I have just finished screening purposals for the Purpose Prize, a cash award to be given by the terrific organization called Civic Ventures that promotes civic engagement on the part of people over fifty. The entries I saw were all impressive and I wish they all could win, but what really struck me was the theme that was taken up by several of them – the growing care-giving crisis in our society, which is particularly accute among women in their Second Adulthood. Many have given up everything – relationships, jobs, freedom – to care for ailing parents or spouse; many are in financial straights because the tax structure is oblivious to the value of their labor.
One group raises money to send caregivers on a vacation and hire replacements for them for the week they are away; another is lobbying for care-giver tax credits and another is trying to build a national support community for those generous, overburdened souls.
I wrote in in Inventing the Rest of Our Lives about how important it is at this stage of life to, as Gloria Steinem has recently put it, “do unto yourself as you have been doing unto others.” The demands of caring for a dependent relative are a real challenge to that imperative. I also wrote about the need that many of us feel to stay engaged in public life and the fact that as we become more outspoken we can put our big mouths to the service of making change. We really have to step up to the plate on this one, especially since the women like us who are drowning can’t speak for themselves.
P.S. On another (happier) subject, I am quoted in a very interesting article in the May/June issue of the AARP Magazine called “The Secret Lives of Single Women.” It reports on a survey of 2500 women, many of whom are enjoying being single, having sex, and discovering all kinds of things about themselves.