When brainstorming a title for her latest book, Ellen Waterston, along with Source Weekly publisher Aaron Switzer, knew they had to hit a bullseye. Composed of columns from her monthly series, “The Third Act,” which Waterston has been penning since 2021, the central thesis of ageing and ageism necessitated something punchy. She recalled her children’s insistence that she often repeated a specific statement when accompanying them in various new adventures — as passenger when they were practicing for their driver’s licenses, wild vacations, etc.
“I don’t know that I said it a lot, but they would maintain that I did, and do, say: ‘We could die doing this,'” Waterston explains.
The phrase stuck, and so became the final touches on the publishing adventure of Source Media’s inaugural book publication, “We Could Die Doing This: Dispatches on Ageing From Oregon’s Outback.”
Dedicated readers of the Source Weekly, and those for whom the written word is an artform to be knelt before in various states of awe, should already be aware of Ellen Waterston. The high desert scribe has carved out a deep presence in Oregon and beyond through several published books of poetry and prose, as well as her monthly column in this paper. Waterston was named Oregon’s 11th Poet Laureate in August 2024, and has maintained a breakneck pace of appearances and speeches in that capacity, all the while keeping a close pulse on the emotional, existential and — more often now — political bedrock of growing older for column fodder.
In “We Could Die Doing This,” Waterston casts a wide net of foci for her column collection, foregoing the pull to weed past pieces with regional highlights like Chapter 32’s essay, “Existence Value,” which includes hyperlocal references to organizations like the Central Oregon Chapter of Great Old Broads for Wilderness, or the Summer Fishtrap Gathering in Joseph, Oregon. Indeed, Waterston retains the balance of her colloquial delving into subjects that put the ageists among us on notice while also representing the place she so lovingly writes about and calls home. Chapters are separated by the season they were written within, creating a homey yearlong snapshot.
“I really love loving something as much as I love writing and poetry in Oregon,” Waterston says. “Especially this desert.”
“The Third Act” began as a way for Waterston to address and dissect some of the minutiae surrounding ageism that she began to see as more rampant the older she grew.
“Ageing is something we all have in common,” she says, “and ageism is something you’re not prepared for.”
The subtleties of ageist offenses are given vivid dressings-down in Waterston’s columns, perhaps most unabashedly in Chapter 6’s “Old Does Not Mean Addled.” In it, Waterston examines the often-patronizing huzzahs of younger strangers while hiking who feel compelled to give sympathetic cheerleading in the form of “Good job!” Or, “You’re an inspiration!” Written with Waterston’s stealth humor and investment in understanding, her chapters shine with acerbic calls for respect and empathy for those card-carrying members of a certain age.
“It’s a fascinating moment where people go from this arms-length sympathy, as though ageing is a disease they’ll never get, to the shift of realizing we’re in this together,” she says. “And it’s the ‘in this together’ that I try to focus on.”
Over the past three years, Waterston has examined deficiencies in the health care system for older citizens, sex life in your 70s and the importance of a sense of purpose and contribution to society and the culture, among many other wide-ranging topics. Throughout her run of columns that comprise “We Could Die Doing This,” she has found herself surprised by the complexity of the unforeseen roadblocks that stymie the older populace during her research.
“What I’m astounded by is the challenges that hit people,” Waterston says. “There’s this sort of calibration that doesn’t take into account surprise challenges — whether they’re within a family, within your own health, whether they’re an economic crisis that throws some 30- or 40-year-old right out into the world without the security they thought they’d just spent the last 10 years getting an education for. Ageing — or being old — is no different.”
In light of her attention to the above, Waterston’s columns have emerged as a touchstone for her readers over the years. Her hope to reach more than just the older audience she’s advocating for and representing has proven to bear out.
“I hear from younger people that they read my column all the time,” she says. “Even if people don’t like it, it’s like public art: If it causes any reaction, they’ve thought about it. So I’m happy then.”
Author! Author! presents Ellen Waterston
Thu., April 3, 7pm
Caldera High School Auditorium
60925 SE 15th St., Bend
$35
COCC Poetry Month Events with Ellen Waterston: Writing Workshops, Poetry Readings and Conversations
Wed., April 16, Noon, COCC Prineville Campus
Wed., April 16, 4pm, COCC Redmond Campus, RTEC Student Commons
Thu., April 17, 4pm, COCC Bend Campus, Barber Library
Thu., April 17, 6pm, COCC Prineville and Madras Campuses (live stream event)
More details: barber.cocc.edu/poetry
This article appears in The Source Weekly April 3, 2025.
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