OOPS #19: Adventuring to Our Limits
Getting older changes things. The bodies that once carried us up mountains without a second thought begin to impose conditions of their own. But perhaps the answer isn’t to stop adventuring — just to adventure differently. A three-week trip to Canada brought home to Sian how much is still possible when we adapt, accept a little help and concentrate less on what we can’t do than on what we still can.
Jack and I are just back from a three-week trip to Canada. Partly a holiday in the Rockies, but mostly a visit to my new grandson, who was just two weeks old when we met him.
Now we are back and recovered (mostly) from our jet lag, I’ve had an opportunity to reflect on our trip — and realised that in three short weeks we packed in a whole range of the joys and challenges associated with getting older.
Jack and I have always loved travelling. Until fairly recently we were both fit and active, and much of our travelling involved exploring new parts of the world and fairly strenuous walking. Now Jack has a hip that needs replacing, occasional attacks of pseudo-gout and lungs susceptible to chest infections — and I have an autoimmune condition that affects my muscles.
We had planned our holiday with ChatGPT (other AIs are available…). We made her (she is a ‘her’ to me) aware of our limitations and our trip was designed with those in mind.
The Canadian Rockies are wild and glorious. They are also at a fairly high altitude, and the first thing we discovered was that my particular autoimmune disease gets worse at altitude. Then Jack developed a bout of pseudo-gout — exquisitely painful and with no effective treatment — and started to cough.
We could have retreated to our hotel and looked at those amazing mountains from our room. But we didn’t. We took the trips out we had planned, adapting them a little to our new limitations.
And when they weren’t adaptable, we helped each other — and laughed.
Our sunrise visit to Moraine Lake involved a steep walk up to the viewpoint. The mostly young visitors stormed past us on the path as they raced to be there for sunrise. Jack started joking with those overtaking us that they would be like us soon enough — and when they laughed, we felt better.
And we got there in good time to see the tips of the mountains begin to glow pink.
The rocks all around us held groups of people and it felt almost like a festival as people chatted and laughed. Then the sun began to rise and the whole area hushed.
It was good to be there — to be part of this gathering of people responding together to something so beautiful.
As we adapted our trip, ChatGPT became a daily companion — advising on the best way to modify our plans so that we saw as much of this beautiful area as we could (as well as on the best places to eat along the way).
There is a whole debate going on about the role of technology in supporting older people. Much of the technology under discussion is designed to keep people safe: sensors that alert someone if an older person gets out of bed or leaves their home in the middle of the night, if the gas is left on or if someone falls.
All important, of course — and for some people vital in allowing them to stay safely at home.
But as Jack and I discovered, technology can do something else as well. It can help us live, not just keep us safe.
Without ChatGPT we would probably have had a much duller, safer holiday. With it, we had the confidence to adventure to our limits, try unexpected and splendid restaurants and experience the Canadian wilderness in all its splendour.
The last half of our trip was in Alberta, spending time with our new grandson Alfie and his parents. And we — and they — discovered that we were still handy with babies.
I spent a glorious ten days in a mist of baby cuddles, giving Chris and Matt time to catch up on sleep and do the endless paperwork needed to bring their new son back to the UK.
The fact that Jack was hobbling and I lacked stamina didn’t matter a jot to Alfie. We were people he felt safe with and could fall asleep on — and that was really all he needed.
We came back to the UK with a new understanding of ourselves. Of our limitations, yes, but also of what we could still do.
Getting older may mean doing things differently. It may mean going more slowly, changing the plan, accepting help and occasionally watching younger people disappear up the path ahead of us.
But it doesn’t have to mean staying safely in the hotel room.
And we have new adventures to plan.
