Time up!
SUMMARY - The man is reaching to his higher self (old man) while ignoring his lower self (child and wife).
The image is a pre- medieval representation of the human cycle and its timely aspects represented in the artist's show of child, woman (man) and old man.
Elders were revered, honoured and respected. Children were loved. Young ones were useless yet worthy considering their only need to exist. They offered nothing much. They were a liability in that the society needed to invest in them. On the other hand, elders were a resource.
Old is gold. It has passed through the test of time. It has excelled. It is exemplary. It is a step to super existence. It has more to give than to gain. It owes no one. With or without a continuum, it is in way, perfect.
Unlike the "cherished" and systemized children of nowadays, life of a person passed through tough times that it was almost a zero sum to profess old age. It was luck. Not diseases, not accidents not wars not plagues. They all haunted lives. Like Odysseus (Ulysses) Like Iron John. You would be wiped anytime! You had no base of anything. Or rather of too little. It is counting chicks before they are hatched (modern times problem).
The past can buy the future, so they say. But the present is in your hands. The picture is a treasure of traditions, customs, lineage and rooting. The old man has knowledge, wisdom, information and surely by zeal he has managed that far. We all say long life is a reward to good deeds. Old men must have preserved them in their days or else they would have perished!
The woman is obstructive here, in my view. She holds the child dear and high. She wants him to see it. She is the mother. The Earth. She values the new. She hopes for the bleak future. She is unconscious (as most women are). But the man, conscious to the old commandments of abiding by one's roots is not moved but strains (no room for dilemma!) further against her whims to get the old man. For what profit would our man be of to the young child if he has no hold of the old man? It would be a break. A cut. A fall. And things would be apart. We mend by sticking to the tried and not galloping the new.
In the end, among the children to come, the women to live and the old to associate with, the man shall stand justified with wisdom, conscience, filiality and of good courage to be trusted with the flame of humanity.
Rise High
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