Make Mine Home: Spatial Modification With Physical and Social Implications in Older Adulthood

As older adults plan and execute moves, anticipating a long duration in a new residence may counterbalance feelings of loss resulting from leaving one’s home and/or community. The literature shows that the preference to remain in one’s living space is often a less costly option and preferred option (Geboy, Diaz Moore, & Smith, 2012). Indeed, numerous communities have established programs to help older adults age in place or remain in their homes (Oswald, Jopp, Rott, & Wahl, 2010; Vasunilashorn, Steinman, Liebig, & Pynoos, 2012). Moreover, there are state and federal incentives to support older adults in their communities. However, relocation is an option often explored and undertaken by older adults. A key reason for moving has been found to be difficulties faced in one’s current physical environment (Oswald, Schilling, Wahl, & Gang, 2002). This study shows how older adults attempt to make certain that their next residence will meet their projected needs. Gerontological scholars have highlighted the importance of understanding housing transition processes (Perry, 2013; Scheidt & Norris-Baker, 2003; Shippee, 2009). It has been suggested that researchers “describe if and how permanent moves are distinguished from temporary ones” (Sergeant, Ekerdt, & Chapin, 2008, p. S96). I argue that one way to distinguish between these two types of moves is to consider the extent of older movers’ emotional and material engagement in projecting a future after a move. Arguing for an intersection between material culture and gerontology, I examine how the process of imagining a future self—in a future space—has meaningful and functional implications for older adults who are relocating. The deliberate work of personalizing a unit in a senior housing community can make the idea of moving seem more attractive and achievable. Imagining a Future Self When older adults plan moves, they engage in a process of imagining a future self. This imagination includes the activities they may be engaged in, the friends and family members they want to interact with, and what kind of residence will accommodate this future self (Perry, 2012). The latter is the focus of this paper, as the linking of the self with a living space is part of the process of relocation. This process occurs in any move taking place at any point across the lifespan, but scholars have noted the importance of moves and reconciling one’s possessions in older adulthood (Luborsky, Lysack, & Van Nuil, 2011; Marcoux, 2001; Rowles & Watkins, 2003; Stum, 2000). Rowles and Watkins suggest that the complex ways that a home creates a sense of “being in place” (p.78) involves cumulative transformations of space into place over a lifetime. In this way, domestic space is a critical site where memories are anchored and identity is maintained (Rowles & Watkins, 2003). Ekerdt, Sergeant, Dingle, and Bowen (2004) argue that relocation has two unique features for older adults. First, the accumulation of their possessions over a lifetime must be contemplated in household disbandment in later life. Second, relocations at this life stage are generally into smaller quarters. For older adults in the United States, the process of relocation may begin by surveying the available housing options offered by senior communities and Continuing Care Retirement Communities (CCRCs). The residential units within these communities may be considered commodities in that they are designed to be produced and sold with attention to economies of scale. Often, they are perceived as identical in form to an undiscerning spectator. However, such a perspective overlooks the complex nature of senior housing units and the ways they may lose their identical and impersonal features. This paper provides examples of the “singularization” of senior housing units and its potential impact on older adults’ well-being. Anticipating many conversations about the loss of leaving one’s home, I was surprised during the course of this study by the number of conversations I had about countertop and cabinet colors, as well as other discussions of adding patios and sunrooms. I observed that many study participants became preoccupied with modifications in their new residences. For some older adults, the iterative aspect of choosing to move, choosing a retirement community, choosing a specific residence within a community and examining potential modifications within a residence cannot be overstated. As I tried to understand the emphasis on modifications, which for some movers overshadowed the overwhelming feelings of how much work was involved in moving from their original homes, I realized that the personalization aspect was part of a larger question: do I see this space as my next home? Attention to the personalization of space through modifications contributed to the work of imagining a future in the new residence. This process can be better understood by drawing on literature on commodities and material culture. Recent Scholarship on Commodities Commodities and their circulation have been explored by scholars to understand the relationships between buyers and sellers in processes of exchange. Recent scholarship focuses on the ways commodities are appropriated in creative ways. For example, Foster (2005) argues that Karl Marx’s study of commodities, which says the “exchange value” of a commodity is reducible to price set through market relations, did not consider other ways value is enhanced as consumers work to change meanings of commodities. For example, through marketing practices, products are positioned to appeal to the individual tastes and lifestyles of consumers. Using “lovemarks” as a term for personalization, Foster suggests, “Creating lovemarks therefore entails inserting products into stories that shape people’s relationships” (2005, p. 11). In addition to tailoring products to fit the narratives that people tell about themselves, Fehervary (2009) also suggests looking for examples of appropriation before consumption. For example, through marketing to target audiences some products seem “made for me” (p. 447). On the other hand, she suggests that some commodities are not subject to appropriation because they are strongly tagged as prestige brands. A Louis Vuitton purse owner can only “borrow” the brand’s symbolic meaning, but can never fully see it as hers (Fehervary, 2009, FN 15, also FN 14). In contrast, in this study, marketing directors of senior housing at times encouraged appropriation—often termed “personalization”—as they hoped that potential residents would see that the housing was suited to their stage of life and feel that a particular retirement community unit could be “made for me.” In his discussion of gift-giving practices, Carrier (1993) describes ways that impersonal, mass manufactured commodities can be personalized. He provides the example of how gift-wrapping a store-bought item is an important material modification that invests a commodity with personal meaning. By contrast, if an item is homemade, like jam, wrapping is not considered necessary. I suggest, in the case of senior housing, that material modifications can similarly be seen as a way to personalize spaces that are otherwise identical. Such methods of personalization may also be an example of the social life of objects, in which objects ebb and flow in commoditized milieus (Appadurai, 1986; Kopytoff, 1986). Building on Simmel’s (1978) argument that value creation need not be linked with production of objects, Appadurai (1986) argues for a more dynamic understanding of commodities. In his view, Marx’s account of commodity exchange should be perceived as potentially only one phase in the social biography of an object. Kopytoff (1986) also emphasizes the commodity as a phase in discussing the tension in an object’s history between becoming a commodity (something “common” and thus exchangeable) and becoming its opposite—singular. Singularity does not have to be equated with preciousness, as objects can be singularly “priceless” or “worthless.” The personalization processes described in the ethnographic data that follow show that, in the course of moving in older adulthood, there is a premove stage during which singularity is possible and that, in the history of a housing unit, much can be altered. Such a perspective requires an understanding of contexts that will, in Appadurai’s words, “help link the commodity candidacy of a thing to the commodity phase of its career” (1986, p. 15). I suggest that the premove stage is a context in which the potential for senior housing units to become “singular” (rather than remain impersonal commodities) occurs. Effecting this transformation is uncertain as it depends on the policies of senior living providers as well as certain skills and knowledge of older adults. Among potential residents of senior living, there is an asymmetry of information and options for other older adults also working to customize spaces. Foster (2005) calls this a “politics of knowledge” (2005). While personalization is another a way to singularize a commodity as a projection of a future self in a future material space, the ability to imagine and execute such modifications depends on one’s expertise, nurtured through experiences which may depend on one’s class and professional background, personality characteristics and age. As discussed below, characteristics such as familiarity with construction practices or dispositions such as politeness may be products of historical moments of education, upbringing, and career orientation that continue to be exhibited in older adulthood.