Saratoga News Point of View Carl Heintze Patriarchs have no role in current society The other day someone called me a patriarch. I wasn't sure whether this was a compliment or not, so I looked it up in the dictionary. After doing that, I'm still not sure. Webster's defines a patriarch in several ways: as the father and ruler of a family or tribe, as a venerable old man and as a bishop in the early church. Well, I've got a family. In fact, I suppose you could say I founded it (with a little help from my wife, of course), but I certainly don't rule it. I may be old, but I'm not sure I'm venerated by anyone. And I'm certainly not a bishop. I'd always thought that patriarchs were considered wise men, that they sort of sat around and figuratively or literally stroked their beards and when asked uttered words of wisdom to their juniors, family members or whomever. But the dictionary doesn't say anything about patriarchs being wise or learned. Just that they're old. Not that I think I'm very wise or learned, but it would be nice to think that now that I am old, I also might be venerable--and learned. I suppose too often these days we confuse experience with wisdom. You don't necessarily have to be old to be wise, though there more often seem to be wise older men than younger ones. Or perhaps that's a prejudice of the aged. I like to think I've come a long way from, say, when I was 10 and a fat shy kid with glasses who always seemed to be in need of a haircut and who got red 4's in handwriting. (Red 4's were like D's in present-day public school grading, about a half-step above an F.) Today my handwriting isn't much better (but I can type), and I'm still not skinny; I still wear glasses, and a number of people have told me I am still shy. But I do know a lot more things than I did when I was 10. I know, for instance, that the best thing to do with crying babies is either to feed them or walk them, or maybe both. I know that in spite of everything you do, children grow up. I know that bad days usually are succeeded by good ones; that most people are good, though not necessarily always friendly; that owning a house means owning a lot of work, but that it also confers a certain stability to one's life not found in apartments or condominiums. These are all things I've acquired by living a long time. On the other hand, I am not sure that the sum total of all these things makes it possible for me to tell anyone else what to do. I know that when my children have come to me seeking advice on affairs of the heart I've sometimes been wrong. So I've stopped telling anyone who is right for whom. I know that I like women, but I also know I'll never understand them completely. Just when I think that I do, they throw me into confusion. Having at a couple of times in my life been uncertain that it would last very long, I am grateful each morning when I realize it's continuing. So I've come to wonder if living long also means much of anything. In this country we tend not to honor age, but to abhor it. The emphasis is on youth, beauty and speed, not age, ease and veneration of the wrinkled. In other countries--China and Japan, for instance--the elderly have the honored place by the fire; their advice is sought--if maybe not always followed--and they are an obligation the young learn early to assume, not to shirk. Here we like to warehouse the old, to develop Sun Cities, the Villages and Rossmoors, where the old can live together presumably in harmony and where the sight of wrinkles and scars is circumscribed, as it were, and out of sight of the young--and so forgotten until suddenly, unbidden, it arrives for them, too. So we don't have patriarchs, nor do we want them. Instead, we have the young and the old, without a transition in between, without the blessing of experience or the anointing of wisdom. Thus, getting old does not necessarily mean people are going to come to you for pearls of wisdom; nor does it mean you are wiser, more venerated or honored. It just means you're older. So I guess I don't want to be a patriarch, even if I might be so qualified. The market, at least in these parts, seems to be very limited. [ Back to Contents Page | Saratoga News Home Page | Archives ] This article appeared in the Saratoga News, September 23, 1998. ©1998 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.