health-wise?
When I was young, my friends and I used to walk to the store, buy pounds of candy, sugar cereal, chips, funnel cake mix, and Dr. Pepper and stay up late feasting. Now my food life is very restricted and I would get extremely sick if I tried that again.
What’s an aging-related adjustment you refuse to make, and why?
I won’t ever dye my graying hair. I pretty much checked out of our culture’s beauty standards a long, long time ago. I love how gorgeous real, white-haired people look. I will never get plastic surgery. I am heavy duty into real bodies.
What’s your philosophy on celebrating birthdays as an adult? How do you celebrate yours?
For a couple years in a row, all I wanted for my birthday was Pizza Hut for a celebratory dinner. Because I eat so wholesome and organic everyday, it felt like such a pleasurable treasure hunt to find the nearest Pizza Hut. Most everyone who finds this out about me is usually shocked because I am basically a CSA poster child.
My family has always celebrated birthdays as the most important days of the year. My mom still makes us our favorite meal and cake of choice. She goes all out in her special way with presents. She loves watching you unwrap anything, so goes to the discount grocery store and country auctions to find unusual assorted treasures. I have become more and more like my mother as I age. I try to carry on her traditions.
BONUS: Listen to jacinta bunnell (she/sir) in conversation with Neko Case:
In Conversation: Neko Case and Jacinta Bunnell
Listen now (36 min) | Readers, here’s a little treat for you: a *recorded conversation between singer-songwriter Neko Case and author/artist Jacinta Bunnell. Here they tell stories and talk about their experiences with getting older; their appreciatio…
Just want to say this was my introduction to Jacinta and what a breath of fresh air she is! After a lifetime of playing by the rules and taking everything, including myself, too seriously, I’m trying on some of her attitudes and loving it. Thanks!
I'm a big Jacinta fan, and loved learning more about her via this interview.
How lucky and wonderful to have grown up in such a connected, loving, multi-generational family - an excellent tree sprouted from that fertile soil.
I also appreciated the fresh perspective on some of the benefits of staying childless by choice, and relate to the concept of one's 50s and hopefully 60s as a time wherein it's possible to make and have rich friendships with people who are both much older and much younger.