[ SECRET POST #2904 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2904 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 040 secrets from Secret Submission Post #415.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

02. http://i.imgur.com/kIZnudJ.png

[(Anonymous)]

I'm in very much the same boat, OP. Older Immigrant parents and all. My plan is procreation. Lots and lots. Fuck it, if I can I'll have as many kids as I can feed, clothe and love, and with any luck, at least one out of ten I'll like as well as love.

[(Anonymous)]

while I enthusiastically approve of this plan personally, it's not for everyone, unfortunately

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah that was my plan too until I got the wonderful news that I can't have children... So that went out the window and I'm now too old to be considered for adoption and too single to be a foster parent (my state has restrictions...)

[(Anonymous)]

I'm so sorry, anon. There are so many kids that need security and love, it confounds me when persons willing to give both aren't allowed to. I hope you find a way to what you want. <3

[kallanda_lee]

Yeah...this might be a mental exercise I don't really want to do, especially with my dad being sick and all. But I very much feel you.

But hey, maybe we can do find an orphaned-captain-America-fans get together on some lonely Christmas eve in the not too distant past.

Yeah, I think I made myself sad now.

[queerwolf]

But most people's parents die before them and there are plenty of only children out there.

I'm not sure I understand what about your situation would prevent you from have a full, meaningful life even after your parents pass.

[kallanda_lee]

A lot of people parents pass when they're pretty old, though. I mean, I live near a senior's residence, and I literally see 65-year-old women with their 90-year-old mom quite regularly. I don't know how old OP is, but that's quite different if you're still in your 20's or 30's, maybe even rely on them in some ways, and then end up alone - without the buffer of siblings or whatever.

[queerwolf]

I guess. I was raised by my mom and she died when I was young (I was an adult though). I understand the sentiment of worrying what will happen when you don't have your parents anymore all too well, but this secret makes it sound like some unique situation that OP can't recover from.

If nothing else, there is such a thing as a chosen family.

[kallanda_lee]

I get that - but I also get how that's a real worry. And the sad thing I see now, that a lot of my once-chosen family has moved on the have blood families of their own, and I don't see them much anymore.

[hwc]

If nothing else, there is such a thing as a chosen family.

Well, yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what OP means when they say "non-blood family like the Avengers". Sounds like they haven't found a chosen family yet and are worried that they will be alone once they outlive their blood family.

And an anecdote regarding ages: a former classmate celebrated her 18th birthday the same year her father turned 70.

[(Anonymous)]

It's not as easy as all that. All the elders in my family are dead. It's just about down to me and my brother, and a scattering of relatives that live across the country and the world. My older nephew is 22 from my brother's first marriage, and my younger nephew is 10 months old from his second. My two kids are 6 and 11. As far as bonding goes, it's going to be hard for them to because of their scattered ages. I envy families where brothers and sisters have kids in the same age bracket, within five or six years of each other, and they all do things together, go through school events together, trips and camping. Fuck, I envy families with multiple generations. My brother and I went from being "the kids" to being the oldest generation within ten years.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm an only child and a "late baby", so my parents were a good deal older than was typical of their generation. They both died when I was in my forties.

I'm managing OK, I guess, but although I'm married I'm also childless. That was by choice; but there'll be no passing along of genes to anyone, nothing to mitigate the sense that they (and I) will be forgotten in a generation.

TBH, I try not to think too much about it. It saddens me.

[kallanda_lee]

Yeah, I also don't plan on kids, either. So I do wonder what life will be like when I'm older and my family's gone.

[(Anonymous)]

This is something I struggle with too. I'm still very young (early 20s) but for many reasons I don't plan on having kids. My parents are much older than typical and my mom isn't in particularly good health. I don't want kids but at the same time I feel like I'll be ending their memory. My biggest hope is to be successful enough that I can leave some kind of legacy for the both of us.

[(Anonymous)]

If it makes you feel better, there will probably come a point where humanity will be wiped out or the earth will be uninhabitable or even the most memorable events will be forgotten in the distant future, thereby negating every effort of carrying on a generation or legacy. Dark, I know, but it's kind of freeing.

[(Anonymous)]

This is literally the human condition. I mean, whether or not you die before those you love, at some point, everyone you knew, everyone who remembers you, will have died.

'But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. Who can but pity the founder of the pyramids? Herostratus lives that burnt the temple of Diana, he is almost lost that built it. Time hath spared the epitaph of Adrian's horse, confounded that of himself. In vain we compute our felicities by the advantage of our good names, since bad have equal durations, and Thersites is like to live as long as Agamemnon without the favour of the everlasting register. Who knows whether the best of men be known, or whether there be not more remarkable persons forgot, than any that stand remembered in the known account of time? The first man had been as unknown as the last, and Methuselah's long life had been his only chronicle.

'Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater part must be content to be as though they had not been, to be found in the register of God, not in the record of man. Twenty-seven names make up the first story and the recorded names ever since contain not one living century. The number of the dead long exceedeth all that shall live. The night of time far surpasseth the day, and who knows when was the equinox? Every hour adds unto that current arithmetick, which scarce stands one moment. And since death must be the Lucina of life, and even Pagans could doubt, whether thus to live were to die; since our longest sun sets at right descensions, and makes but winter arches, and therefore it cannot be long before we lie down in darkness, and have our light in ashes; since the brother of death daily haunts us with dying mementoes, and time that grows old in itself, bids us hope no long duration;--diuturnity is a dream and folly of expectation.'

[a_potato]

To some extent, everyone has to deal with this. They may not have the same certainty, but they have the same fear.

My parents had me when they were older, just like yours. When I was growing up, it was common for people to think that they were my grandparents. My actual grandparents, like yours, have all passed. My aunts and uncles are starting to go, and I have doubts that my mother will survive the next five years.

My husband, meanwhile, has Crohn's and colitis. It's very likely that he'll contract colon cancer, and if he doesn't, then it's a fair bet that he'll still die long before me.

We move through life constantly surrounded by death. And it hurts, and it is absolutely frightening and heart-rending to imagine going on even after those we love have passed. But what we have, in the interim, are beautiful moments, and life. And life is worth living even after loss, because as long as you're alive, there's still someone to give voice to the memories of those who have gone, and there are still opportunities to love again, and opportunities to gain back a piece of what you're missing.

[(Anonymous)]

*nods* My last senior family member on my dad's side died in the spring. On my mom's side, the last one to whom I was close died in late November. I've got one aunt on my mother's side (and I don't like her very much), and that is it. I'm an only child, my cousins are distant in every sense of the word, and aside from my husband and his lovely parents, I have very little family left.

The distaff relative was over 100, and a real sweetheart - I'm going to miss her a lot. Although she was surprisingly healthy for a centenarian, she'd lost virtually everyone she'd ever cared about. But she chose to made the best of it, by being kind to others, volunteering with her favorite charities as much as her mobility issues allowed, and not taking anything for granted. She was a great example :-)

[diet_poison]

I'm sure you can and will find people to love who are your age or younger, too, OP! If finding a partner and starting a family doesn't appeal to you (and hell, even if it does), you can find ways to make friends and find opportunities to work or volunteer with younger generations to leave a legacy and to make lasting connections.

[(Anonymous)]

You are far from the only person to draw strength from Captain America as a role model.