The Joys of Old Age in The Shire as Seen from The Ivy Bush

There a seat for you at The Ivy Bush and time to rest and chat. This is just a little painting - only 8" x 10" - but it captures something I love best about the life we read of in Tolkien's Third Age Shire. When the elders in your village are known by all as "gaffers" and "gammers", your community is recognizing binding societal ties. People we think of as cherished grandparents are intrinsically deserved of dignity and respect, and here, we see Hamfast Gamgee, "the Gaffer," at about the age of 75, holding forth at The Ivy Bush on the Bywater Road. As Bilbo's gardener, he still has work commensurate to his season of life, but he also has leisure, companionship, fine walks to take all about The Hill, a small but pleasant smial at Number 3 Bagshot Row, a good garden for plenty of fresh food, and a place of honor amongst his neighbors.

The Gamgees are considered poor. Sam doesn't even own a real hat when he sets off on his adventure, yet the smial he grows up in has all the family really needs for a decent life.

"What's come of his weskit?" - Miriam Ellis

It is only when Sharkey and the ruffians arrive that we hear of hobbits being homeless and hungry. The Cottons have to make sure that The Gaffer has something to eat amidst the thievery and thuggery of the occupiers and after "The Scouring of the Shire", Lobelia Sackville-Baggins leaves her fortune to ensure that hobbits made homeless can be rehomed. Elders like Farmer Cotton (seen here at the head of his table) help restore a proper hobbit way of life with help from the four travelers who come home from their adventure and are appalled at what has happened to their communities.

So, when we see the Gaffer getting to sit with his friends at The Ivy Bush, we get a good picture of what was considered natural in the Shire. Tiny Daddy Twofoot sits at his side, full of interest in what the Gaffer has to say about his employer, and Old Noakes is across the table, greatly enjoying his pipe. The Miller, I'm sorry to say, has his back to us and discourages inviting us to the table, but otherwise we see a scene of the joys of old age in Third Age hobbit society here.

Perhaps this is Highday (hobbit Friday) on which everyone stopped work at noon to prepare for special weekly feasts. Perhaps after their visit to The Ivy Bush, The Gaffer will invite Daddy Twofoot for a ramble up The Hill for a dish of taters and a look at the sunset. Or maybe the gardener will go up to Bag End to advise Mr. Bilbo about root vegetables and to enjoy the distinction of being called "Master Hamfast". It's a small scene of a good life.

While I'm careful to avoid idealizing the hobbits, who have plenty of faults, I've turned to them all my life for an inkling of what a merrier society than my own would look like. A place where elders have the security of a supportive community, where lads and lasses are safe, where little "faunts" at the age of three learn to give flowers to others on their birthdays, and where someone like Mr. Baggins earns the name of "gentlehobbit" - not because of his grand smial or his rumored "jools" - but because of how he treats his neighbors. That's a plan for living I can respect, and I hope this little moment at a local inn offers a place for you to rest and think, too.