On Golden Pond

Getting old is not all about fun. Besides all the same problems people have to face in early ages, before death, it is the last chance to give it a thought. Norman in the movie turned eighty, and he knew time was near. Generally speaking, when most people are in their 70's or 80's, they have two very important things to do, one is to thank God for giving them such a long period of time to enjoy, to suffer, to make good use of, and to waste ; the other is to give it a good ending. Those who are in sick or illness or have disabilities, which sure seems normal compared to younger ages, don't have much control of the remaining days and will just be waiting for the moment to come; those who are relatively healthy and movable, can put some of their own thoughts into the daily life. It is unfortunate to be alone in the last cold days,and it fells even colder to have no hands to hold. Young people are always seeking for truth love, and doubting about the existence of it. People who don't believe in love see no things could last for ever. In America, more than half of all marriages break up within ten years. Can two people be together forever? It may feel better to have the soul mate than a nurse around when getting old.
And it won't be easy for a young adult to feel how an 80-year-old man feels. Just like when we were little, our parents always tell us that we had to work hard, because time just passes by so quickly, they would be gone even before you realize it. We could not really understand it at a very young age till seeing how easy it is to waste a couple of years that easily. The point is when I am dying, I would rather say, God I wish you could give me more years to live, than say, God, I wish I could have tried harder to be a happy man. This statement might be pretty empty and meaningless, just as saying I would like to die if only I can find the true me and the real happiness to live for a day. Pretending to be a great philosopher to answer a question like what is real happiness to mankind is not making me any happier at all.There are three availabilities, the first is you are deep thinker who is trying to answer some questions that God did not even give human being that kind of wisdom to do so; secondly, you are doing an assignment to pass a class; the last, is you are not a happy man. People who are happy won't think about what on the earth happiness is in their daily life. Otherwise it is like looking for aspiring when you have no pain in the body but just the addiction to the pill . Some search in the physical world, some believe in spiritual fulfillness, the rest of the people have no clue or never think. Or maybe, death is the last and only chance they have for their satisfaction of being meaningful living in this world. So why are people afraid of death? My conclusion is it is not because they want to live longer; but they don't know where they are heading.Christians see better lives in heaven with God after death; Buddha will take a short break and come beck to earth after a shot while, etc. These people don't consider death a bad thing. The rest, please just let it happen, no matter how long or how short the life is, how good or how bad you feel about it, it is just a matter of time. Be yourself and enjoy yourself till the last minute.
Another issue the movie brought up was the family relationships. The most possible reason why two family members, mostly a parent and younger generations, don't or can't understand each other is just because they are a family. Family is where you belong , where you get the most love from. Family is not like friends. Everybody in the whole life may have the chance to meet thousands of people who you can get a close look at and seek something in common with. The most unlucky guy on earth may have at the worst at least one or two people to share something in life with. If only it is a tenth percent of chance, people got so much space to search around. But in a family, we don't. Everyone is a hundred -percent, which means we can't go around the world to decide who the right couple to be our parents is. Since parents are still living,and we have not decided to run away and never come beck, we have to face it. Apparently most people don't have much hard feeling to be with their families, but you never know what is happening outside your own world. The relationship is unchangeable and unavoidable, so every single little problem can become very obvious and enhanced. There certainly is generation gap because of the unstoppably technological and sociological change of the modern world. Even two people from the same generation may feel hard to understand each other, despite two came to the world twenty to thirty or even more years earlier one than the other. They would not have a good time together that easily. In some cases, the tragic consequence is always like, not just in the movie, when kids are young they can never appreciate what parents have given to them,until they get older till become adults, especially when they have their own kids, they can start to understand what all those love really meant in the past and how selfish they could be. In the movie Juno, when Juno was pregnant at the age sixteen , her father told her that she better find somebody who really love her, no matter how she is. Family is like that, whenever or whatever happens, it is the one who is always there standing behind you. It doesn't make it any easier to understand each other in the family, but the unconditional love is much more important. Psychologically, older people might need more love from family, especially after they retired from work, they may feel isolated from the society and get lost in life because of socialization- and responsibility-free lives. Family could be their only resource to get attention and care.
Being on the very last stage of life is different than ever before, it is the time to say goodbye, to be ready to be gone. This is life, what more can we say about it?

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