This is 59: Mary Elizabeth Williams Responds to The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire
"I grew up in a home with grandparents, raised as an only child, so part of me has been an old woman my whole life. Now I just look more the part."
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.”
Sometimes you’ll find responses from writers, musicians, and artists you’ve heard of—like Kate Pierson, Neko Case, Rosie O’Donnell, Ava Duvernay, Jerry Saltz, Lucy Sante, Ricki Lake, Hilma Wolitzer, Elizabeth Gilbert, Judith Viorst, Cheryl Strayed, Deesha Philyaw, Chloe Caldwell, etc.—but more often it will be people (of all ages) you haven’t heard of, Humans of New York-style. (Check out all the Oldster interviews…)
Here, author, podcaster, and doctoral student Mary Elizabeth Williams responds. -Sari Botton
PS If you’re enjoying the work I do here at Oldster, please consider supporting it by becoming a paid subscriber. 🙏
P.S. A reminder that as far as I’m concerned, everyone who is alive and aging is considered an Oldster, and that every contributor to this magazine is the oldest they have ever been, which is interesting new territory for them—and interesting to me, the 60-year-old who publishes Oldster. Also, I’m trying to foster intergenerational conversations in which elders learn what it’s like to be younger, and younger people learn from elders what it’s like to be older.
When you see a piece featuring someone younger than you, try to remember when you were that age and how monumental it felt. Bring some curiosity to reading about how the person being featured is experiencing that age. Or, if you prefer, wait for the next piece featuring someone in your age group. In the last few weeks alone, I’ve published pieces by people in their 60s, 70s, and 80s. Not every piece will speak to every reader. I’m doing my best to cover a lot of ground and be inclusive. Please work with me! Thank you. 🙏 - Sari Botton.
Mary Elizabeth Williams is an award-winning journalist and the author of two memoirs, Gimme Shelter and A Series of Catastrophes & Miracles. In 2022, her New York Times Modern Love column was adapted for Amazon Prime. A stage 4 cancer survivor and one of the first people in the world to participate in a groundbreaking immunotherapy clinical trial, she now serves of multiple patient advisory boards and consults and speaks on access, equity, and healthcare. She’s currently a doctoral candidate of medical humanities at Drew University and a postgraduate student in conflict resolution at Strathclyde University Glasgow. Her substack and podcast are called Patient. (Ed. note: She interviewed me recently!)
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How old are you?
59.
Is there another age you associate with yourself in your mind? If so, what is it? And why, do you think?
Lately I feel very much my 21 and 35 year-old selves walking beside me. Those were, like this one, ages of great uncertainty and great possibility. When I was 21, I was leaving college and genuinely didn’t know how I was going to create a life that was for the first time not just student/daughter. But I was also excited because that was so freeing. At 35, I had two young children, was dreaming up my first book, and felt like I could really call myself a writer. There’s so much power in these cataclysmic life eras, if you don’t let yourself get too Sylvia Plath under a fig tree about it.
I like that I know what I’m good at and I can own it without downplaying myself and my achievements. At the same time, I’m humbled enough by time and experience to know I don’t have all the answers. Both things are incredibly joyful.
Do you feel old for your age? Young for your age? Just right? Are you in step with your peers?
Um, yes to all of it? I’m a city dweller. I walk everywhere, I have access to good food and good healthcare. I have strong social ties and I’m a university student. These things help keep a person biologically youthful. But I also grew up in a home with grandparents, raised as an only child, so part of me has been an old woman my whole life. Now I just look more the part. My daughters tell me I’m very millennial in spirit, but that might be a Gen Z dis.
What do you like about being your age?
I believe that women have as many eggs as we have fucks to give. At a certain point, we’re all out of both, and it’s glorious. I notice that people still have as many opinions about what I should do and how I should live as they did when I was 25, but now I’m like, what’s missing in your life that you’re so invested in mine?
I also like that I know what I’m good at and I can own it without downplaying myself and my achievements. At the same time, I’m humbled enough by time and experience to know I don’t have all the answers. Both things are incredibly joyful.
What is difficult about being your age?
I was laid off earlier this year, and as a female in her 50s, I’m confident I’ll never get another media job. I’m afraid I’ll never get another job, period. The financial precarity, especially within our American healthcare and Social Security system, is terrifying. I easily could have another 25 years of life left; what will they look like? Will I be able to pay my mortgage? Can I afford to get sick again? Unemployment hits very differently at this age.
What is surprising about being your age, or different from what you expected, based on what you were told?
I think women are expected to want to do everything they can to remain as fuckable-appearing as possible for as long as possible. I’m as vulnerable to the beauty industry as anyone, but I have also been pleasantly surprised by my increasing immunity to the male gaze. I know older women sometimes speak of becoming “invisible.” I don’t feel invisible at all. I’m louder and brighter than ever. I’m just less conventionally attractive, and that makes me less valuable in a sexist, capitalist society. I don’t like that it can have an impact on my income, but it doesn’t at all affect my self-worth.
A few years ago there was this male writer who seemed to always have a negative comment about everything I did. I was finally like, oh, is this because I’m not 30 and I’m not writing about things a 30 year-old man cares about? It was like a lightbulb moment—I can either try to appeal to this type of audience that I’m further every from every day, or not give a shit. Turns out it’s surprisingly easy to not give a shit what 30 year-old men think of you.
I believe that women have as many eggs as we have fucks to give. At a certain point, we’re all out of both, and it’s glorious. I notice that people still have as many opinions about what I should do and how I should live as they did when I was 25, but now I’m like, what’s missing in your life that you’re so invested in mine?
What has aging given you? Taken away from you?
It’s given me history, personal and global. I’ve lived through things now. Survived them. There’s absolutely no substitute for lived experience, for the knowledge and perspective it brings. It’s valuable.
What it’s taken ugh, is my memory! I used to have easy access to everything I’d ever learned or done; now I have to root around in the junk drawer of my mind. What was the name of that guy I dated? When was the battle of Clontarf? Learning new things and remembering old ones is just harder now. I miss my mental dexterity. Wait, is that the right word?
How has getting older affected your sense of yourself, or your identity?
Going around in an aging body is a trip. Running is harder. Learning is harder. I have to wear my glasses most of the time, so now I don’t feel like I look like myself without them. And yet I still see my goofy, hopeful 6-year-old self in everything I am today. I would miss her if I’d lost her.
Two years ago I learned I had a sister who’d been given up for adoption and died in 2014. I wrote about it for Salon. That’s been biggest identity shift of my older life. Even though I didn’t get to be a sister, I still had a sister. There was someone out there who had the same mother and father I did. Even before I had kids, I could imagine my kids. I never imagined my sister. Now I think about her and grieve her every day.
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?
Okay, so I wouldn’t say I “missed” menopause, but I got to skip the line because of the cancer. It was strange in the midst of everything else to confront the end of my fertility like that. I sometimes feel that because I was busy trying not to die, I didn’t really reckon with that life transition. I think about it more now that so many of my friends are still in it.
What has been your favorite age so far, and why? Would you go back to this age if you could?
Thirty was pretty beautiful in many ways, but I wouldn’t want to go back to a time without my daughters. Forty, before the cancer and my friends started dying, was nice. But even though I’d like to have an income and my old ass back, honestly I’m fine where I am. I’m old enough to be unbothered by so much of the small stuff, and young enough to still climb up big Scottish hills.
I was laid off earlier this year, and as a female in her 50s, I’m confident I’ll never get another media job. I’m afraid I’ll never get another job, period. The financial precarity, especially within our American healthcare and Social Security system, is terrifying. I easily could have another 25 years of life left; what will they look like? Will I be able to pay my mortgage? Can I afford to get sick again? Unemployment hits very differently at this age.
Is there someone who is older than you, who makes growing older inspiring to you? Who is your aging idol and why?
Mel Brooks! He fought Nazis in World War II and then he made a comedy about Nazis! And he’s still out there making people laugh. His resilience and talent and humor are my inspiration. (As, according to my daughters, spiritually a millennial, #GOALS.) When you have a serious life and choose laughter, that’s the most badass thing. And Jane Goodall. She chose an unconventional life when the options for women were much more limited.
Henri Matisse is my biggest aging idol. When he began to face intense pain and diminishing eyesight, he started doing his cut-out work, “drawing with scissors.” Some of his most acclaimed masterpieces are the product of his limitations. He did “Memory of Oceania” when he was disabled and in his eighties. Every time I visit it, I’m like, pick yourself up, loser. Go do beautiful things.
What aging-related adjustments have you recently made, style-wise, beauty-wise, health-wise?
Well, I guess I’m in my comfortable shoes phase of life, because I’m also in my osteoporosis stage of life (thanks for that too, cancer!). I have more than once broken bones just … walking around. The amount of thought I have to give to wet leaves and stairs and cobblestones is ridiculous.
When you’re 20, you can wear a garbage bag and look great. Now, when I see kooky older ladies rocking their Iris Apfel vibes, I’m like, yes, lean in. I’m more committed than ever to not being caught dead in beige. Shit, I guess I really am becoming that purple-wearing old woman you’ve been warned about.
I’m as vulnerable to the beauty industry as anyone, but I have also been pleasantly surprised by my increasing immunity to the male gaze. I know older women sometimes speak of becoming “invisible.” I don’t feel invisible at all. I’m louder and brighter than ever. I’m just less conventionally attractive, and that makes me less valuable in a sexist, capitalist society. I don’t like that it can have an impact on my income, but it doesn’t at all affect my self-worth.
What’s an aging-related adjustment you refuse to make, and why?
I started going gray in my early twenties and I have been coloring my hair forever. Even though it’s not the fire engine shade of my youth now, the red is such a huge part of my identity and my personality, I can’t yet imagine letting it go.
What turn of events had the biggest impact on your life? What took your life in a different direction, for better or worse?
Having metastatic cancer was a pretty big kick in the pants, of course. Realizing that all my somedays might never arrive, going from being a healthy and fit person to a sick one. But more than that, it’s when my older daughter almost died of a common infection when she was 16.
We know our parents are going to die. We acknowledge that we are too. But we don’t, and can’t, think about it with our kids. It genuinely altered my brain chemistry. I’ve struggled with anxiety ever since, and it’s just part of who I am now.
What is your number one regret in life? If you could do it all over again, what is the biggest thing you’d do differently?
I really resonate with George Saunders’s line about failures of kindness—“Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded . . . sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.” That’s it. That’s always it.
I want to be brave enough to step up. I want to be brave enough to be gentle and compassionate, and when I think of the times I avoided someone else’s pain because I didn’t know how to handle it, I regret it. And when I think of the times I wrote something snarky and trite for the clicks, I’m mortified. So if I had to do it again I’d definitely tell more editors to kiss my ass.
I’ll tell you what I don’t regret—every minute flat on my back somewhere looking at the sky. Taking a walk before dinner to clear my head. Sitting in a coffee shop with a friend for hours. Every time someone had a couch I could sleep on in a faraway place and I booked a flight. I get that I’m not in my fire in the belly years so the perspective is different. But the little things in service of myself and my time are what make the memories that matter, not the trying to get to the top of a heap I realize I didn’t even want to be on. Remember, “productivity” is just capitalism-generated bullshit!
Two years ago I learned I had a sister who’d been given up for adoption and died in 2014. That’s been biggest identity shift of my older life. Even though I didn’t get to be a sister, I still had a sister. There was someone out there who had the same mother and father I did. Even before I had kids, I could imagine my kids. I never imagined my sister. Now I think about her and grieve her every day.
What is high up on your “bucket list?” What do you hope to achieve, attain, or plain enjoy before you die?
“Dr. Williams.” That’s the big one. Writing a dissertation is hard, though! I want to see so much more of the world and have more adventures of all forms. I want to learn a lot more things. Mary Oliver’s instructions to “Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.” seem like a good template.
Mostly I want to live in a manner that enables people to say, “She helped.”
Is there a piece of advice you were given, that you live by? If so, what was it, and who offered it to you?
Maya Angelou’s “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time” is one I wish I’d learned earlier. And very early in my online life, the mod of a group I was going through some drama with told me, “Maybe you should turn off your computer now.” It’s harder today when the computer is always in your pocket, but oh yeah, that’s a good one. That glowing brick of despair is not the only real thing in our lives, nor should it be. And we can actually disengage any time we want.
What are your plans for your body when you’re done using it? Burial? Cremation? Body Farm? Other?
My doctor’s got dibs. I was lucky enough to be part of an incredible scientific breakthrough, and anything I can do to be of service, even after I go, I’m going to do.
Okay, so I wouldn’t say I “missed” menopause, but I got to skip the line because of the cancer. It was strange in the midst of everything else to confront the end of my fertility like that. I sometimes feel that because I was busy trying not to die, I didn’t really reckon with that life transition. I think about it more now that so many of my friends are still in it.
How do you feel about dying? And what do you expect to happen to your “soul” or “spirit” after you die?
When I actually was dying, I remember looking up at the stars one night from the Jersey turnpike and feeling very peaceful at the idea that I came from those stars, and one day I’ll go back to them. I think our energy doesn’t entirely die or disappear, but it does get transformed. Every molecule in our bodies is eternal. That’s pretty fucking dope when you think about it.
Death is the easy part, it’s the dying that concerns me. I hope to achieve it with as much dignity and autonomy as possible.
What’s your philosophy on celebrating birthdays as an adult? How do you celebrate yours?
I believe in any excuse for celebration, but I’m not a traditional, have to have a cake or presents person. The past two years were pretty amazing because a friend who’s a yoga instruction leads these beautiful trips my birthday week. So two years ago I was standing under the northern lights in Iceland, and last year I was in Panama. I’ve just started school in Scotland so I don’t have a big friend group or big plans here, but for the next one I might force myself on my friends in Paris.
The worrying about how we're going to get through the next 25 years and can we afford to get sick again is real. Luckily I'm so poor I don't have to worry about a mortgage. I'll tell you what, though, it's the older women with nothing left to lose that worry the Patriarchy: they were the "witches" in the past, requiring a femicide in order for Capitalism to take hold. I wonder if we can coalesce into a real threat again, and this time, win.
I enjoy all of these interviews, but only rarely do I see something like my own sensibility so wholly on the screen. In other words, I LOVE HER and would like to be her friend.