Have the holidays cooked your goose? Are you fatigued, burned-out and down in the dumps? Now do you understand Scrooge better than you understand Tiny Tim?
These are all symptoms of Post-Holiday Stress
Syndrome and if they describe you, here is a quick rundown of blessings to pat
your attitude back into shape for the new year.
Things to be thankful for, or why we older adults
are lucky ducks:
*
The move to privatize Social Security ended up in the political trash heap.
Aren’t you glad? At this writing, the stock market is down around 40% for the
year. That dull old Social
Security check never looked so good.
* The longevity revolution. The people in the US
have picked up about 30 extra years of life in the last 100 years. Those
smallpox vaccinations and various shots plus public health measures such as
clean water systems have worked their magic. Now you and I might grow old
enough to meet our great grandchildren before we meet Our Maker.
* The bionic geezer. Through the courtesy of
titanium and various plastics, we can get our parts replaced when they wear
out. So when bones break down, in we go to the body shop for repairs. Joint
replacements keep many of us active and out of wheelchairs. Our grandparents
didn’t have this medical luxury.
* Medicare. Some take this program of medical
care and hospitalization for granted, but if every age group in the country had
the medical coverage we older people do, we’d finally have health care for all.
So here’s to extending the honor.
* Help with hearing. It’s no fun to lose your
hearing, but the many kinds of hearing aids now available can put people back
in touch with their lives, their mates and their TV sets. (Note: if you think
Wolf Blitzer is mumbling, get a hearing test.)
* Help with seeing. Many blessings upon the eye
care experts and the cataract surgeons. Eye care is miraculous now and here’s
just one personal example: If you
have cataracts as I once did, the world can look like the brown-varnished
paintings of the Old Masters. So imagine going in for cataract surgery and
coming out to find the world really isn’t a Rembrandt painting. It’s brighter.
Much more Matisse.
* New attitudes about retirement. Old notions of
retiring to Bingoland are being replaced by ideas of unretirement, of switching
to new careers and finding new passions. We don’t have to go out to pasture
anymore.
* New attitudes about physical ability. The idea
that older people belong in rocking chairs is being replaced by the idea that
we belong on hiking trails, in gyms or competing in senior class athletics.
* The advent of the Internet and Google. The
whole world is now ours to access. Just for starters, Google can help people
search for a rental, make air and land reservations, look up medical info, find
a classmate, a recipe, a book, a fact, or a lover. You can start and run a
business online, visit faraway places and find any number of new friends. Also,
email keeps you in touch with the people you love. So, almost anything you want
is available----literally at your fingertips. Even pizza and honey-baked ham.
*
This newspaper. Be thankful for The Union. It is one of the few papers
that value older people enough to run a column especially for them. Even
better, I find that all ages read this column, either to see what it’s like to
grow older or to find information to share with their parents. Also, speaking
of forward-looking media, many thanks to KVMR-FM, they who give me the
opportunity to host the on-air version of Second Wind at 89.5. Not many
community radio stations cover the far side of life.
Last, thanks to all who read this column every
week. You fix my PHSS, my holiday burnout. And what better cure than to have
people appreciate what you do?
So, Happy New Year to geezers and
geezers-in-training everywhere.