MEL WALSH--LIFE & HEALTH AFTER 60

GEEZER DIARIES: Birthdays---A New Approach

    I'd like to speak up against year-counting, otherwise known as birthdays. Far better not to know how old you are or how old anyone else is. For once the count is known, the expectations are frozen. And those expectations are often wrong.

    For instance, you are supposed to be mature by 21, this despite the fact that 21-year-olds are known to drink themselves silly with shots on that day. Immaturity at the bar. At the other end of the scale, you are supposed to be wise by the time you go over 80, but tell that to the husband of Anna Nicole Smith. (Well, you can't tell him because he's dead, but tell it to the maxi-yeared old guy with can't see his way past a fluffy chest.) Years do not necessarily correlate with wisdom. In fact, dumber than a duck at 20, still dumb as a duck at 80. 

The Downside of Year Counting

     What limits people's hopes for themselves when a new birthday comes round is the expectation that certain birthdays mean certain unchangeable things must happen in your life. At 40, you are supposedly over the hill. At 50, you are too old to start anything new. At 60, you are supposed to develop an unnatural interest in golf. At 70, an interest in pre-paid funerals. At 80, well, you are not even supposed to be alive.

    I think it's time we unchained ourselves from the straitjacket of these expectations and refuse to count at all. Serve the cake---yes---but hold the candles. And begin to think how old you would feel if you didn't know how old you were.

    Surveys say most of us think of ourselves as 15 years younger than we are, so that's good news. We are beginning to cut loose from the tyranny of expectations. People are starting new careers after 50 and even working on into their 80's and 90's if they like their work. I started a new career in my 60's, ditto for a new marriage and I am not alone, thank goodness. Many are the rebels who refuse to behave the way the candles say they should.

    I think the next step is to stop knowing how old I am. (I was always bad at math and do have to pause to remember my age. It's always changing on me.) Or maybe I'll just say that this year is the 44th anniversary of my 30th year. 

   
 

  

GEEZER DIARIES: The Ages of Age

    

    We older people get lumped together. Myth has it that everyone over 50 is ancient, uninteresting, pretty much the same and certainly over and done with. 

    Well, rats to that... as my grandmother would say, she who was never over and done with no matter how old she got.

    First of all, we in Geezerland are not all the same. There are ages and stages to this part of life. Take 50 to 62. That's when we imagine we are still-middle-aged. Well, our brains are, but our knees aren't. Some of our body parts turn out to be older than we are. Knees give out. Hips ditto. Which gets us to age 63 to 75...

    By then, we have to admit we are no longer in mid-life. (How many people do you know who are 126? That's 63 doubled.) We are now deep into the land of silver hair. Many of us are retired from the formal workplace, but some of us have trouble winding down, so we still work wherever and whenever we can.  

    Part of the impulse to work comes from a need to find a meaningful place in a world that wants to give older people the bum's rush. Part of it comes from walking around on sharp eggshells, fallout from the broken nest eggs of 2008-2010, the era of evaporating assets and thinking that Social Security is more wonderful than you had ever realized. Ditto for Medicare. When you love Medicare more than you ever loved Paul Newman or Sophia Loren, you know you have hit stage two of aging.

    Also, that's the time of life guys start comparing their knee replacement scars. If you see a group of older men with their pants pulled up, that's what they're doing. Also on life's agenda at this time: other positive repairs. Many of us start seeing better than ever because our cataracts have been removed and sent to cataract heaven. I see better now than I did at 10.

    Next there's stage three, 76 on up. I'm not there yet, but I know that the battle to keep ahead of misbehaving body parts gets more intense, but to compensate, so does living. So much more living has to be squeezed into so much less time. I have already bloomed into a period of intense gratitude for still being alive. 

    By the mid-seventies and beyond, every day is a bonus day. Realizing that fact is a gift of age. For there's nothing like peers disappearing from the planet to make you know down to your toes that it's a great thing to be alive. (Some, though, at this stage, start thinking about mortality and mourn the fact that they won't be present to hear all the good stuff said at their funerals, an event they'll miss by just a few days.)

    I've not yet travelled into the further geography of age, but am always asking personal questions of the 90-year-old set, one of my favorite ages and stages. They have nothing to lose by telling the truth about anything at all. If your spirit gets refreshed by honesty, get thee to an elder. The only thing they lie about is how they feel. My favorite over-90 guy would say he felt fine on an operating table, which is maybe how long-lived people survive so long. Their glass is always half full and they drink deeply of that.

    I'll raise my half-glass to that. It's a great attitude to pack for the trip through every stage of life. 

  

Toot, toot, tootsie, hello!

            Today, class, we will consider body parts that nobody talks about, the ones you may be a bit ashamed of, the parts you keep covered most of the time. I’m talking about feet.

            As tires are to a car, so feet are to a body. Without good tires, even the best car isn’t going anywhere. Without good feet, even the best body will have trouble getting around. If you need to walk---who doesn’t?---you need tootsies that work and don’t hurt.

Feet through the ages

            Babies’ feet are so cute, we kiss them. Our moms used to plant loving little kisses on ours. But, over time, feet may not only become unkissable, but worn out, misaligned and just plain painful to use. We end up with feet only a fetishist could love.

Well, blame it on shoes that aren’t the right size. (Feet can change over time and should be measured once a year.)  Or blame it on high heels, pointy-toed shoes, bad genes or aging (which wears out the protective pads at the bottom of the feet). You can even blame the problems on over-zealous shoe salesmen who assure you with the look of an angel that the shoes pinching in the store will stretch out when you get home. That is some stretch—the classic shoe store lie that women may believe if the shoes are “cute”.

And you can’t just blame us women for being a little silly about shoe choices. Men who go gaga over high heels encourage women to end up with shortened leg ligaments and misshapen feet. (It’s our version of Chinese foot-binding and why Cranky Pants should give it up about the allure of stilettos. I wouldn’t wear them for Robert Redford.)

So what to do?

            Get your feet re-measured. (Duh.) Buy shoes that are in the actual shape of your footprint, that feel good in the store. Buy nothing that’s a maybe. Wear new shoes around the house for a while and if they don’t fit, bring them back and try again.

            There are brands favored for comfort: Easy Spirit, Hush Puppies, Teva, Mephisto (especially the All-Rounders), Merrell, SAS, Birkenstock and on the sport shoe front, New Balance and Brooks.  The current style craze is for shoes that rock---literally. Their backs don’t quite hit the floor. Me, I hate the rocker shoes---like walking through an earthquake. On the other hand, CP loves them. Different strokes for different feet but if you want the rockers, bring money.

Now, most comfort shoes can be made even more comfortable with socks that are padded. Thorlo socks started the padded trend and was so successful that other manufacturers came on board. You can always find the basic padded sport sock, but now padded socks come in black dressier versions. (Thorlo socks are worth every penny and last a long time—if your mate doesn’t make off with them.)

Drug store relief

            A visit to the foot care section of the drug store may help with your walking comfort level. Today, there are all kinds of foot gizmos designed to provide relief---from extra padding for the soles to protection for corns and bunions, those lovely bumps that arrive when your feet decide to grow sideways.

Professional help

            As always, if home remedies and well-selected shoes don’t help, get thee to a professional. No, not a pedestrian. The word is podiatrist. A good podiatrist can fit you with special orthotics and help with the problems of misbehaving feet. They may have products that drugstores don’t carry and though they will not go all kissy-kissy over your tootsies the way your mom did, they may keep you on the road.

            And that’s the point---keep on keeping on---passing through the valley of corns and hammertoes and forward into life on the open road. 

Financial Fumbles: Normal or a Symptom?

            Some of us are not too bright when it comes to money. We have Inflammatory MasterCarditis---the brain disconnected from the credit card balance.

In the US, this can be considered normal financial behavior, but there’s a connection between the brain and the wallet that can detect an abnormal medical condition. Example: A recent study funded by the National Institute on Aging indicates that inability to manage money may an early sign of Alzheimer’s disease (AD).

Looking at financial skill levels, researchers compared a group of people with MCI, the mild cognitive impairment thought to be a precursor of AD, with people who were normal. The skills assessed? Understanding a bank statement, paying bills, balancing a checkbook and counting coins and currency.

Without going into the details of the study---how many subjects, how long it went on and other details that will numb your eyes----the researchers summarized their work this way: “Declining financial skills are detectable in patients with mild cognitive impairment in the year before their conversion to Alzheimer’s disease.” That‘s a statement from Daniel Marson, a professor of neurology, who adds “This indicates that physicians and health care providers need to watch patients with MCI closely for declining financial skills and advise families and caregivers to take steps to avoid negative financial events.”

Easier Said Than Done

Have you ever tried to separate a declining elder from his or her checkbook? It’s like taking away the car keys---our two symbols of independence and we cling to them like bees to honeysuckle. But, when things go awry---when people begin to pay the same bills two or three times or neglect to open the bills, something has to change.

So what can be done? Some people recognize their financial impairment and willingly assign trusted others to take on the money duties such as bill paying and checkbook balancing. Some adult children become co-signers on the checking account. Online banking using an automatic bill-paying setup is another solution. When things get really bad and someone with AD is getting into major financial trouble, an official financial conservatorship can be established.  

How Useful Are Financial Fumbles as an Early Diagnosis?

Some claim they are useful as an alert to watch for boulders in the road ahead. Some claim it’s not useful since there is no cure for AD. Why know the early symptoms if there is no cure, but only a medication such as Aricept which supposedly slows the progression of the disease?

Well, there’s no cure, but early detection and early medication can act as a parachute. It slows the descent.

As usual, it’s our choice how to handle these issues.

Meanwhile, I don’t let anyone see my checkbook. They’d say I’ve had AD since I was 21. 

Your computer is an anti-depressant

            I heard a rumor that you don’t always do what I tell you.

            Well, that’s ok, because I don’t always do what I tell me. But I try and evidently, so do you because something I’ve been harping on for a long time has come to pass: Older adults are going online in record numbers. And what’s more, they are mentally better for it. Less depressed. Feeling more connected to family and friends.

So How Do “They” Know Older Adults Are Online?

            No, it’s not through tracking porny sites. A better way to track Internet use is to monitor the installation of broadband. Pew Research Center, premier tracker of trends, found that in 2008, 50% of Baby Boomer households in the 50-64 age group had broadband. By spring of 2009, that use had jumped to 61%. We are on our way to full coverage.

            An older age group---my team---took an even bigger jump. Only 19% of people over 65 had broadband in May of 2008. Today Pew estimates Internet use by Americans age 65 and over at 42 percent. Way to go.

            Now to convince the other 58%.

Why Bother?

            Because a recent policy paper has proved what we Internet nuts know intuitively: that Internet use can have positive psychological effects.  The paper, released just this month by the Phoenix Center, is titled Internet Use and Depression Among the Elderly. Not a barn burner title, but their findings are important. In the 7000 people studied, the use of broadband reduced depression about 20%. And the authors claim their methods showed clear cause, not just a correlation. (See for yourself at www.phoenix-center.org.)

            Given the billions spent on depression-related health care costs, the financial implications are important. Anti-depressants are the most frequently prescribed meds in the US. Some people pop anti-depressants like candy and it’s expensive candy. Consumer Reports figures the cost ranges from $90 to $200 a month. (Interesting cost comparison: In communities where there is a choice of broadband providers, the average monthly cost of the connection is $38.30.)

But Don’t Stop Taking Your Pills

            If you and your doc have agreed an anti-depressant is for you, of course you shouldn’t stop treatment and take a daily dose of Internet instead. But, if you have been feeling isolated, not in touch in family and friends, think Internet. And if you want to fire off letters to politicians, monitor finances and see what pilots have overshot what city today, think Internet.

            I’ll meet you there. Try www.melwalsh.com.

 

Giving parts of yourself

So I’m cleaning out my swamp of a purse, including a wallet with an outdated driver’s license, organ donor card attached. I threw away the donor card. No one would be interested in someone older than dirt. After all, there must be an expiration date on what I’d have to offer another human in the way of needed parts. I guessed I was probably too rusty and dusty to be useful.

How wrong can a woman be?

Very: A friend told me that her deceased husband, aged 80, made a recent and valuable donation of his tissues to help someone else. It seems, no matter what the age, all kinds of parts can be still useful. Think bones and skin, eyes and organs. It’s the ultimate in recycling and really needed. Over 100,000 people are currently waiting for organs.

So What Keeps People From Giving?

Rumors. Myths. Here’s are some of the unfounded fears: Medical staff will let me die just to harvest my precious parts. I won’t really be dead. They’ll charge my family for it. All these are not true. And even if you have planned a grand open coffin send-off for yourself, you can still have it. The experts know how to make you look pretty.

And of course, when it comes to barriers to donation, there’s the denial factor---I will live forever, the first immortal---and also the ick factor of imagining people doing unpleasant stuff to your precious body.

How to get over these normal responses and get on with a donation? Imagine the people you will help. Think how nice it would be to have part of yourself still living and helping someone else live too.

More Info

Get inspired and informed by visiting these sites: www.organdonor.gov and www.mayoclinic.com. Put “organ donation” into the Mayo search box and you can ease your mind by learning more about the myths and misconceptions.

If you want an easy sign-up as a donor, go to www.donatelifecalifornia.org/register. In minutes you’ll get properly registered with the state, a printable donor card and an easy way to email members of your family to tell them your wishes. If you don’t live in CA, there’s a list of state registries at www.organdonor.gov

Your once and future geezer

           Wonder how you’ll do as an older person? Well, researchers at the University of Chicago can polish your crystal ball. They are doing a study of people aged 57-85---the National Social Life, Heath and Aging Project. They go into people’s homes and ask about health, relationships and sex lives, though how they get honest answers about sexual behavior in face-to-face interviews with a spouse in the next room is a mystery. Their walls must be thicker than mine.

Health Findings: Parfum De Tiger Balm

            In the health department, arthritis is one thing these older adults had in common. In the 75+ group, 62.8 % had arthritis, which explains the sweet smell of Tiger Balm in the morning in the homes of older folks---that and our snappy copper bracelets. Among that same older group, though, only 16.8 % reported a heart attack. Is this good news or have those with heart problems already passed into the Great Beyond, beyond the questions of researchers?

 Is a mystery.

            Statistically, hypertension may also be in your future in that 60% of the same older group—75 to 85—have high blood pressure, which may be related to the fact that 55.2 % of them are also obese. And the younger group is even more rotund---61.2 % of the 57-64 year olds are obese. (I am beginning to feel very self-conscious about the buttercream cupcakes I made last night.) 

About Relationships

            I hope this won’t ruin your day, but not all older people said they like to spend time with their partners. Only about 50% of men said they like to spend time with their partners and by the time partnered women got to be over 75 only 47.7 % said they liked to spend time with their honey-buns.

If these results aren’t misprints, we have a problem. Retirement means two people alone in a house all day. Lordy, if you don’t enjoy that, your days are toast.

But here’s the mystery: the vast majority of people in the study said they were happy in their relationships. Maybe the contradiction just translates into what has become a retirement mantra:  I married you for life, dear, but not for lunch. Get the heck out of the house.

Now… The Sex Thing

            The younger ones in the study had more lifetime sex partners than the people 75+. Forty-seven percent of women 57-64 had more than two lifetime sex partners, while only 20% of the oldest women had more than two sex partners in their lifetimes. Well, no surprise here. The fast-lane Boomers among the group had reliable contraceptives and Woodstock. The older ones—well, they were pre-pill and pre-rock and probably lived more in the Tony Bennett lane.

Last, when it comes to sex, men stay true to form. While, most women 75 and older said sex is NOT an important part of life, 75% of men over 75 said sex is still important.

So go ahead. Put that picture in your crystal ball---it’s going to be marriage counseling in our walkers.

 

Dog Bliss You

 

            Everyday is an excellent time for counting blessings, especially the blessing of being owned by a pet.

Scientists tell us pets are good for our heart rates, blood pressure and exercise habits. Think daily dog walks. Pets are also excellent as furry tranquilizers. I get more out of petting a dog than the dog does. Though I’m presently dogless, I remember the highlight of the family day: everybody down on the carpet after dinner to pet and praise Rowdy, the love sponge.

Pets and trippy kitchens

Over the holidays, you may be spending more time in the kitchen, so consider that when owners do trip over pets and injure themselves, it’s often in the kitchen. Sometimes pets just lie in the way to watch the culinary action. (You are their Food Channel.) Sometimes they do figure 8’s around your ankles, a free ankle rub.

What to do? Well, you can just keep an eye out for your pets the way you would for a toddler---think low moving object---or you can teach dogs to stay out of the kitchen. (Forget cats.) Or you can put a baby gate across the door and not worry about tripping over the dog when carrying hot pasta water.

Pets and night tripping

The pet who sleeps next to the bed is in the way when people get up in the dark, but that situation works both ways. People can step on the pet. So a motion sensitive nightlight is a good idea. One web site, www.keepdoggiesafe.com, sells glow-in-the-dark collars.

Another bedroom safety issue from the dog’s point of view:  people who own a burrowing dog, say a dachshund, know that if they throw themselves on the bed or even just sit on the edge, they may squash the dog who has nosed into bliss under the covers. And some of those little dogs are so smart they could sue you.

Staying upright outside

I’ve read 150 blog posts on the subject of people sustaining injuries from their pets. A common theme is outdoor injuries and it’s not just dog owners who get injured, but runners who don’t see the leashes strung across the path or passersby who are knocked down by dogs chasing squirrels. There were pleas to keep the leashes short and the dogs trained. But the website above has another solution---leashes with LED lights.

What a concept: The dog as a Christmas tree.

If you don’t know what gift to get your pet, take a stroll around a local pet store to survey the offerings. If it’s a dog toy, be sure to tell Rover to put his toys away each day because the blogs clearly indicate pet toys are a common cause of falls.

Last, if you do trip, please forgive the pet. After all, it’s only human.

 

Alzheimer’s: Helping the Helpers

            If awards for distinguished service were given to caregivers, the family members caring for those with Alzheimer’s would be on top of the honors list. They and those they care for have a rough road to travel. However, as with any tough journey, there are ways to make it easier.

Here are some tips:

Get informed

Almost none of us grew up knowing anything about Alzheimer’s Disease or AD, so there’s a void when it comes to accurate information and common sense tips about handling this brain disorder. To the rescue come many good books, among them Learning to Speak Alzheimer’s: A Groundbreaking Approach for Everyone Dealing with the Disease, by Joanne Koenig Coste. This book gets five-star reviews from readers. Then there’s A Caregiver’s Guide to Alzheimer’s Disease: 300 Tips for Making Life Easier by Patricia Callone. The older classic in the field is The 36-hour Day: A Family Guide to Caring for People with Alzheimer’s Disease, Other Dementias and Memory Loss in Later Life, by Nancy Mace and Peter Rabins.

Online, there’s good information about everything from symptoms to caregiving at www.alz.org, the Alzheimer’s Association website. This national group runs a 24/7 telephone hotline at 1.800.272.3900.  

Which brings us to the subject of support…

Get support

This is not the time to go solo like the Lone Ranger. (Actually, even he had help and moral support from Tonto.) No, this is the time to seek out the village it takes to care for people with dementia. Round-the-clock phone support is at the number above and here’s the kind of help they offer:

Understanding AD, medications and other treatment options, general info about aging and brain health, caregiving skills, legal, financial and living arrangement decisions, crisis assistance, education on the issues families face every day, plus referrals to local community programs. They also have message boards where people can trade concerns and questions.

Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital runs an Alzheimer’s Outreach Project which includes supportive group meetings for caregivers. Get more info 530.274.6350  X 250.

Local adult day care services for the brain-impaired have been greatly curtailed by government budget cuts. Decimated is not too strong a word. However, a feisty group of families---give them an award!---has managed to start an adult day program, Helping Hands, in Penn Valley. Their phone is 530.432.2540.

Online, the biggie website for caregivers is www.caregiving.org, the home of the non-profit National Alliance for Caregiving. Check out their Resources tab.

Get out of town

Easier said than done, but if anybody needs a vacation, it’s someone who is a 24/7 caregiver. Adult day care services offer a mini-vacation of a few hours, but these have been almost totally closed down in this community with the people in Penn Valley doing their best just 3 days a week.

Bottom line: Services for older people shrink as the older population grows. We can do better than that, can’t we? 

 

What to Eat (Again)

 

            Sheesh! I am so sick of changing nutritional advice. When I was young, bread and potatoes made you fat. My grandmother said so. But, by some miracle, 30 years later, these same foods didn’t make you fat. No, it was just the buttery toppings you put on them. So said the nutritionists back then and we got permission to carbo-load. And now, deep into The Age of the Glycemic Index, bread and potatoes make you fat again.

            There are a gaggle of other confusions. Eat meat---you need it to be big and strong. Or, don’t eat meat---draft horses don’t eat meat and they are big and strong. Or, got milk? Good. But, on the other hand, milk is food for baby cows, not for humans: lactose intolerance tells us so.

And on and on until you want to throw in the towel and eat anything that fits in your mouth. So will someone out there please boil it down and tell us what is true? Are there any enduring truths, some universal rules to guide us as we trundle our carts around the supermarket?

            To the rescue

            Enter best-selling author, Michael Pollan, he who has made it his business to seek out the basics of nutrition. His most recent book is a short and sweet little thing called Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual. The book answers the questions: What should I eat? How should I eat? Pollan distills world-wide nutritional research into short guideposts. You can read his book in one evening.

            But first, why should you care?

            Because people who eat the typical Western diet---processed foods, a lot of meat, much sugar, much fat---suffer from a high rate of Western diseases: obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer. It’s that simple: our diet makes us sick.

             Food rules, the basics

Pollan’s mantra is this: Eat food, mostly plants, not too much. And by food, Pollan means the plants and animals people have been eating for generations, not the highly processed foods that are coming to dominate the American diet.

In all, there are 64 tips in Food Rules, including such gems as: Don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk. Also: If it comes from a plant, eat it. If it was made in a plant, don’t.

            

The Medical Mess: Here's A Basic Fix

         My  professional take on the current medical mess is: Yikes!

As I write this column, reform is stalled in Congress and many people suspect that it may not be reform at all, but a disguised gift to insurance companies.

I wish I could know the truth here and also tell how each of us will end up a year from now under the new legislation, but I don’t have a clue. Really, even the experts have to guess the probable results. There is no previous model as to how it will all come out. Inventing new ways of health care is not measurable science---it’s more like a mud pit wrestling match.

Now, add to this mud pit a second related mess: As of March 1, Medicare reimbursements to physicians were cut 21%, which will mean that more docs won’t take Medicare patients and/or will pare back their practices to reduce the number of Medicared geezers on their roles. Some older people already find it hard to locate physicians who will take Medicare patients: docs say the reimbursement rates are so low, they lose money on older people. Currently one in four older people has trouble finding a primary care doc. Cutting rates will leave more of them out in the cold.

A short-term solution

To fix the situation and keep seniors and their doctors from storming the halls of Congress, the House of Representatives passed recent stopgap legislation to delay those cuts, but the Senate went off for the weekend leaving the cuts in place. Meanwhile, back at the ranch---the Center for Medicare Services  (where they pass out the Medicare money)---has told contractors to hold up on claims until the Senate also does a short-term fix, presumably within the next two weeks.

But note these are short-term solutions. We need to find a new physician reimbursement formula. On the other hand, we also have to find ways to contain medical costs or we will be in even deeper deficit doo-doo.  One thing I am sure about: higher costs do not necessarily mean better medical care. Other countries spend less on care with better results.

Again, yikes! We’ve gone the wrong way here.

But is there a way to steer around these issues?

Yes.

A modest proposal

Each of us should do everything possible to stay out of the illness care system. Get healthy, Stay healthy. Think of it as a system by-pass operation.

The fact is effective health care reform starts at home, not in Congress, not in an ER, not in a doctor’s office. If we still smoke, weigh 300 pounds, eat cookies for lunch, sit until our rears grow roots in the chair, then we will end up sick. Imagine diabetes and heart issues for starters. And if we don’t take care of ourselves, we lose all right to blame other taxpayers for not wanting to subsidize our care.

OK, it’s easier said than done, this get-healthy business, this using your own initiative stuff. I find it an everyday struggle against my Inner Slug and its cousin, the Inner Cookie Monster. On the other hand, going forward and depending only on an uncertain health care system to make things right for me seems clueless.

Yes, there are illnesses and accidents that are unavoidable, but we control the preventable medical conditions. Those are the ones we can work on to stay out of the mud pit.

Me, I’m starting my health system bypass today. Vegetable soup for lunch is my opening salvo. 

I say it’s better to eat a carrot than to curse the darkness. Or the mud pit.

 

Take Your Driving Self-Test Here!

  Every parent says it: I don’t want to be a burden on my kids.

            That sentiment shows parents are beyond wonderful. Their kids have been a burden to them for decades and yet the parents don’t want to get back at the buggers.

            However, if you really don’t want to burden your kids, think outside the usual box of horrors---the one that involves nursing homes and you with the mental capacity of a daffodil. Imagine instead what a burden it will be for your kids to have a parent on the road who should not be driving. Think of the worries your children will have---images of geezer you mashed up in a car crash. 

            Further, collisions are not the path to geezer health and independence. If you get into trouble, your kids are the ones that will have the burden of visiting the ER, neglecting their jobs and children to look after you.        .

How To Know If You Should Hang Up the Car Keys

            The AARP puts forth these warning signs---their list, my words:

·      Your parking is way off. Not within the lines.

·      Scrapes and dings, not only on the car, but on the garage, mailboxes or fences.

·      Fender benders.

·      Stopping in traffic for no reason.

·      Getting lost a lot.

·      Not using signals or using them wrong---driving a hundred miles on a freeway with your left clicker on.

·      Hard for you to move into the correct lane of traffic.

·      Hitting curbs.

·      Driving too fast or too slow.

·      Slow response to surprise situations.

·      Getting all worked up when driving.

·      More close calls.

·      Claiming that “cars come out of nowhere” at you.

·      Trouble getting your foot from the gas to the brake.

·      Clueless about dangerous situations.

 

            I’d add a few more things: If your children tell you that it’s time to stop driving, they are probably right. If you have trouble seeing at night and can’t tell a black-coated person on the roadside from a penguin out for a stroll, it’s time to stop driving after dark.

            Other things to watch:  you‘ve gotten so short with age, you can’t see over the dash. Or you can’t turn your neck to check out the blind spot and everything looks like a blind spot.

 

            The truth is, some day, if we live long enough, we all will have to stop driving and it’s a good idea to begin thinking now how get to the store, the doc or your favorite watering hole. This is easier said than done, but public transport, friends, neighbors and moving into a town center in the later years are all possibilities.

            So is taking a younger lover with a clean driving record. Your choice.

           

On the Road Still: Staying in Charge of Your Driving

Question: Would you like to extend your safe driving lifetime by many years? Or do you want to hang up your car keys too early, either because of an accident or because you haven’t reviewed the rules of the road since you last made out in a Nash?

            Well, if you want to keep safe and happy on the road, consider the AARP Driver Safety Program, the nation’s first and largest classroom refresher course for motorists 50 and over. Also, any age driver can take the online version of the course at www.aarp.org.

            So Why Go?

            Partly to update your knowledge of driving technique. Example: It used to be that people were taught to hold on to the steering wheel at clock positions 10 and 2. Now the recommendations are 8 and 4 o’clock, so when and if an airbag pops out at 600 miles an hour, that airbag won’t throw your arms into your face.

            And then, do you know how far your chest should be from the steering wheel so you won’t get injured by the airbag in an accident? Ten to 12 inches . That’s easy for people with long arms, but manageable for the rest of us. (Further airbag hint: if, like me, you like to put your legs up on the dash during a long trip as a passenger, don’t. The force of the airbag can turn us into human pretzels.)

            Another example of changing rules: older people were taught to pump their brakes, but today, you don’t do that when cars have ABS, an anti-lock braking system. Instead, you just stay steady down on that brake. (To check for ABS, look for an ABS symbol on the dash when you turn the car on.)

            So What Else Is There To Know?

            Lots. Driving is like love-making. Just because you’ve been doing it for years doesn’t mean you know all there is to know on the subject. For instance, do you know how older adults get in trouble on the road? Are you thinking highway driving? Nope. It’s intersections. At least 40% of fatal crashes for drivers 75 and older take place at intersections.

            Why? The vision changes that come with age have a lot to do with it. Your peripheral vision (side vision) and depth perception (judging the speed and distance of oncoming traffic) both diminish with age. You may think “that car came out of nowhere” to crash into your side at an intersection, but it could have been that older eyes were playing depth perception tricks.

            How Do I Find an AARP Course Near Me?

            Go to AARP.org and put Driver Safety Search into the search box. More info at 1-888-227-7669. 

 Watch out for the intersections on the way to class.

A Very Moving Tale

This is a very moving story—literally. It’s one for Boomers and their aging parents, and I’ll start it with a question: Have you ever heard of Move Management?

Well, it’s a new and growing industry with about 500 specialists dotted across the United States. When older people decide to move to a retirement community or to assisted living, move managers can take on the burden of the move, leaving the family free to fight about who gets the turkey platter.

Seriously, move managers help the older person through the emotional trauma of downsizing. They sort, organize and pack possessions, give designated items to charity or family members, make dump runs, run tag or estate sales, manage the actual truck move and then arrange the new place so that it replicates the best parts of the old home.

Those move managers whose talent is interior design may oversee painting the new place in favorite colors, arranging the furniture in a familiar pattern and inventing a special  display of the objects and photos that mean the most to the movee.  The end result? There’s no place like the new home---except maybe the old one, but smaller and more edited.

Who Needs a Move Manager?

Can you say millions of us?

If you have ever helped an older parent move out of the old family home into a new smaller apartment, you’ll know how nice it would have been to have expert help during the process. It took my sister and me six weeks to help mom go through the house and garage, decide what to take, dispose of the rest, get the house ready for sale and we were still not finished after six weeks of seven days a week labor.

It would have been great to have a professional direct the proceedings and maybe instruct the men who were cleaning out the garage not to throw and break bottles of 1950’s insecticides into the dumpster.  (When the dumpster began steaming, the town hazmat squad arrived to prevent another Bhopal.)

Well, that was just us, but many are the hurdles to cleaning out the old family home and resettling in a new and smaller nest. There are not only logistics to consider, there are all the emotions connected to leave-taking and change, so a talented move manager will listen to the older person and make sure that when it comes to prized possessions, he/she has the best of the best in the new place. (Example, a vast collection of family photographs can be edited down to the outstanding pictures which can be enlarged, reframed and lit in a special display--- much better than photos sitting in old shoeboxes.)

If you want to talk to a move manager, go to the website of the National Association of Senior Move Managers at www.nasmm.org. Look for the state-by-state search engine. Also ask the manager of any retirement facility. They may have a recommendation. Then, too, some professional organizers will take on senior moves. Find them in the Yellow Pages under organizing services or at the web site of the National Association of Professional Organizers, www.napo.net. Search there under moving/relocation services.

            Opportunity for a Business

            Boomers looking for a business opportunity in a down market may want to learn more about starting a move management business. Begin at www.nasmm.org and also Google: Move Management Washington Post. There you will find an article about how other people started in the business.

            Finding a growing business opportunity in 2009 may be the most moving experience of all. Good luck.

The Way We Were (And Are)

Gerontology is the study of older adults and what a trip that field has been for this geezer! I went to gerontology school when I was in my sixties, the oldest person ever to get an MA in Gerontology at USC.

            Usually, young people study older people---20 somethings trying to understand the elders of the tribe. Each beginning gero student is like a young Margaret Mead doing anthropology work in a foreign land, The Land of Age. But I was the foreigner in the group, an indigenous population of one, the only degree candidate who was Socially Secured and Medicared. I studied what I was. They studied what they were going to be. I think I had more fun, already swimming in the surf they could only look at from the shore.

One Shining Memory: The Peak Experience

            Though the scholastic training was great and comprehensive, it didn’t and couldn’t catch all the experiences of aging in the academic net. There are things about being old that aren’t in text books.

Example: each older person’s enduring memory of a lifetime’s peak experience, an indelible image that has been burnished bright by faithful remembering over the decades. I think everybody over the age of 60 carries a proud and often secret recollection of a special moment in life, one that defines who they were and what they loved.

For my mate, Cranky Pants, it’s the time he first flew solo. For others, it’s the time they sang in the Civic Light Opera, or the time they taught school children in a foreign land. Or maybe it was the time they fought forest fires, or the day of the great earthquake when they went through the neighborhood shutting off the gas of people too panicked to find their own wrenches. Often the peak experience required bravery, the overcoming of fears, performance that was beyond the demands of everyday experience.

Whatever it was, the experience of remembering this one special time nourishes the self-esteem of older people whose pride can be eroded by the downers of aging. When people can’t hear, see or move well or even put on their socks, their pride leaks out. The self-esteem balloon loses a little air. So the recollection of a special moment serves to bolster the self-image, to guard against the erosion of a healthy ego.

And So???

And so if you are older and the proud owner of A Memorable Moment, I’d suggest that you not only secretly cherish it, but you display and enjoy any tangible reminder of your experience. Expand the pleasure of remembering with a photograph, a citation, a recording---any shred of physical evidence that you have been there and done that. And find someone who will listen to your story and tell you theirs---equal time to each proud moment.

Sometimes, though, people want to keep their memories to themselves or just share it with blood brothers. I know someone whose personal claim to fame is enjoying three liaisons in one day---his personal best---but you can bet he is not telling his grandchildren.

Giving Comfort to The Elders

One way to bring pleasure to older adults is to listen to their stories and if they repeat the same one too often---ask them to talk about other memorable moments of their lives:

What was the scariest time? Or the thing they most remember about mom or dad? What do they most want younger people in the family to know? To do? Do they have a legacy ideal they want to leave behind? What are their most treasured objects?

Last, though I don’t know the source, here’s a pertinent thought I wrote down and carry around in my wallet: “To love people is to sing the song that is in their hearts and to sing it to them when they have forgotten”.

Really, How Old Are You?

How about making a guess today? Polish up your crystal ball and tell me what age group is most unhappy.

            Some might answer that older people have to be the least happy. After all, if they are retired, they are unemployed with the loss of income and status that comes from the workplace. And what’s more, judging by their behavior, older people evidently have to be in bed by nine. It’s life in the dull lane, bored into unhappiness.

Actually, though, surveys show that older people are as happy as young people. Imagine that. It’s the middle-aged who are the least happy and no wonder. They have more obligations than any other age group. Think kids, jobs and foreclosing mortgages.

            So the idea that older people are crying into their beer (or Ensure) is, in general, a myth. But what makes older people happy?

A Look at Senior Self-Perceptions

            A recent study spotlights one reason we older folks aren’t down in the dumps about aging. We think we are much younger than we are. In a study published in the Journals of Gerontology, over 500 people 70 and older were asked how old they felt they were. On average, they felt about 13 years younger than their chronological age.

            And rather than take a one-moment-in-time snapshot of people’s attitudes, the study tracked perceptions about age and satisfaction with the aging process over a six-year period---this to find what changes might come to pass over time. Well, the perception of age stayed pretty steady over the years.  In other words, if a person felt 13 years younger at 70, he or she was likely to still feel 13 years younger at 76.

            And note that the question asked was very specific: “How old do you feel when you look at yourself in the mirror?” That a mirror was mentioned made the results even more amazing: if you asked me how old I felt when looking in a mirror, I’d have to account for the wrinkles in my answer and would have to up my number. These people had the same dilemma when asked to reflect on their reflections---and yet they still felt 13 years younger.

            Now, if you left the mirror out of the question---if you ignored the visual clues---and just asked how old people felt, you might get an even more amazing answer. I’ll bet they’d say they felt even younger than 13 years. In fact, I have read other studies that placed the perception level at 15 years younger than chronological age.

Kids, Try This At Home!            

Heck, you can try this experiment on yourself. Without looking in a mirror, how old do you feel? Then, when looking in a mirror, how old do you feel? Is there a difference? What is it?

I Make Me Feel So Young

Now, when it came to the study, was there a gender difference? Yes, indeed. Men saw themselves as four years younger than women who were their age equals. The investigators could only guess at the reason. Maybe women were trained over a lifetime to look more closely at their physical appearances and so were more realistic in their assessments. Or, one could say unkindly that men were more delusional about their actual age, which, if true, could account for older guys going after all those young trophy wives.

Bottom line: Nobody knows.

What Drags Down the Cheery View

            The researchers found that getting sick was likely to make people think of themselves as older. So staying well is a key to maintaining a pleasant illusion about our actual age. But then you already knew that. Nothing makes a person feel older than being marooned in a hospital bed or diagnosed with a geezer-related illness.

More research in this study---the Berlin Aging Study---indicates that “people who feel younger are less likely to die than those who don’t, given the same level of chronological age and equivalent physical health”.

So maybe thinking we are younger than we are is more than a pleasant illusion. It may be a life-saver.

Me, today I feel 50, but my knees are having an 80^th birthday party down below my belt. 

Grammy Knew Best

You know, the old folks at home had it right about health. Grandmothers back then were doctors in housecoats, and though we today think we own the advanced ideas about nutrition, my grandma knew as much in 1948 as many of us today, even though we are overfed on dietary info.

My grandma “got” the fact that fish and fish oils could help keep a family healthy. That’s why, like many Americans back then, cod liver oil was part of our daily diet. So were sardines---many, many cans of sardines. Sardines on Ritz crackers---that was the blue plate lunch special in Grandma’s Kitchen, with a side of tomato soup for a veggie blast.

Walking Her Talk

But gram didn’t just know what should be done, she did it and made us do it too. You swallowed your cod liver oil and your black strap molasses--no questions allowed.

Today, though, while many of us know what to do, we don’t do it and we don’t make our families do it. Our talk about health may be just show. If little Jason doesn’t like the veggies or fish that we oldsters know he should eat, he may be allowed to exist on burgers, fries and “juice” boxes full of sugar water.

Well, we had to eat what we were served and in an era of food scarcity, it made survival sense. The rule was: Eat it, no substitutions. Hating the globbiness of oyster stew, I was once made to sit at the table by myself for the hour it took to get that stew down.

Vitamin D and The Art Deco Grandmother

And it wasn’t just on the food front that my grandmother and others in the 1930’s showed some health smarts. Though today we are told the sun is our enemy---think skin cancer----the grannies and moms of yesterday used to put babies out to nap in the sun. Look at family photos from the Depression and you may see a diapered ancestor getting a Vitamin D bath outside in her baby carriage.

While I would not take sides on the sunning issue—not enough evidence  on benefits (Vitamin D and nature’s anti-depressant) versus drawbacks (skin cancer, sunburn)--- I do know that the women of yore were onto the sunshine vitamin and saw that children got it in short daily sunbaths.

The Gospel of Gram on Preserving Health

It was also gram’s goal to keep us from getting “run down”. Run down meant you didn’t eat right, spent too much time in the house reading the funnies and above all, didn’t go to bed early enough to get a good night’s sleep. Early to the mattress was the rule or you might get health cooties like colds.

Well, it took over 60 years for scientists to catch up to grandmother. This month a new study concluded that a lack of sleep was related to catching a cold. Published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, the investigation involved 153 men and women who were sequestered in a hotel for two weeks while cold viruses were stuck up their noses.

 But and however, only 35% of those exposed to the virus got a cold. The amount of sleep was the key to the puzzle. Those who got less sleep were five and a half times more likely to be sick than those who caught more dreamtime.

Grandma would be heartened to see that after 60 years, scientists have caught up with her. Really, scientists could have saved time and trouble and just asked my grandmother, who might have sent them to bed without supper for wasting money on something that was as plain as a sardine on a cracker.

Crystal-Balling the Year Ahead: Geezer Version

             Tongue planted firmly in cheek, I offer a crystal-ball guess about the aging scene in 2009:

January…The AARP begins the New Year by declaring that seventy is the new twenty.

February… The feds announce that Medicare will not cover Botox injections, this despite intense lobbying from fast-wrinkling Boomers. Angelina Jolie’s lips stage a protest.

March… The Big Two automakers arrive in Washington with the specifics of their rescue plan. They want to extend Medicare to old and ailing car companies. 

April….BigPharmCo recalls its arthritis pill, SleezeEase, because, despite black box warnings and the small print in TV commercials, some people actually took the drug and actually kind of expired from it. The FDA says it’s it not responsible, but will do better with the next black box drug that they will also not be responsible for.

May…. President Obama adds money to the CIA’s Viagra for Afghanistan program, whereby the allegiance of warlords is obtained by giving them little blue pills in exchange for information. This Erections for Victory program was started by the Bush administration and if you don’t believe this actually happened, google: Viagra Afghanistan. Better bribery through chemistry. Really.

June… Pain in the Prostate Month. The national poster boy is Gary Tenducci, 65, of Winnetka IL who managed to visit the small room 154 times in just one night.

July…The stock market goes into a summer dive with the Dow Jones staging another showboat meltdown. Investment advisors across the country tell retirees to hold their stocks, as “the market will eventually come back”. Seniors advise their advisors that they don’t expect to live to be 116.

August…Social Security recipients get another cost of living raise, but the government takes an ever-larger hunk out of each monthly check----typically $48 for shipping and handling, $102 for fair share contribution to assorted bailouts and $424 for prescription drug insurance, which was initially offered at $42, but---oh well. If any older adult is not satisfied with the check or with the government cooperating with bait-and-switch insurance companies, he or she may return the check to the US Treasury, no questions asked.

September… Seniors notice that the donut hole in their prescription coverage has gotten so large, it’s all hole and no donut. Millions protest by dumping their meds down the sink, thereby insuring that all the households on the town water systems are protected from heart disease and arthritis. The federal government, looking at the improved public health statistics, considers using Universal Drug Dumps as one way to get health care for all. The Secretary of Health, Education and Promises described the phenomenon as “a great big Boston Tea Party with a good medical outcome. What’s not to like?”

October…will be the first month that the S&P 500 goes lower than the temperature outside. Senior citizens across the country stage a protest by driving very slowly on freeways. Other drivers don’t notice anything new.

November….is Sunset Supper Month, when restaurants all over the country offer early bird dinners consisting of a wide-ranging menu of turkey with giblet gravy and turkey with giblet gravy.

December…Bing Crosby’ s rendition of White Christmas is digitally re-mastered into Green Christmas and everybody gives and gets solar-powered appliances. Small children receive training windmills as gifts to introduce them to clean energy. But all the grandparents are happy because their shopping was done in the pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-holiday super stimulus sales that started in May.

On New Year’s Eve 2009, the lights go on all over the world. This celebratory surge trips off the electrical grid. Five billion TV sets go dark which insures a high birth rate in September 2010. Senior citizens deny any responsibility. Seventy is not the new twenty. 

The Gratitude of Geezers

     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. 

Undriving the Driver

What do an eighty-five year old man and a sixteen-year-old boy have in common?

            Two things: Both want the car keys permanently in their possession and both have the highest accident rates of any age groups. But the difference is that the teen’s driving will improve with maturity while older people will continue to experience deterioration in reaction time, in eyesight, hearing, distance perception, night vision and perhaps, if they take certain meds, clarity of consciousness.

When A Driver Loses His Edge

Now there are older people who are excellent drivers---I’d ride with them to hell and back---but there are others who are losing it and refusing to acknowledge the loss. Worse, there are others who have lost it. They get tickets, drive into trees, dent the car, forget their destination and generally worry their family members.

Then comes The Discussion: Isn’t it time for Mom or Dad to give up the car keys? Sometimes, a wise older person can see what’s happening without the family getting into it at all. These smart people just stop driving or restrict driving to the daytime or just to the corner store. Some of them enroll in an AARP course on safe driving, a course specifically directed to improving the skills of older drivers. Others begin to leave the driving to a mate with better eyesight. (One good rule: Whoever can see a person dressed in black, riding a bike without lights at night, should be the driver of choice after the sun goes down.)

But other older people are in complete denial and that’s when family members either step in and have a discussion about driving or if appropriate, confiscate the car keys, thereby insuring they will be left out of the will and not spoken to for months.

Here’s one solution that worked for Cranky Pants and his dad. Dad realized that his driving deteriorated. CP realized Dad wanted to control the car keys. An agreement was made: Dad had the car keys at all times except when he asked a home health aide or a family member to drive him somewhere. Other than the driving time, Dad had the keys. It worked.

Understanding Older People

 But why, you may ask yourself, do older people cling so stubbornly to their driving rights?

For the same reason the teen does: A love of independence. An appreciation of one of our basic freedoms---the freedom to go out.  And an older person has other concerns: who will get the groceries, go to the drugstore or travel to the doctor’s? And what kind of a dive does a social life take if you can’t drive? And how do you get to see your grandchilden’s soccer games without a car?

These and other transportation benefits that younger people take for granted are rightly treasured by older people, who, unless they live in cities, have poor choices when it comes to public transport or the possibility of walking to carry out errands.  So what to do? Here’s a second idea:

A Cost Analysis

How much money does it take to operate a car? For most people, it’s the second highest household expenditure after the mortgage. In some households, the money spent on cars almost equals the money spent on food and medical care combined. 

 So to do a cost analysis, consider the cost of the car, its financing and maintenance, the insurance, the gas, the registration and the costs of parking. Then there’s the fact that a car is a depreciating asset---evaporating money. Add in the parking tickets and the dent removal and that’s a chunk of change spent on transportation.

The calculators at AAA estimate that it now costs .71 cents a mile to own a financed car. If you drive 20,000 miles a year, that $14,200 dollars. Check out the figures for yourself at http://tinyurl.com/3pf2yn.

Fourteen thousand dollars could buy a lot of taxi rides when we can’t drive anymore---to say nothing of lower blood pressure. But few seem to think of the taxi option for older adults, as if it were an extravagance. But as we have seen, it is probably a bargain when compared to owning a car. Yet conventional thinking about this issue seems to end with taking the car away or using an inconveniently scheduled van service.

Me, when I’m 90, I’m calling a cab.

Find more information about dealing with older parents and their cars at http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/personal/01/18/taking.keys.away.

Depression Geezers Speak Up

 

My Inner Swami is AWOL I don’t know what will happen economically and neither do the experts. Recession? Depression? Nothing?

What I still have, though, is that character within: Ms. Worst Case. Yes, I am a worst case planner. I imagine a worst case scenario, figure out how to handle it and then, relax, feeling I am prepared for the worst.

Now, older people can be helpful in these economic times because many remember the worst-case economic scenario, The Great Depression, either as young adults, teens or tots. And we are here as witnesses that a country can live through bad times.

Yes, work was very hard to get and food was sometimes scarce. We could not have second helpings of potatoes. Fresh fruit was an unknown. I practically fainted over a fresh tangerine in a Christmas stocking when I was five years old.  And we were educationally starved. Nobody had money for books and I did not see a book until I went to kindergarten.

So those were some of the downers, but, believe it or not, the Depression had some good things going for it. Even the worst case had silver linings:

Better Family Life: Today, critics see the nuclear family as an isolated unit, living below the poverty line when it comes to family relationships. In the Depression, though, generations often lived together to save on rent. In one small duplex, our grandparents hosted two sons in an unheated attic, a widowed son and his two daughters in one bedroom, my husband-deserted mom on the couch and my brother and me in the grandparents’ room. Ten buddies against the storm. It was a lively home, offering the comfort of relatives, the sharing of tasks and believe it or not, a lot of laughs.

And when generations live together, the youngest learn from the oldest. I hope I learned generosity from my grandmother Lucy. Though we hardly had enough food, when hobos came to the back door looking for dinner, my grammy fed them. And there were lots of hobos who wandered up from the railroad tracks. I think our house had the hobo hieroglyphic that said: Good Stew Here.

Community Togetherness: Again, critics say America has lost its sense of community and is separating into groups that have no common identity. This trend is sometimes called Bowling Alone. Well, in the Depression, almost all the people were in the same economic boat. There wasn’t the huge disparity between the classes that exists now, or if there was one, we didn’t know about it. There was no TV to bring in the lifestyles of the rich and famous.

My mom told me everybody she knew brushed their teeth back then with charcoal because no one could afford toothpaste. Didn’t that bother you? I asked. She said no---not that nor any of the other economies because all were practicing the same ones. Those were the days of party lines---several families sharing one phone line---and the excitement of getting hand-me-down clothes. (To this day I prefer gently used clothes to new ones. Someone else suffers through the starch.)

Better environment: We didn’t produce carbon dioxide when we drove because we didn’t drive. We didn’t have a car. We used public transport or walked. As for other energy use, there was no AC. Heating was minimal. My gram once chopped up a dresser to use as firewood on a freezing night. Saved by the furniture—what a story.

Excellent playtimes for kids. We got lots of outdoor exercise. Kick the can, tag, hopscotch, hide and seek, sliding down the sandbank…these kept us active. And there were no toys except sticks and stones and an old tin can but we had lots of fun. Really. Never did I feel deprived, at least not until I got to kindergarten and realized that books existed. Then I learned how to get to the “lie-berry”.

So those are just a few of the great things about the Great Depression and though we may never have another, it’s nice to know that living on a lower level economically does not mean living on a lower level emotionally.

So you who are young and frightened should look at us old cottontops and see that we have survived pretty well. And so shall you if it ever comes to it. But I am hoarding toothpaste just in case.

Going Down in History

 

A Surprise Request for Family History           

Go memoir yourself---that’s the current advice given to older people and it is a good idea. Those who come after us may want to know where they came from, genetically and geographically. But, in 50 years, unless you write it down, your past will be lost to the future.

Then nobody will know how you ate dirt during the Depression and how you saved aluminum gum wrappers as a way to insure victory during World War II.  Nobody will know the colorful sayings of your grandparents, or how they told you tales about “the old country”, tales that made you happy you lived in the new one.

            So, unless you are a president or a dignitary---not necessarily one and the same---first-person accounts are really the only way to preserve your past. Write about yourself, your parents and your grandparents and go as far back as memory and patience will take you. There are many books, courses and people to help get these memories and thoughts out and down on paper or tape.

But really, just start: I was born in so and so. My earliest memories were such and such. I went to school wherever and I had a big crush on so and so. This you can do.

A Surprise Request for Family History

Now, though we oldsters have been urged to write about ourselves, nobody tells us to write about our children and those are the people grandchildren may be most interested in. At least my grands are and why not? They are closer to their parents than they are to their grandparents and their curiosity about a more immediate past is natural.

Case in point: Last summer, at a three-generation get-together---a time when family stories will out---what the grandchildren wanted to hear were the stories of their parents---what were they like as kids, as teenagers and as young adults. They wanted to know who their parents dated before they ended up with each other and what kind of trouble or glory their parents got into before they assumed the role of middle-aged parents.

The time was ripe for blackmail, but I tried to keep to the truth without telling anything that would send the parents to the law books to see when the statute of limitations had run out on minor crimes of the immature.

That get-together got me thinking about doing a new kind of memoir, not about me, but about my kids---sort of a baby book continued. (Most of us kept those books, with the birth data and first picture, what weight was gained in the first three months. The little baby shoes kept too, or bronzed as if they were the infant feet of gods.)

Well, at least we kept those baby books until the second child came along and buried our good intentions under dirty diapers. After that, the biography of my kids just consisted of the class pictures, year by year, with the bad haircuts and goofy smiles. And after that, their history got even more brief----school yearbooks with short-cut designations of character: most likely to succeed, most likely to make trouble and so forth.

Making Up for Their Lost Years

So how to fill out the lost years of our kids for their kids? Maybe think now about a holiday present. Maybe buy a small blank book and start filling it in with short descriptions and available photos. Nothing fancy, but plenty meaningful to those who care.

My mom, a child singing star, had a scrapbook made by her mom---photos, reviews of performances and clippings from newspapers. If my house burns down, I will grab Cranky Pants, my laptop and that scrapbook, which goes to show that kids do treasure the memories of their parents and maybe that’s where some of our memoir energy might go—not unto ourselves, but unto our kids for their kids.

Now, you who are skilled at scrapbooking can really make something of this project. We who are not so skilled can still do something. A blank book, a pen, some photos, a little glue---a very nice holiday present for the grandkids.

If you can’t get started, just imagine your grandchild 50 years from now rescuing your scrapbook from a burning house. The house will likely never burn, but the desire to know about our parents always, always will.

Conventions: Once a Doubter, Now a Fan

I thought I lived in a house, but now know I was living under a rock---at least when it came to the great American institution of conventions. Until recently, all I encountered were the conventions put on by elephants and donkeys---the political conventions---which I discovered as a kid watching snowy TV pictures coming in under a set of rabbit ears.

            Viewing the vintage political conventions of both parties---well, that was when I starting doubting the intelligence of adults---all those silly hats and the cheering of feel-good speeches whose content was as light as a passing cloud. (I had a content detector even back in 6^th grade.) I thought some of the speakers made Milton Berle look like Socrates. So, back in grade school, I developed a prejudice against conventions. The behavior of conventioneering adults made me not look forward to growing up.

The Changing of a Mind

            There’s nothing like actual experience to change a mind harboring a fossil prejudice. Last week, at the national convention of the AARP in Washington, I learned there are interesting conventions, meetings where people actually learn things and come out at the end better for the experience. OK, pooped from all the walking and the over-stimulation of 30,000 new buddies, but better.

            Maybe I should get out of the house more, but I was blown away by the grandly scaled and beautiful Washington convention center. Imagine an exhibition floor as large as seven football fields and that was just the bottom floor. There were others that harbored a ballroom and a theater, meeting rooms, lounges, grand art-filled halls and most important, enough bathrooms so that one never ever had to wait. (Men may not get this, but women know the importance of no-waiting rest rooms.)

So What Was There for the Learning?

            What wasn’t there? You could learn about budget travel and retiring abroad, about foods that will keep you young, about fixing your digital photos and also about online dating, cruising in China, senior sex from Dr. Ruth in person and so much more, it would take all of today’s paper to relate. But if you wanted to find your dream job, learn about current brain research, catch up on what’s new in eye care, learn what to see in Ireland or where to take an art course in Mexico, someone was there to tell you.

            There were sections on tech---computers lined up classroom style if you wanted to learn to use one better (or at all).  Also, representatives from about every government agency you could name, plus info on Medicare literacy, financial smarts, building communities for successful aging and lots of fun stuff besides. Example: There was a three-band night club the first evening just to get people rocking and rolling, but by dinnertime all I wanted was a room service cheeseburger and bed. (If there is a late night party to poop, just ask me.)

Celebrity City

            Now, if you wanted to see Paul Simon in concert or perhaps Natalie Cole, Ramsey Lewis or Chicago, you could. Regis Philbin was there as were Shirley MacLaine, Maya Angelou, Quincy Jones and the newly famous Young@Heart Chorus, average age 81. Martina Navratilova was present to start off your morning with a fitness session and Chaka Khan was there to sing goodnight. Even Grass Valley has its reps: Both Carole Carson and I gave speeches and were interviewed by John Palmer on Retirement Living Television, though the expo was so big, Carole and I never saw each other.

 

            I did get to meet about 1,894 other people, mostly at Gallo’s Livingston Cellars booth, where, as a spokesperson, I helped introduce many Easterners to the virtues of California wine and, as an author, inflicted all who showed up with my book, Hot Granny. I also met the people who run AARP publications, so now there are faces on the masthead names that put together the magazine appearing regularly in our mailboxes.

            But, by Saturday afternoon, with a tropical storm adding its own excitements, people began tearing down the hundreds of exhibits on the Expo floor. It was as if an entire city was being dismantled. However, like Brigadoon, AARP’s National Event and Expo will rise again in 2009---this time in Las Vegas.

            So, next year, I’m saving October 22-24 for a (gulp!) convention. You can find out more at aarp.org/events or call 1-800-883-2784.

            And now I’ve got to go vacuum my office. The floor is littered with discarded opinions.

 

Make Your Own Village

 

Second Wind

            Some day you and I will be over the hill. And I say better over the hill than under it.

            Still, the fact is that sometime, when we are a bit more frail and doddery, we may need help to remain independent in our own homes. And if the body and energy falter, it’s helpful and sometimes necessary---to have someone do the driving, shopping, cooking, home repairs and all the other chores of life. It’s also nice when you are sick to have someone bring chicken soup and the pain pills du jour and of course the ice packs after your annual bad fall in the garden. And then there is the basic need for human contact, for pleasant company, for someone to nag and be nagged by---one way to know you are loved.

            I know, all that is what you have a mate for, but couples do not dive into Eternity in sync. It’s not a synchronized event—one always leaves earth before the other, which is a sobering thought, though it can be used to help appreciate your mate more now---absence making the heart grow fonder before the actual absence.

            What’s more, when it comes to counting on mates for help, many older people are not only widowed, but single through choice or divorce. Some are also childless or alienated from their children, so no caring kids are coming to the rescue if one does begin to falter in the life chores department.

             In yesteryear, the old folks and the young folks lived together---my widowed grammy shared my bed when she was old---but today, the middle manager son is transferred to the other coast, the daughter married and moved to Maui and the black sheep kid lives in Thailand and not for the weather. And even if the adult kids were still around within helping distance, most older people I know don’t want to be a burden.

            Like two-year-olds, we want to do it ourselves. Or maybe with a bit of help from other sources.

One New Source to the Rescue           

            So, assuming your family may not be the solution or even the one you want… and assuming you and I do not have a butler, driver, maid and handyperson on our household staff, we will need help and so will millions of other people in the US. And, mirable dictu---which means No Kidding in Latin---there is actually a solution to our needs, something that is happening quietly all over the country,

Making Your Own Extended Family

            The solution, already a reality in some places, is to invent an area support group, a “village” in your town. It means getting together a membership organization of older people that offers the following services: driving to appointments or shopping, getting the house repairs done, cleaning, help with housework, care when you’re down and out physically plus nutrition services---which often means meals delivered to the door.

            The model for this solution comes from Beacon Hill Village in Boston. The neighbors there got together and organized to help each other survive as older adults in their own homes. The Village offers household and home maintenance services, health and wellness help, including exercise opportunities. And since isolation can be a problem for older people, they also arrange small get-togethers, parties and trips as well as cultural opportunities for expanding minds and life experience. All in all, they say they want to make “remaining at home a safe, comfortable and cost-effective solution.”

            Through media exposure, people all over the US heard about Beacon Hill Village. They had so many requests for information about organizing this service for older adults that they now have a detailed handbook that covers all the how’s of starting a membership organization.

            The manual, which can be ordered by mail, phone or online offers help from the founders, the original business plan, marketing materials, fundraising letters, board and committee structures, budgets and ways to help you develop your own Beacon Village. The price for this package is $350 for non-profits and neighborhood groups or $500 for profits and municipalities.

            The web site is www.beaconhillvillage.org and the email is bhvillage@aol.com. Phone: 617-723-4117. Address: 74 Joy Street, Boston MA 02114.

            Doesn’t all this sound better than counting on Black Baa to come back from Thailand to pick up your meds at the drug store? Besides, he might make off with your pain pills.

Over 50?: Pack Your Suitcase Full of Ideas

Planning---what a pain in the posterior. Why not just be in the moment? Fly by the seat of the pantsuit?

            Well, when it comes to retirement, if you go with the flow, you may end up down the drain.  It’s smart to plan for retirement and that means doing more than buying a Harley and hitting Route 66---which gets us to one of the puzzles of retirement planning…what he wants versus what she wants.

Planning in Tandem

            If you are a partnered person, you’d better check out your plans with your other half, because he or she may be thinking of staying home, raising llamas and meditating in perfect quiet. You, on the other hand, may want to travel far and wide with a brass band in an old school bus, giving concerts in wayside parks all across America.

            Don’t laugh. People have very different retirement movies in their heads. One mate wants to head to remote deserts---peace at last---while the other wants to live downtown where it’s happening. One wants to spend money down to the last dime, while the other wants to forego present spending pleasures and save for a rainy day.

            And when it comes to family, some want to live near the kids, others have been there, done that and want to move to Mexico. Or, one wants to be the designated baby sitter, the trophy grandparent, while the other says, enough of diapers, spit-up and school recitals, this is the time for Us, not Them.

            So start talking with your partner. Better to fight---I mean negotiate---today rather than later when you find yourself trying to meditate in the middle of the brass band.

Planning for money

            I know, all the money that should be going to your 401k is going to Exxon. But you will need more than Social Security to survive at a decent level. However, when it comes to multiple sources of income, lucky are those among us who have pensions---a disappearing concept---or retirement funds that are not sinking---or houses that are not losing their value.

            Well, all any of us can do today is the best we can.

            If you want an economical way to invest and are up for the risk that goes with investing, look to Vanguard, the favorite of retirees everywhere for its low-cost investment vehicles. Not that you can’t lose money there. It’s just that Vanguard doesn’t charge an arm and a leg to buy into one of its stock or bond funds. They also have sensible investing info: www.vanguard.com.

             If you would to like to become more literate about money, read The Little Book of Common Sense Investing by John Bogle and Women & Money: Owning The Power to Control Your Destiny by Suze Orman.

Planning for work

            The age of eligibility for Social Security will probably be pushed up even more and that SS income won’t be enough anyhow, so be prepared to stay in the work force until you are old enough to be on the Today show’s Smucker’s jam jar. Most Boomers already sense this scenario and plan on working as older adults.

             What kind of jobs they will find is another story. I’ve met highly educated retired teachers in the checkout line packing my groceries. To get around the hiring issues---low-paying jobs and employers prejudiced against older adults----some people plan to start their own businesses when they get older, or sell their crafts or offer their services part-time. And later life may be the time to buy that franchise or start that store…any smart enterprise that will float your financial boat.

            Now, if you love your work, keeping on with it into old age is a dream come true---seriously. Good work is a keystone of worth, a link to the rest of the world and a way to keep our brains from turning into tofu.

            So bottom line: develop some kind of plan for your later years. You don’t want to arrive in Geezerland without a suitcase full of ideas.

            But getting a Harley is not a full-fledged plan and Cranky Pants tells me a spring tour of Greek temples isn’t one either.

            Darn.

Getting Around (No Matter What)

I kiss my cane. At least I used to when it helped me get out and about instead of stuck at home with a bum hip. I also once loved a walker, though my relationship with crutches after a ski injury was more love-hate.

            What these things have in common is that they are assistive devices. But, if ever good things have a negative image among the populace, it’s assistive devices. People don’t like the thought of using them.

            I hear this a lot:  If I use a cane or walker, people will think I am old. Given that a recent national poll indicates there is more prejudice against older people than any other group, I can see the reasoning behind not wanting to look old. Who wants to get run over by a heavy stereotype?

            But and however, it’s time the stereotyping of older people got zapped by the reality that older doesn’t mean done in or finished. It means experienced. And my hope is that experience will teach smart older people that it is far better to use assistive devices to get out of the house than to stay home watching TV re-runs. First-run living is better than re-run fiction.

            Here are a few ideas for re-gaining physical freedom:

            Canes: If you need a bit of help maintaining stability or taking weight off a limb, consider canes. They worked for Fred Astaire. Today’s canes come in more fashionable styles so they lose that sour medicinal look. Still other canes fold—great for travel---and some are gorgeously carved. Or, you can do what I did when I once needed a cane: buy a plain one and decorate it yourself. I cut out travel images from wrapping paper and used a little glue-like Hodge Podge to glue the pictures onto the cane. I could have sold that cane dozens of times to people who loved its jauntiness. For more ideas and products, go to www.fashionablecanes.com or www.houseofcanes.com.

 

            Walkers: These have gone the way of baby strollers. They used to be plain, functional and cheap, but have now gone upscale---almost into the lifestyle statement category.

            The original design still does a good job---supporting people on three sides as they get out and about. If you ever used one of these after surgery, you know how helpful they are. With just two front wheels, they are also light, fold easily and can be tucked into a car without effort.  But they are almost all designed to be dull. Rich, rich will be the first manufacturer that wakes up and smells the Boomers. There will be Elvis walkers, rainbow walkers and walkers with green leaves on them. 

            Some of the newer walkers---aka rollators---are far better looking---think Racing Green---have four wheels---think off-road----and added functions. Most of all, they have a seat, a great boon, for it means one’s walking range is extended. A person can get out to a fair or festival and have his own seat with him when he gets tired. There’s also a basket for a purse, sweater, water or small groceries, so you can take your stuff along. Very cool.

            Heads Up: People need to be sure to set the brakes on the newer walkers before they sit down, so the more advanced walkers with brakes may not be the best choice for an older person who can’t remember things. Also, many walkers are adjusted too low, so the people using them are hunched over, squishing lungs, ruining posture and making them look like what they don’t want to look like---old.

            Warehouse clubs carry walkers as do some pharmacies that stock heavy duty medical supplies. Online, check out www.planetmobility or www.cane-n-able.com.

If You Want to Jazz Up Appearances

            People who get around regularly in wheelchairs have learned how to dress and accessorize to show they are not dead to the world. Those using other assistive devices might follow their lead. So forget the stereotypical older person’s wardrobe. (Those wearing beige cardigans will be sent to the principal.)             Instead, wear a baseball cap in a bright color. Sport a tee shirt that proclaims something funny or eye-catching. Cranky Pants sports one that says Older Than Dirt. Who knows what he’ll escalate to if he ever gets a walker? Wear a bright bandana. Hang a license plate on the back.

            Try a little outrageous geezer behavior. If not now, when? Flirt with the sex of your choice. Nobody arrested an old person for winking. (I never understood why older men are called ”dirty old men” for behavior that makes younger men “studly”.)

            Last, use everything you can to keep on keeping on. Whatever it is or whatever it looks like, your assistive device is doing you a favor. You don’t have to kiss it, but “appreciate” may be the appropriate word.

Emotional Health: Keep Your Bucket Full

 

            Pretend you carry around an invisible bucket. When it’s full, it represents your positive vibes. Empty, your morale has gone bust. Now the job is to fill that bucket with fresh water to keep the morale plumped up and your well-being deeply hydrated.

            How to keep the bucket filled? Do what you love, be with people who accept you so broadly---opinion warts and all----that you don’t have to watch your mouth. Nice too if they love you and you love them. Also good for the morale to have a place that feels like a sanctuary. Some call this home. Others call it Nature. Still others call it the neighborhood pub. Doesn’t matter. Whatever relaxes. Wherever you don’t have to watch your back. Whatever fills your invisible bucket.

            Then consider what and who will drain that precious bucket. What will dry up the water, empty the juice, leave the pail full of dust and spider webs? A job you hate, people who make your spirit dry and itchy, the feeling you have no real home refuge. And here’s the self-generated desiccator: feeling sorry for yourself.

Poor Me

            There probably isn’t a person on earth who hasn’t one time or other felt sorry for himself, often with good reason. Who hasn’t felt shoved off the good luck trail, thinking that everyone else was dancing on the path, you the only one without a map and limping along in the brush?

            Older adults have even more reason to revert to the poor me trap. Reaching full maturity---aka the falling apart stage---we suffer cataracts, bad knees, low energy, hips that don’t work, joints that talk and feet that show their mileage. We are more vulnerable to heat, cold, smoke inhalation, poverty, insomnia, feelings of uselessness and certain dark thoughts like wondering when we’ll fall off the conveyor belt of life into eternity. (Some even worry once they’re plopped into eternity whether they‘ll be taking the up or down elevator.) But none of these thoughts or conditions will fill our bucket. Indeed, they can punch holes in the pail.

Stopping the Morale Leaks

            There are three secrets to happy aging and keeping the bucket full. One is to stop worrying about physical decline and do something either to prevent or fix whatever is driving you crazy. Modern surgery does wonders with eyes, hips and knees. Exercise and good nutrition--- plus avoiding processed foods with weird ingredients and high fructose levels---should promote health and increase energy levels. In other words, a lot of what ails us is manageable.

            The second secret is gratitude. When the levels are down emotionally, see the bucket as half full, not half empty. Be grateful that you actually have what you have. I know that is a platitude, an old saw, but clichés got to be clichés because they are true. Few things are as good for the morale as giving thanks for the good things you enjoy, whatever they may be.

            Now here’s a true cornball story about gratitude: Every morning I walk down the driveway to pick up this paper and I think of it as my Lucky Walk. I hear the birds doing their morning chirps and think I am Bird Lucky. I look at what’s growing and think I am Plant Lucky, more specifically, Lavender Lucky. I pick up the paper and think I am Writing Lucky. (Look, people actually read what I write. How absolutely lucky is that?)

            Next, I see the houses in either side of me and think about the people who live there and know I am Neighbor Lucky. And so it goes. On those mini-walks, I am also Goat Lucky, Horse Lucky and even Chicken Lucky because my neighbors not only love people, they love animals that I can enjoy without having to clean the barn. One might say I am even Horse Pucky Lucky.

            So those little walks can set the theme for the day: gratitude, especially global gratitude for the sheer miracle of being alive, breathing on a small dirt clod hurtling through space at muchmillion miles per hour, heading who knows where. The trick is not to care where, but just be happy for the ride.

            Now, the third secret…well, I forget. But then I am allowed to forget as I am practically old enough to have dated Cro-Magnon men. But I do remember that your job and mine is to keep our buckets full and share the overflow.

            Look around. Many folks are wandering around with dry pails. So throw a little water on someone today.  It’s a sure way to fill your own bucket. 

Thinking Smart, Thinking Ahead

Second Wind

            Some day you and I will be over the hill. And I say better over the hill than under it.

            Still, the fact is that sometime, when we are a bit more frail and doddery, we may need help to remain independent in our own homes. And if the body and energy falter, it’s helpful and sometimes necessary---to have someone do the driving, shopping, cooking, home repairs and all the other chores of life. It’s also nice when you are sick to have someone bring chicken soup and the pain pills du jour and of course the ice packs after your annual bad fall in the garden. And then there is the basic need for human contact, for pleasant company, for someone to nag and be nagged by---one way to know you are loved.

            I know, all that is what you have a mate for, but couples do not dive into Eternity in sync. It’s not a synchronized event—one always leaves earth before the other, which is a sobering thought, though it can be used to help appreciate your mate more now---absence making the heart grow fonder before the actual absence.

            What’s more, when it comes to counting on mates for help, many older people are not only widowed, but single through choice or divorce. Some are also childless or alienated from their children, so no caring kids are coming to the rescue if one does begin to falter in the life chores department.

             In yesteryear, the old folks and the young folks lived together---my widowed grammy shared my bed when she was old---but today, the middle manager son is transferred to the other coast, the daughter married and moved to Maui and the black sheep kid lives in Thailand and not for the weather. And even if the adult kids were still around within helping distance, most older people I know don’t want to be a burden.

            Like two-year-olds, we want to do it ourselves. Or maybe with a bit of help from other sources.

One New Source to the Rescue           

            So, assuming your family may not be the solution or even the one you want… and assuming you and I do not have a butler, driver, maid and handyperson on our household staff, we will need help and so will millions of other people in the US. And, mirable dictu---which means No Kidding in Latin---there is actually a solution to our needs, something that is happening quietly all over the country,

Making Your Own Extended Family

            The solution, already a reality in some places, is to invent an area support group, a “village” in your town. It means getting together a membership organization of older people that offers the following services: driving to appointments or shopping, getting the house repairs done, cleaning, help with housework, care when you’re down and out physically plus nutrition services---which often means meals delivered to the door.

            The model for this solution comes from Beacon Hill Village in Boston. The neighbors there got together and organized to help each other survive as older adults in their own homes. The Village offers household and home maintenance services, health and wellness help, including exercise opportunities. And since isolation can be a problem for older people, they also arrange small get-togethers, parties and trips as well as cultural opportunities for expanding minds and life experience. All in all, they say they want to make “remaining at home a safe, comfortable and cost-effective solution.”

            Through media exposure, people all over the US heard about Beacon Hill Village. They had so many requests for information about organizing this service for older adults that they now have a detailed handbook that covers all the how’s of starting a membership organization.

            The manual, which can be ordered by mail, phone or online offers help from the founders, the original business plan, marketing materials, fundraising letters, board and committee structures, budgets and ways to help you develop your own Beacon Village. The price for this package is $350 for non-profits and neighborhood groups or $500 for profits and municipalities.

            The web site is www.beaconhillvillage.org and the email is bhvillage@aol.com. Phone: 617-723-4117. Address: 74 Joy Street, Boston MA 02114.

            Doesn’t all this sound better than counting on Black Baa to come back from Thailand to pick up your meds at the drug store? Besides, he might make off with your pain pills.

            

The Daughter Makeover

It is probably a good idea not to look too much like yesterday.

If your get-up is from the 1940’s, 50’s or 60’s, people might think your mind is old-fashioned too. And that’s a liability when you are older. It can work against you both in the workplace and in life.

But brain fossilization just isn’t true of most older people I know. In fact, because they read and actually watch hour-long news shows, older people may be more up-to-date on world happenings than many youngsters who have their faces stuck solely in FaceBook.

Anyhow, I think it’s sensible to have your insides and outside match and when an opportunity came my way to get a little more with-it on my outside, I took advantage. This big opportunity for chic-ing up is known as visiting your daughter, though it can be done with anyone who knows you well enough to tell you that your pants are baggy in back and you need a new ‘do”.

Your Own Reality Show
The trick to this kind of truth-telling is to have the hide of a rhino and a willingness to throw your old lipstick in the trash. A credit card helps too, as you will be told to buy liquids to get the yellow out of your hair, to acquire a handbag that doesn’t have an I Like Ike button on the bottom, to buy some lip gloss which makes your lips shiny---and you looking a bit like a street-walker. (The geezer goes a-tarting---this week’s episode!)

So here’s what I learned in my week at The Daughter Spa----things we were taught to do that are totally not on fashion’s radar screen today.

• Suits are out. Bottoms and tops should not match, but they should go together. Going together is very liberally interpreted in today’s world.
• Shoes and handbags should not match and we fossils need to stop saying purse and pocketbook and start saying bag. (Bags have gotten so huge with tons of metal hardware---they look like portable armored cars.)
• Fanny backs are for dorks. (I will remain a dork: They are useful and a way to carry more junk onto a plane. Also, we don’t have to ask where our keys are. They are on our bellybutton.)
• Bright lipsticks, weird-colored eye shadows and eyeliners are out at The Daughter Spa, but colored hair is still in.
• When it comes to hair color, expensive streaking is still in and reduces root worry. (Gray is not yet the new blond, but I’m hoping.)
• White sneakers---our first choice footwear---is out. We can no longer be little old ladies in sneakers, but I intend to sneak my sneakers into my wardrobe plan which is so far: bottoms with elastic waists, tops that don’t have to be ironed and that don’t show marinara spots.
• Avoid bubble hair-do’s, aka the silver helmet effect. Also, condition your hair. Dull hair is a sure sign that you are nearing your expiration date. Look for products what concentrate on making you shine again.
• As for guys, they should drop the buzz cut and the thin ties of the 50’s, and preferably drop the ties altogether unless somebody died or got married. Unlike older women, older guys can still wear shorts and nobody cares about the knee replacement scars. They are marks of honor, like the dueling scars of yore.
• Anybody of any gender older than 12 is too old for a Speedo. Lands End has many bathing costumes for older people who left Bikiniville long ago.
• For women, waxing to de-hair various parts is in. So is making topiary out of a certain private spot. But I do not want an intimate relationship with hedge trimmers so I will live and die as nature made me---except for the lipgloss.

Words for the Wise
I usually hate beauty books: the advice is to buy mucho products and try to look young, young, young. Phooey, but I do say try to look your best and not like a relic in Madame Tussaud’s museum. Though it has an annoying title---How Not To Look Old---Charla Krupp’s book does have some tips that can be useful to the older woman who wants to look her best.

Yes, I know---being your best is more important, but if you still wear The Suit with the matching pocketbook and baby doll heels, my daughter will be at your door. She’ll put you in handcuffs and take you shopping.

Keep Your Emotional Bucket Full

Pretend you carry around an invisible bucket. When it’s full, it represents your positive vibes. Empty, your morale has gone bust. Now the job is to fill that bucket with fresh water to keep the morale plumped up and your well-being deeply hydrated.

How to keep the bucket filled? Do what you love, be with people who accept you so broadly---opinion warts and all----that you don’t have to watch your mouth. Nice too if they love you and you love them. Also good for the morale to have a place that feels like a sanctuary. Some call this home. Others call it Nature. Still others call it the neighborhood pub. Doesn’t matter. Whatever relaxes. Wherever you don’t have to watch your back. Whatever fills your invisible bucket.

Then consider what and who will drain that precious bucket. What will dry up the water, empty the juice, leave the pail full of dust and spider webs? A job you hate, people who make your spirit dry and itchy, the feeling you have no real home refuge. And here’s the self-generated desiccator: feeling sorry for yourself.

Poor Me
There probably isn’t a person on earth who hasn’t one time or other felt sorry for himself, often with good reason. Who hasn’t felt shoved off the good luck trail, thinking that everyone else was dancing on the path, you the only one without a map and limping along in the brush?

Older adults have even more reason to revert to the poor me trap. Reaching full maturity---aka the falling apart stage---we suffer cataracts, bad knees, low energy, hips that don’t work, joints that talk and feet that show their mileage. We are more vulnerable to heat, cold, smoke inhalation, poverty, insomnia, feelings of uselessness and certain dark thoughts like wondering when we’ll fall off the conveyor belt of life into eternity. (Some even worry once they’re plopped into eternity whether they‘ll be taking the up or down elevator.) But none of these thoughts or conditions will fill our bucket. Indeed, they can punch holes in the pail.

Stopping the Morale Leaks
There are three secrets to happy aging and keeping the bucket full. One is to stop worrying about physical decline and do something either to prevent or fix whatever is driving you crazy. Modern surgery does wonders with eyes, hips and knees. Exercise and good nutrition--- plus avoiding processed foods with weird ingredients and high fructose levels---should promote health and increase energy levels. In other words, a lot of what ails us is manageable.

The second secret is gratitude. When the levels are down emotionally, see the bucket as half full, not half empty. Be grateful that you actually have what you have. I know that is a platitude, an old saw, but clichés got to be clichés because they are true. Few things are as good for the morale as giving thanks for the good things you enjoy, whatever they may be.

Now here’s a true cornball story about gratitude: Every morning I walk down the driveway to pick up this paper and I think of it as my Lucky Walk. I hear the birds doing their morning chirps and think I am Bird Lucky. I look at what’s growing and think I am Plant Lucky, more specifically, Lavender Lucky. I pick up the paper and think I am Writing Lucky. (Look, people actually read what I write. How absolutely lucky is that?)

Next, I see the houses in either side of me and think about the people who live there and know I am Neighbor Lucky. And so it goes. On those mini-walks, I am also Goat Lucky, Horse Lucky and even Chicken Lucky because my neighbors not only love people, they love animals that I can enjoy without having to clean the barn. One might say I am even Horse Pucky Lucky.

So those little walks can set the theme for the day: gratitude, especially global gratitude for the sheer miracle of being alive, breathing on a small dirt clod hurtling through space at muchmillion miles per hour, heading who knows where. The trick is not to care where, but just be happy for the ride.

Now, the third secret…well, I forget. But then I am allowed to forget as I am practically old enough to have dated Cro-Magnon men. But I do remember that your job and mine is to keep our buckets full and share the overflow.

Look around. Many folks are wandering around with dry pails. So throw a little water on someone today. It’s a sure way to fill your own bucket.

Adventures in Dating

      Do older people date or has the mating scene been left behind with the bellbottoms and the lava lamps? Well, many singles over 50 would like to date and become doubles, but they have trouble knowing how. The bar scene seems ridiculous now:

    What’s your sign?

    Centrum Silver.

    So what’s a lonely older person to do? Here are some suggestions adapted from my book, Hot Granny. Though the principles below apply to all seekers, this advice was directed to women looking for single men:

What to do?

Try: The vast resources of other women. They know men, They have address books and memories. Their cousins, their co-workers and even their rejects may be just what would interest you. And you don’t have to already know these helpful women, Unless a stranger is talking to a lamp post, talk to her. I met my husband through a woman I sat next to on a plane.

Try: Getting out into the world of organizations. I know several people who were married late in life to someone they met in church. Others try political fund-raisers or they volunteer for food banks, community radio, music groups or alumni organizations. With the economy so constipated, do-good organizations need nice-do-gooders like you.

Try: Taking a class. Learn to fly fish. Go to a line-dancing class. Check out the offerings of the community college.

Try: Travel. Take a cruise. Take a cruise directed to an interest of yours…like jazz. Try an Elderhostel tour.

Try: Recovery organizations. If you have had a struggle with substance abuse, find an organization that encourages sobriety. One friend travels around the world, serene in the knowledge that anywhere she goes, she will be welcomed by fellow AA members---all of whom have a similar idea about how to have a good time.

Try: Getting active. Join a gym or a biking club. Hike with those who love the rivers and the mountains.

Try: The performing arts. Join a theater group, a band or a choir.

Try: The Internet. The Net is an adventure in cyberspace, but watch your back and know that many men who advertise for company already have it---they’re married.

Internet Adventures

            Dating sites on the Internet have proliferated like horny bunnies.  Each site may have different rules: photos required or not, memberships fees or not. But all will ask you to say something about yourself.

        If you have trouble tooting your own horn, you can ask a friend to help you with the write-up. Veterans of cyberdating suggest getting a book to learn how to write an appealing profile, take a good photo and discover ways to protect your personal privacy, such as www.myprivateline.com, a service providing a toll-free number that can be forwarded to your real phone number. (That’s so you don’t have to give out your home phone number right away--or ever).

        If you do decide to cyberdate, wear a well-tailored rhino hide. Older women can get bruised by the reality that some men are only after younger game. And the going standards used to evaluate women are often not related to character, kindness or experience---but to cuteness, bust size and layability. So, cyberdater, beware. And if your ego starts shrinking into a dry dustball because of rejections, stop the Internet action and get back to flesh and blood introductions.

Same Old, Same Old and Yet….

        If you haven’t dated in a while or even if you have, first dates as an older person can be just as nerve-wracking as they were when you were sixteen. Mellow years but same fears. Even the questions are the same:  What if you hate each other? What if you really like him and he doesn’t like you? What if he likes you and you hate him? Should you (blank) on the first date?

            But some concerns are different: You will no longer waste time on jerks. You will survive if he doesn’t like you. You now know how to gracefully disengage. You can finally trust yourself to decide what you want to do on a first date or indeed, on any date at all.

            So go forth and know it’s possible to be valued in your going-on-geezer years. Yesterday I told Cranky Pants, my late-life hubby, that a fund-raising mailer was asking him to donate an “appreciated asset”. He said no, he was going to hang on to me.         

###

Friends: The Best Blasts from the Past

There are friends and then there are old, old friends. The Double O friends are the people you knew at camp, grade school, high school or college. Maybe in the service, maybe from the old home town, but you, long ago, shared the same stomping ground. (Catholic schools count double points as a stomping ground.)

This shared history is powerful friendship glue and few emotional pleasures are as keen as reconnecting with these blasts from the past---maybe with someone who used to wear pedal pushers and giggle with you about Snooky Lanson on TV. Then there were the boys, now deep into their Social Security years. They wore porkpie hats, narrow ties and talked about bases and how to get there. (Rarely did they hit a home run in the 1950’s, but it was intriguing to imagine.)   

Taking Up Where You Left Off

      One of the miracles of growing older is finding that these friendships are a renewable resource. The character, the humor, the spunkiness, the smarts that attracted you are likely to still attract decades later. Last week, the woman who made me laugh fifty years ago at the wrong time in school made me laugh at a memorial service for our dead classmates. Bad girls---and inappropriate still.

      Probably inappropriate forever, though we are too old to go to detention. And my goal is to be inappropriately giggling with Witty Patricia 20 years from now.

Some Things Never Change

            Well, they change a little. Women still are champs at exchanging confidences, though the character of the subject matter differs over the decades. We still do talk about men or the lack of them, makeup, clothes and family. We no longer exchange recipes---been there, done that. We no longer complain about cramps, unless they are in our legs at night.  To our credit, we talk a lot more about politics, the world, the environment and voting. We seem to have become far more aware of the main issues on the global docket and more involved than ever in trying to bring about change. So we’ve improved. Gone beyond Snooky to Obama.

            Men will have to speak up for themselves, but my observation at home is that the people Cranky Pants loved back then and still knows now are high on his list. And perhaps one of the greatest male mentors when it comes to treasuring vintage friendships was Tim Russert, devoted to all the people he knew way back when in Buffalo. Case in point: Sister Lucille who showed up at his memorial service.

Words to the Wise

            Maybe you’ve stayed in touch with the oldies and goodies and maybe you haven’t. If you want to get in touch, pick up a phone. If you don’t know where the person is, try Google, a marvelous online tool for finding lost lambs. I re-found a friend on Google after forty-five years, a woman I had lost to time, travel and marriage. (Wedding bells do break up that old gang, especially when a woman changes her name, which is why I kept my maiden moniker, so the kids from 8^th grade could find me.) Many schools also keep rosters of alums. To find relatives, try the genealogy websites or call the family busybody.

     Note that later life friendships have become chic. There’s a new and growing business in girlfriend getaways with many web sites and even a magazine that advertises special places where women can go to enjoy time-outs together. If you Google girlfriend getaways, you’ll come up with many options for group get-togethers. (ABC News touts the nearby Napa Valley as one of the 10 best.)  There’s even a niche tee shirt business that concentrates on “she-shirts” for girlfriend getaways. And for those with money to burn on terrycloth-robe resorts, a site called www.girlaway.com lists the world’s best destination spas.

But you don’t have to spend money or set aside a week. Just go grab an old old friend and raise a glass to the past. Sometimes the past is a very pleasant place to visit, even if you don’t want to live there.
.

How to Get Family Email Without a Computer

           OK, you know and I know there are people who did not grow up digital. They were tech-deprived. Their messages were not instant, their friends lived next door, not on Facebook, and when they were young, a lap top was something you sat on if you were a little kid in need of comfort.

            Those people today are known as grandparents and some of them---I won’t name names---are resisting the best part of the modern world---computers, family email and getting the latest pics of the grandkids playing soccer.  I know these resisters and here’s how they think:

            If I get involved with computers, the computer will explode when I push the wrong button and maybe I too will explode with frustration because I don’t understand what it’s all about and maybe I am too old and dumb to learn. So I’ll stay out of the fray. 

            But these grandparents are leaving themselves out of the main family communication loop. And though older people may prefer to communicate by snail mail and the phone---it’s what they know---the grandkids they want to hear from don’t. Let’s see a show of hands here from those grandparents who get letters and regular phone calls from their grandchildren.

I thought so. Today’s kids speak email and if grandparents want to stay in touch, they have to put a toe in the tech water. Luckily, there’s a pleasant, easy compromise solution and it is called Presto. Remember that name because it’s how people can get emails and photos from the family without owning a computer or knowing how to do anything but pick up their printed-out email at home.

So What Is Presto?

            Think of it as nana technology, just made for grandparents. The device looks somewhat like a little fax machine and, like a fax, it plugs into a phone line. Made by HP, the device is called a printing mailbox and that’s just what it is. Family and friends can send emails and photos and presto, the little printing mailbox goes to work and prints them out.

            There’s no spam and no way to get in trouble on the net with criminals and porn salespeople. If gramps wants porn, he’s going to have to get a computer. And if he wants to send email back to his family, he’ll also have to get a computer as Presto provides incoming emails and photos only.

All of which is surely better than nothing. I think of Presto printouts as a family news report---who is doing what, what the new baby or the new house looks like, how little Madison’s smile has changed now that she’s lost her front teeth.

The Presto machine is on sale as I write this for 99 bucks, though it usually retails online at places like Amazon for $150. To run it, you need the $9.99 monthly services of the Presto people. Practically, someone in the family who is comfortable with computers will set the device up, though the Presto people say the process is a breeze.

Learn much more at www.presto.com. They even have a section of testimonials from older people who did not want to be Presto-ized, but who changed their minds as soon as the emails and the family pictures began appearing in their living rooms without their doing a thing. No typing. No sitting in front of screens. You can reassure grandma by telling her Martha Stewart was so impressed by Presto she did a TV segment on it.

Now, if you are looking for a Father’s Day present for a computerless older dad, think Presto. Maybe several kids can go in on it. The son or daughter physically closest to the parent would be the one who sets it up. And also, it’s not just a device for older folks. The Presto people gave out their printing mailboxes to mothers of soldiers in Iraq. 

So thank you, Presto. And maybe your service will gently pull some grandparents into the 21^st century.

Come on in, the century is fine.

Planning for the Future---Or Not

Do we know each other well enough to talk about the deep personal stuff? Yes? Then here’s a column that may help in the years ahead:

When you hit 65 and the birthdays after, you’ve moved into a new neighborhood of life. Some part of you knows you could graduate from the planet any day now and nobody would say you died too young. And this could happen just as you were enjoying senior matinees at the movies, bass fishing shows on TV and payback checks from Social Security.

And next comes the secret question we all ask ourselves: When will IT happen?

Then the next questions: Should we pay off my credit card bills or leave them for the kids? Should we plan long-range as if we would hit 100---say plant a redwood, adopt a foster kid or start a new career or marriage? Or should we plan as if IT will happen tomorrow? Maybe we should finally make that will leaving out the disagreeable Jimmy or maybe we should wander over to the undertaker and pick out a designer urn. (Is Versace into that yet?)

Another option: Maybe we should recognize that we are on a sure-to-sink personal Titanic so we might as well go first class. Live it up. Eat chocolate until we smell like new Hershey bars. Drink double dirty martinis. Grab the next attractive stranger on a street and kiss him or her, risking jail for the sybaritic life. Or is it hedonism? (I always get them mixed up which means I don’t do enough of either.)

Another option: Don’t think, Don’t plan. Let life and its opposite happen.

So What To Do, If Anything?

            Me, I am not zen enough for the last option---doing nothing---which is why one friend always tells me: don’t push the river, it flows by itself. But I push rivers and urge streams along because I like the illusion of a little control in my life. So I try to come up with some sensible way to live, not knowing how long I may have---20 minutes or 20 years. (If it were 20 minutes, I certainly would stop writing this and put on lipstick to ready myself.)

            But I split the difference, knowing either is possible—tomorrow or 2036. I try to live in the moment, enjoying every day, knowing I have done the paper work required of us older adults---the will, the power of attorney and all the health care stuff. (But I overdid it once, paying for a cremation back in the 1970’s and now I can’t find the paperwork. Neither can the bonfire people. Up the creek on this one.)

            As for downsizing and passing on the legacy possessions, I asked which kid wanted which thing so everybody gets something of emotional value from the house. But since none of us will remember what we said, I’m writing that down now. And Cranky Pants and I won’t let visiting kids leave the house without taking something. The somethings they don’t have room for go to a thrift store. 

Planning on a Long Future

            On the other hand, I went back to school at 65 to get an advanced degree in gerontology, which is the study of geezer life forms---all the better to write and broadcast about later life. I also got re-married in my late 60’s---Cranky Pants and I thought as “long as you both shall live” was finally doable at our ages. And now I am planning what I want to be doing in my 90’s besides still writing.

            So I try to cover both sides of the question. What I don’t do is live every day as if it were my last. If it were my last and I knew it, why it could ruin the whole day. Instead, I appreciate each day as if there weren’t an endless supply of days.

Because there aren’t.

Words to the Wise

            Here are two helpful books if you want to work both sides of the lifespan street: Putting Things in Order by David Finkle and Ellen Baumritter, a write-in diary and workbook that helps organize papers, thoughts and wishes. And on the other side, try Dare to Be 100: 99 Steps to a Long Healthy Life by Dr. Walter Bortz, who gives this advice: Keep your foot lashed to the pedal. No braking allowed.

            OK, doc. (He’s 78.) 

###

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

The Truth About Grandpa & Grandma

Some of you do one thing that really warms a columnist’s heart. You clip out these words, sending them to people you care about. Now that’s just about the highest literary prize there is---ending up on a refrigerator door--- and I want to thank you. Below, by the way of thanks, is a column that you may want to pass on to your adult kids.

The Truth From Grandma and Gramps

* If we geezers are not now vegetarians, it is unlikely we will give up our BLT’s tomorrow, even if you think we should. (Incidentally, you are probably right about the virtues of the veggie/grain diet, but the habits of our stomachs seem to overcome the conclusions of our brains. Still, take heart from the fact we are eating fewer things with eyes and more things with leaves.) 

* You should keep pestering us on one subject---becoming at least as computer literate as our grandchildren. So keep on your soapboxes. You are right on this one. Without some knowledge of computers, we are out of it and will be getting more out of it as the years pass and as everybody but us and the dog does email.

* You are in charge of your kids and greatly influence their relationship with us. Even if you don’t think we are the perfect grandparents, put in a good word for us now and then. Maybe tell our grandchildren a family story that puts us in a good light, rather then tell them about the time Mom almost burned the house down or the time Dad told off Aunt Martina at Thanksgiving, saying there were two turkeys at the table and she was one.

* We may pooh-pooh Father’s Day and Mother’s Day as commercial, but we are secretly delighted when you remember us. A phone call is nice, a visit better and a visit with a meal not involving our cooking services best of all. And no, Dad doesn’t need a new tie and you should not give in to his whining about being the only grandpa on the block without a flat screen TV.

* If you think one or both of us shouldn’t be driving, state your case. We may not want to hear it, but we also don’t want to injure anyone. And please help us find another transportation solution because we surely don’t like to be grounded any more than you did. And if we at first don’t want to hear you, remember this: As you wanted to get out of the house and on the road at 16, we geezers have the same instincts. The Route 66 Dream never dies. Old drivers never die---someone just takes away our car keys.   

* We may offer you our family possessions while we are still living, just to lighten up on worldly stuff and to have the pleasure of seeing what we love at your house. If you can use these things, say yes. It will not jinx us or send us to a premature death, nor does it mean you’re greedy.

* Alternatively, we may ask you which possessions of ours would mean something special to you after we graduate from the planet. Please speak up and tell us. Again, it’s no jinx, but it will give us pleasure to know the silver teapot or the turkey platter will be going to a good home. So please tell us. (We may need reminding to write it down so that all you kids can know who gets what.)

* Don’t get bent if we drop the habit of giving holiday presents and go instead to the retreat position of sending greeting cards. We love you, but we really don’t know what you or your kids want anymore. Our incomes shrink in retirement and some of us are not often thanked for the presents we have sent. So don’t get bent if we aren’t Santa anymore. Been there, done that.

* Come visit. Some grandchildren have never seen the homes of their grandparents, never tasted grandma’s meatloaf and never ridden on grandpa’s tractor. If you want your children to be influenced by something other than the video game du jour, Grand Theft Auto IV, let them hang out a bit with us.

And we promise not to tell them all those embarrassing stories about you.

###

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Q & A: Common Issues After 50

Here are some basic questions about life after 50, ones I’ve been asked since it got around that I am interested in gerontology----the study of geezer life forms. I’m hoping the answers might help readers who are wrestling with the common issues of aging:

Q:  I just turned 50 and got my draft notice from the AARP. I don’t like growing older. Too many wrinkles. Any advice?

            A. Look at it this way. Age is a party you don’t want to go to but once you get there, you have a good time. Some report the later years are perpetual recess with no teacher looking on.  Frankly, it’s great to do what you want after doing what everybody else wanted for 50 or 60 years. And remember, the only way to avoid a new birthday is not to be here anymore. So write this in lipstick on your mirror: Better to be over the hill than under it. Not that I think 50 is over the hill. No age is over the hill if you decide to see life, not as a hill that tops out at 50, but as an interesting journey through many ages and stages. And stop looking at your wrinkles. Seriously. Worrying about wrinkles is like doing housework---not the most interesting way to spend a life.

            And don’t knock AARP without giving it at least a chance. Visit www.aarp.org for information about a huge variety of subjects interesting to people 50 and over. A sister site, www.aarpmagazine.org, presents articles online in case you didn’t finish the AARP magazine in the doctor’s waiting room. The AARP organization and its magazine have been stereotyped as fodder for geezers, but they are, in fact, a lot more up to date than the people who don’t read them imagine. (Disclaimer: I will have an article in the summer issue of the AARP magazine so I have profited in the low three figures from this association.)

Q: My grandson is having his sixth birthday next month. His parents have hired a clown and a jump house. I’m invited, but don’t want to go. Little kids’ parties should be for little kids, plus I am already getting hints that a special present is due. It all puts me off. What to do?

            A: Some children’s parties have gone over the top. It’s high living for tiny tots. Grandparents who grew up in the Depression may have trouble with that.

First, if you don’t want to go, don’t go. You’ve earned the right to escape torture at the hands of rowdy six-year olds. But please give some kind of a present. Just don’t be guilt-tripped into giving more than you want. So say no nicely to the party or make a cameo appearance, but keep your opinions about the event to yourself.  Wet blanketing the occasion is a no-no.

Q: I took early retirement and had a ball relaxing for six months---but now I want more focus in my life. Long ago I wanted to be an artist. Is there a way I could do that now without making a fool of myself? 

            A: It’s only foolish to sit on your dreams. You’ve gone through a common first stage of retirement---the honeymoon stage---where you enjoyed the release from work as well as many fine napping opportunities.  And for those who have been chained to work, retirement may be life’s first chance at sustained creativity of all kinds---photography, writing, arts and crafts. The trick is to foster those feelings instead of stifling them as too foolish, too late or too ambitious. Read this excellent guide to discovering your creativity: The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. Also, check out the art courses at colleges and recreation programs. Last, make yourself a place at home to experiment. You don’t need a loft in Paris. A kitchen table will do. Enjoy.

###

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Saints Among Us

There are some saints you don’t pray to. Instead, you pray about them and for them. The saints I have in mind are the family members who care for the ill, frail, infirm and brain-impaired. These caregivers are the silent saints of our culture. In California alone, there are 1.8 million householders caring for someone 50 or older, mostly parents or spouses.

If you haven’t been there, it’s hard to imagine what these caregivers contribute and what they endure in the name of love. For them, love isn’t some ethereal feeling, it’s cleaning up after Dad when he’s peed on the floor. It’s dealing with Mom when she doesn’t know who you are. It’s getting the meals, doing the laundry, giving the meds, keeping the environment safe, preventing falls, being on night watch, wondering how to feed a person who can’t swallow, learning how to understand someone with a stroke-induced speech loss, figuring out how to lift a husband out of bed without ending up bedridden yourself, and last----and it’s always last----learning how to take care of yourself so there will be enough of you left to take care of someone else.

Bald Tax Facts

And what these caregivers provide does effect you, even if you can’t imagine how. Here’s how: the care they gave at home is what keeps their loved ones out of nursing facilities where sixty-eight percent of patients are on Medicaid, a government-financed program, a program funded by your taxes. So if you haven’t yet applauded home caregivers for humanitarian reasons, you should thank them for providing tax-free services to people-in-need, many of whom would otherwise be getting publicly-funded care.

And what’s more, caregivers render these services often at great expense to themselves, either not being able to work outside the house, or having to work restricted hours, or losing time on the job to responsibilities at home. And you can imagine what those diminished work options mean to their own eventual Social Security benefits.

Local Help for the Sainted

            There is some help for local caregivers---never enough, of course, a lack made worse by the recent closing of the Lutz Center. One upcoming opportunity, however, is a series of classes for caregivers called: Yes, I Can! 

Free to all family caregivers, the classes are on Mondays, April 14 though May 19, with a final class on Thursday May 29. The time is 10 AM to 1 PM and the place Sierra Nevada Home Care, 1020 McCourtney Road, Grass Valley. Reservations at 1-800-635-0220.

            Organized by medical social worker and family caregiver, Evelyn Donaldson, all the essential subjects are covered: caring for the caregiver, communication and behaviors, body mechanics, incontinence, legal and financial planning, nutrition and speech and community resources---where to go for help.

Other Help

            There’s excellent help on the Internet at www.caregiver.org, home of the Family Caregiver Alliance. They have an entire section devoted to caregiving tips and offer audio classes in the subject complete with downloadable workbooks. There’s also an online discussion group.

So those are still more reasons for a caregiver to become computer literate if she or he has not yet learned to do the digital dance: all the practical help and camaraderie available online from Family Caregiver Alliance. 

Words to the Wise

            Other local sources of aid can be located by calling our wonderful, all-knowing Helpline. They not only offer resources for caregivers, they offer help to all ages and almost all problems except where to get free Botox injections and if that is your only problem, I want to change places with you. Contact Helpline on the net by googling: Grass Valley Helpline. Their email is helpline@nccn.net and their phone is 530-273-2273.

            Last, the next caregiver you meet, genuflect. Crown her with laurels. Better yet, bring her supper, a bottle of wine and maybe offer a few hours of respite. She deserves nothing less.

###

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

The Pack Rat Is In

I can pass for normal, I really can, but I wonder if I am in fact a garden-variety geezer. Or maybe something else?---like a nostalgia-addled, memory-ridden, photo-burdened acquisitor of memorabilia? You tell me.

            Is it normal, not only to be a pack rat, but a pack mule riding around in her life with hundred-pound sacks of old snapshots and mementos? Compare my experience with yours: Did you save your dance cards from the 1950’s? Did you save the wedding guest list your mom wrote back then as well as the dorm assignment mailed to you in 1954? Did you save birthday cards from the 70’s, to-do lists from the 80’s and your week-at-a-glance calendars for the last few decades?

            Me, I can tell you what I needed to do in October 1970: “Decide about downstairs, meet with Sam Radelfinger, ZPG meeting”, and I can also tell you who came to Thanksgiving the same year. I even have the menu and the head count: 24.

            Is this normal? Am I nuts or just a natural born historian?

            Whatever I am, it’s got to change. Because a keeper kind of person accumulates, and accumulates and pretty soon her past is bigger than she is.

            Case in point: We had a small leak in a pipe under the house where I stored my banker’s boxes full of photos and memorabilia. Yesterday I discovered the boxes were damp and today, boxes emptied, the entire house is littered with my past drying out. It’s on the dining room table, the kitchen counters, the bed, the bookcases and the heat registers.

My parents’ past is drying out along with mine---photos taken at the seashore in 1932, pictures taken with a Brownie way back when skirts were longer and hair shorter. Yes, even my grandparents and great-grandparents are drying out on the dining room table.

            Oh, the sweet smell of mildew in the morning.

So what do I do with the stuff I rescued? What do you do with your stuff?

Do I pack it all away in archivally correct see-through sleeves? That would fill about 20 huge binders and they would have no room to rest in this house, the shelf space being taken by Cranky Pants’ photo albums from 1958 to 2008. (It takes one to know one.)

Should I scan and digitize it all, putting it on the Internet for future generations to see? Maybe give it to the kids and let them do with it as they will? Or---calling up some Zen energy---stop worrying about it and let go? Realize it is not my present and future life I am trying to hold onto, just images of lives long gone. Over.

Easy to say, hard to do.

Words to the Wise

Well, I still haven’t figured it out except to stop the damage and think before I store things. And I am not sure a digital camera is going to help.

Say I do take years of digital pics and transfer everything onto CD’s. Well, 50 years from now, when my grandkids go searching for their pasts, will the computers of the future be able to read the media of today? My new computers can’t read anything I did when computers first came out. And you do remember 78’s, 45’s and 33’s?  And CD’s can disintegrate. On the other hand, I’ve heard there are archiving spots on the Internet, but how do I know they’ll be in business in 2058?

Which is why I like physical images I can hold in my hand: eyes and hands don’t go out of style. Maybe I just take the best of the images---either scanned from the old pics or newly transferred from a digital camera---print them out on nice archival paper, stick a few of the very best in a safe deposit box for future generations, put some up around the house in frames and let the rest go. Maybe that will be progress.

Meanwhile, it looks as if I will be having dinner tonight with my great grandmother on the table. I heard some of my ancestors used to end up under it, so that’s progress too.

###

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Geezers Going Green

Going Green

Going green is not just for the young and Birkenstocked. I have gone green without changing a thing. The same ecological miracle could happen to you. Maybe when Earth Day comes you will even be hailed as the cool geezer with a teeny, tiny carbon footprint.

Here’s how I got green without even trying:

I was just a run-of-the-mill thrift queen from New England, the place where my cheap---I mean thrifty---ancestors settled in swampland because swamps were a good buy. They and other queer ducks like them are still known back there as Swamp Yankees.

Now those love-a-bargain genes show up in my life today, not in swampland, but in a great love of thrift stores, second-hand anything and, most of all, garage sales, my idea of a morning well spent. This penchant has earned me no little suspicion among those who think, if you can afford something, you should buy it. These are people who would die if they were seen prowling a Salvation Army store and who never learned the glory of the hunt for garage sale treasure. (Clueless on the old stuff front, they probably think eBay is a body of water.) 

Anyhow, given the scorn heaped upon me by people of a buy-new disposition, imagine my relief to learn recently that I was not tight, but green. Ha! Redemption is at hand for the cheap of heart. Because it seems that recycling clothes, books, furniture and other objects of desire is good for the planet. It means no energy and materials are used to make new stuff. It means that no landfills are filled. It means that you are green, good and will definitely go to Ecology Heaven where you will hang out with John Muir and guys who oversaw recycling centers.

Easy Ways to Recycle Stuff

            Let me count the ways:

1.      The informal trade between women. My daughter and I trade back and forth when we get sick of our clothes. One of my friends just outfitted me with some numbers from Chico’s that her new husband didn’t like. (He wants her all swirly and girly.) I have done the same kind of off-loading to friends when I got too big for my britches--literally.

2.      The classified ads in this newspaper. A good place to sell---you can post photos---and a good place to pick up deals, especially on furniture. Also where you can get the scoop on garage sales.

3.      The local radio shows that feature call-ins about stuff wanted and for sale. On KVMR, it’s Flea Market on Thursdays at 1 PM, 530/265-9555. On KNCO, it’s Swap Shop, Monday-Friday at 3 PM and Saturday at 8 AM, 530/477-5626.

4.      The many great thrift stores in this area---meccas for bargain hunters.

Words to the Wise

            Do you want to be doubly sainted? Well, deal with the thrift stores that not only help the planet through their mission of recycling, but support excellent non-profit organizations. Below are a few. Find others in the Yellow Pages under Thrift Shops. Hours for drop-off times can be a little weird, as can the list of treasures they will take or not take.

Animalsave Thrift & Treasures, 520 East Main, Grass Valley.

Food Bank Gift and Thrift, 13467 Colfax Highway, Grass Valley

Hospice Gift & Thrift, 754 Zion, Nevada City. Stores also in Penn Valley and Colfax.

Thrift Shop---Cancer Aid, 317 South Auburn, Grass Valley. 

            Now, if anybody gets on your case about your activities in the used stuff world, tell them that if they tried it, they might like it. I write this in a desk chair with a mink stole thrown over the back in case of night chill. It cost 10 bucks at a garage sale and I don’t think the lady who once owned it ever wore it.

            And if you happen to love antiques, well, easy sainthood is yours. What is antiquing but honoring the recycling gods with your credit card? When I go antiquing now, I tell Cranky Pants that I am not shopping, but reducing the carbon footprint of the world.

            If he swallows that excuse, I have a recycled bridge I want to sell him.

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Navigating Retirement

Retirement used to be simple. You reached your 60’s, got an award pin from the company---forget the gold watch--- and died before you could do anything else. At least that’s how it was for my favorite grandpa, Henry, and for many of your immediate ancestors. 

            But now, we potential geezers have to be on our toes. Retirement is no longer simple. The good news is that it’s no longer simple because gains in longevity mean we have a lot of living ahead of us. We don’t keel over at 62 like poor Henry.

And navigating the years ahead will involve many decisions: Who are you now that you’ve retired? How should you spend your remaining time? Do you want and need to go back to work? Full-time? Part-time? As a volunteer?

What about your mate or home companion? Does he/she have the same plans and ideas? Does your mate want to stay home while you want to trek in Nepal? Have you found the most engrossing hobby/passion in the world while your partner is just sitting around drenched in envy and wedded to a serious TV habit?

Staying in synch with your partner remains an issue in retirement no matter how long you’ve been together. One may not want to retire. Ever. The other can’t wait to hang it up at work. One might want to spend money. The other may want to save it for a special trip on his 100^th birthday. She thinks she owns the house because she’s had it to herself everyday. He may think he has some rights to domestic space besides his chair, his side of the bed and the BBQ. So, as you can see, retirement presents many rich opportunities for fighting, grousing and generally getting lots of new issues on the marital agenda.

Now, do I have any suggestions for retirement survival? A few:

* Don’t expect to get retirement figured out right away. It is a life passage, not an evening banquet event. A friend told Cranky Pants it takes about 3 years to get comfortable in the new life and that seems about right to me. If you can dance the dance sooner, good for you. If you take longer, you can keep me company.

* Know that you will have new issues to figure out with your mate and as usual, compromise can work wonders. She may have to give up some turf. He may have to try a little travel. They may have to decide how much to save, how much to hold out for taxes and how much to blow on a really great experience or object of desire.

* Use all your smarts when it comes to money, even if you haven’t used those mental muscles before. When your house is depreciating, when stocks are down and CD’s earning so little that they can’t keep up with inflation, you will feel up the creek but there’s always a little paddle called your brain.

Proven ways to survive: Don’t waste anything, buy smart, go back to work, take up a paying hobby, share living space, downsize living space and arrange your smaller quarters as though you were making do on a small yacht. Also, make sure you are getting all your benefits plus realize that the spending of money and the enjoyment of life are not the same thing. I could live in a one-room shack if it had a good roof, a stove, a feather pillow and rose bush growing near the door.

* Now that you may have the time, help out the world. Governments on all levels are having big money problems, so social services are shrinking and so are the budgets of non-profit agencies. Be worthy of your extra years on the planet and give back, or, if nobody ever gave anything to you, just give anyhow. It’s time to break the stingy cycle.

* Stay healthy. I’ll still need you as a reader in 20 years.

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

The Spring Blessing Count

It’s spring and the rump is sprung, at least if you are older and have lower back troubles. But when the daffodils are waving at you, it’s hard to focus on the pain that can come with aging and much easier to focus on the pleasures of growing older. So today, now that we have passed the vernal equinox and gotten the flu and the winter blues behind us, let us count our blessings.

Blessing One: We are alive. (Now don’t say “duh”! because the reality is that just about one hundred years ago, Americans lasted on average only until their late 40’s.) Women hardly had time to get all hot and menopausal. Men had no time to play retirement golf badly. Both were pushing up daisies, so there was no great need for a program like Social Security. Not that many people lived long enough to need it.

Blessing Two: We have a better chance than ever of reaching really old age still able to enjoy life. Treatments for chronic health problems now exist, therapies that help us to be feisty 80, 90 and 100-year-olds. How many of those elders were around when you were young? I did not know one person over 72. In our family, we would have sold tickets if we got anyone over 80.

Blessing Three:  Yeah, our hips and knees give out as do our eyes and shoulders. But and however, hip and knee replacements can restore people to full function. So can shoulder and eye surgery. Many of us would be using guide dogs to tell us where to drive our wheelchairs if it weren’t for the blessing of modern surgery.

Blessing Four: As much as we fear being bag ladies and guys, it is not likely we will go hungry or homeless in our old age. Yes, retirement shrinks the income and some have mortgage or rent trouble, but most of us most of the time will not be sleeping under freeway bridges or searching dumpsters for slices of cold pizza.

Blessing Five: There’s lots to do that is either significant, absorbing or fun. If you are bored when you’re older, you just don’t have your arms open to receive gifts such as volunteering, creative endeavors, geezer sports or the glory of seeing political candidates on immense flat screen TV’s. (Just kidding about that. With heads and mouths almost at life size, that is actually scary.) But the world needs your help and also, isn’t there a creative genius lurking inside? To be happy, you do need meaningful, rewarding occupation. And they are there for the taking---a blessing each one.

Blessing Six: We live in the Light Ages now. Anything you want to know you can pretty much find on the Internet. So there is no reason to be the clueless codger of the stereotype, the person who keeps up on nothing. Now you can track news, health issues, financial information and travel info, to say nothing of the fact that you can find companionship on the social sites and also email unsolicited advice to your grandkids. (If you haven’t yet fallen for a computer, get in touch with the volunteers at the Gold Country Computer Learning Center. They’ll adjust your attitude so painlessly you won’t even know it. 530/272-0497 or www.gcclc.org.)

Blessings Seven and Eight: Paul Newman and Sophia Loren are still alive.

Words for the Wise

            When you can’t fall asleep at night because you can’t figure out what Governor Spitzer was thinking when he threw it all away, think instead about your blessings. More interesting to count them than sheep. Really.

So how high a blessing count can you get? Well, it’s fair to count good meatloaf, the daffodils, Fluffy, money in the bank, stretch jeans, Medicare, the Yuba River, the county libraries, free speech, George Clooney and the Easter Bunny.

            So I got you started here, but I hope you never finish this list and that’s a blessing too: a blessing list with no end in sight. Enjoy, and may there be many chocolate rabbits in your basket this weekend.       

            

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Book Seller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Grandkids: Nature Illiterates?

            I wish there were a school for grandparents---Grandparenting 101.

Because sometimes we grandparents wander cluelessly through the family landscape, wanting to help our grandchildren grow up well, but not knowing how to do it in today’s world. Well, after 12 grandchilden and a little clueless wandering myself, I have finally gotten a few clear ideas about how to help.

What I see happening: Children are becoming isolated from the natural world. Reality is a video game and outside is the distance between the family car and the front door. Activity is structured, competitive sports on manicured fields dominate the “leisure” hours and it seems to me most every kid hour is accounted for. No time for daydreaming or just wandering around the world.   

Well, there are fewer woods in which to wander, catch frogs and build forts. Then there are the media scaring the bread pudding out of parents who see stranger danger behind every bush and West Nile virus in every bird.  And thus the kids can become shut-ins, scared of the great outside and turning into nature illiterates. So, OK, they may learn in school about the forests of the Amazon, but can they name the trees in their own backyard?

Now, if people don’t appreciate Mother Nature, they are not likely to be good stewards of the environment. Even our generation, we who did more in the outdoors than our grandchildren, are not the most perfect of nature’s caretakers and I wonder what’s coming next. Can people who have only seen green through a window, go green, vote green? Time will tell.

So What Can Grandparents Do?

Plenty and what works will depend on the particular child and his/her inborn inclinations. Here are some things to try to connect children to the natural world:

Gardening. Some kids will be fascinated by what grows in your backyard. Big hits at our house: Herbs like mint and lemon verbena, cherry tomatoes, lavender, the spaghetti sauce tree (bay) and pomegranates (though the last should be broken open outside).

Cooking. This is one way to teach where food comes from. For instance, some kids think whipped cream comes from a can and it is a great science experiment to have them take out an eggbeater and whip the cream that comes from the cow. Then they eat their experiment.

Fishing. Bring out their inner hunter by taking them fishing. Some kids will love this, others hate it. Then try something else like…

Berry-picking. If you grow berries or really know a wild blackberry from a poison berry, take them berrying.

Sky-watching. This has gone over big at our casa. Getting up in the middle of the night and watching meteor showers seems like a great adventure to three generations of us. (These astronomy lessons can be supplemented by the great NASA images on the Internet.)

Scouts. Depends on the program---but can be a good way to learn about the outdoors.

Summer camp. This depends on the summer camp. Some are about computers and weight loss, not the outdoors. Check out the program and send them with someone they know so they won’t get homesick.

Camping with the grandchildren. Some kids love this and others wish they were at the mall.  If you are going to camp, make sure the kids are dressed for the weather and that you have all the needed equipment. Give each a flashlight to check out monsters and other night visitors.

Hiking. Again, it depends on the kid. Some will think it an adventure, others a death march.

Pets. Though the trend seems to be to try and make humans out of pets---dress them, send them to school, give them little beds---they are non-human animals unburdened by civilization and are thus instructive about mammalian behavior. I like to point out the way dogs are superior to us---their sense of smell, their capacity for direction, their utter faithfulness and lack of judgment---but kids seem more interested in their reproductive antics. Whatever works.

Words for the Wise

            To get more ideas, go to www.sciencenewsforkids or www.hookedonnature.org. Read Last Child in the Woods: Saving Children from Nature Deficit Disorder by Richard Louv. And know that you are doing right by your grandkids when you become an advocate for the world outside their window.

Mel Walsh is a gerontologist and certifiable geezer. Her book of advice for older women, Hot Granny, is available at The Bookseller in Grass Valley and online at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Thanks For Your Memories....

You have a story to tell. It’s about your life---where you were born, what happened after that and then, what happened after that and so on up until today. You may think your story is the same old, same old---school, work, mates, kids, lots of pizza---but consider the fact that there are people who would find your story fascinating—the heart and soul of real life on earth.

These people are called sons and daughters. They may have children---your descendants---the distant fruit of your loins---though where the loins are has always been a mystery to me, but I can guess.

Anyhow, those grandchildren and great grands may be very interested in what you did and what you thought during your time on earth. I know I wish I knew more about my grandparents. Whatever made them decide to take us all into their home during the Depression? Two bachelor uncles in the unheated attic. Another uncle, widowed with two daughters, in one bedroom. Grandma, grandpa, my brother and I in another and then, poor husband-deserted mom on the couch. What made my grandparents take on the task of helping us all when there weren’t even enough potatoes to go round the table? How did it work out for them? Did they regret it, especially when I called Grandma a “stinker” one day? (Mouth washed out with soap for that one.)

Writing Life Stories

Now, you don’t have to be Churchill to attempt a memoir. Just a few stories written down or taped will do, but first you have to overcome your own resistance. Here’s how: If you imagine you are not important enough to tell your story, think how much you would like to know about the lives of the people you come from. Well, someone might feel that way about you.

And, if you think you are not a born writer, just put a few things down on paper any which way. You will not be judged on your grammar, but a great grandson in 2092 might love to hear about life in the 20^th century, however the story is told.

If you can work a tape machine or a video camera, do that or have someone do it for you. Talk about your own parents. Talk about a person or someone who influenced you.

I have an audiotape of my dad in the hospital in his 90’s. I hear him answering the bedside phone this way: “State your case.” Yes, that’s how he answered phones. Small memento, maybe even simple-minded of me to value it, but I am glad I have that tape. And years from now, someone will treasure a trace of you.

Help at Hand

            There are many books on the market to help you sort out what to say and how to say it. I’m now reading Your Memoirs by Hawley Roddick. She gives hints about how to get the process started and how to handle the delicate issues---mom’s fondness for gin, dad’s girlfriends or the time Mother Saint Ida caught you canoodling with Handy Andy in the cloak room. A look in your bookstore or on Amazon will reveal dozens of other book choices.

Memoir products are now segmenting into specialty areas and morphing into other media. For instance, there’s a new DVD just out: Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience. Also available in the memoir cornucopia: ways to track your spiritual biography and how to pass on your ethical values. Ask about these choices at the bookstore, library or on the internet from that great guru, Google.

Words for the Wise

            If you want hand-holding, personal historians are at your service and some give free initial consultations. Go to www.personalhistorians.org to find one in your area. Locally, Pat Barrentine offers this service at www.lifelinestories.com. Other local personal historians include Susan Luccini at 530/692-2538 and Suzanne Warren, who specializes in video histories, 530/268.2184, www.silveravenuepictures.com.

            So then, consider getting parts of your life recorded in some way and do it while your memories are still in retrievable storage.

             

12 Tips: You'll Give Thanks for This Thanksgiving

                  It’s November, kickoff time for the Official Semi-Pro Entertaining Season. This is the month harried cooks call the Butterball Hotline on Thanksgiving morning to find out how to cook the turkey they forgot to defrost. 

            But, as any hostess knows, there may be other defrosting jobs on Thanksgiving---maybe breaking the ice with grandchildren who barely know you, maybe getting family members to relax and enjoy each other, nursing drinks instead of grudges.

So here are a dozen tips to warm up visiting grandkids and their parents, especially when they are spending the long Thanksgiving weekend with you:

1.                  Get off to a good start. Family members may have driven a long way to your house---over the river and through the traffic jams. When they come in the door, have refreshments at the ready. Maybe an easy mulled wine for the grown-ups---you can buy the spices already assembled. (Try Aspen Mulling Spices.) Do the same with apple cider or sparkling grape juice for the kids.

2.                  Avoid a seasonal nervous breakdown over the Thanksgiving meal. Get help. Grandkids can stuff the celery with cream cheese. They can whip cream for the pies (and lick the beaters). If they use manual egg beaters instead of electric machines, it’s safer and keeps them busy longer. And of course, pull the adults into the action, too. Even a cooking-impaired person can drive to a bakery to pick up a pie.

3.                  Provide nostalgia as a first course for Thanksgiving dinner. It’s one sure-fire way to get people talking and enjoying themselves. At each place, put a memento of that person’s past. Maybe their third-grade picture, a report card, a crayon drawing---anything to get the nostalgia flowing. I am wicked, but I put out the graduation certificate of my first-born son---he who graduated some 40 years ago from Little Beaver Nursery School. Digging up the past this way can make for an hilarious start to the meal.

4.                  Relax about manners and about whether or not everyone likes your cooking. If you have a kids’ table, know that your Brussels sprouts will be offered to the dog. Hey, you did it too.

5.                  Get out of the house. Families can get restless if confined long together. Maybe it’s the noise and the constant interaction. Anyhow, plan some expeditions for both generations. Think holiday craft fair or the special movie that opens on Thanksgiving weekend. Your grandkids will know what that special movie is, even if you don’t.

6.                  Get active. If the weather and the yard allow, throw a football around. Kick a soccer ball. Go walk in a park. I know one family that hikes to a designated Bird Tree in the woods and there they hang up bird goodies like suet and peanut butter stuck into pine cones. Then the birds have a holiday too.

7.                  Think games. Ask your visiting family what games they love. Cranky Pants’ family members lay out a huge puzzle that anyone can try to put together. We also do charades---pretty primitive charades so the youngest won’t feel left out. I do a pitiful imitation of Big Bird—all dignity left behind.

8.                  Do family theater. If anyone sings, dances, plays something musical or does pig calls, ask for a demo. Ask, don’t insist. Some grandchildren have learned Thanksgiving poems or songs at school and are freshly rehearsed for your viewing pleasure.

9.                  Be quiet on the negative front. Don’t criticize—not even the studs in the nose. It takes all kinds to make a family and this is the only one you’ve been issued.

10.              Be imaginative with the grandkids. They like to play, so give Native American headdresses to young family members and they can play at being the first Indians at the first Thanksgiving. Just a feather and a ribbon will work. One year I dressed up my daughter in full costume, moccasins and all. A faux squaw-ette, she went around the neighborhood to wish them all Happy Thanksgiving. Forty years later, I still hear the stories about that Thanksgiving.

11.              Remember the visiting pets, the grand dogs of the family. Have a treat ready, plus water and food bowls in a corner.

12.              Order in pizza on Friday.

What To Do About Holiday Dread

            If holidays are so much fun, then why do we dread them?

            Is it exhaustion from family—too many people all at once and in repeated doses?

            Well, truth to tell, though family occasions are satisfying---this is my clan, where I belong---they can be fraught with issues. (Now there’s a word: “fraught”.) It means burdened and loaded and is related to the word, “freight”. Freight is baggage and families, as we all know, come with a complete set of baggage, some of it matching, some not.

So what’s to be fraught about?

You already know:

1. Old history, enmities that aren’t water under the bridge, but emotions still dammed up, waiting to explode over a minor holiday incident---maybe the ”wrong” gift, maybe being late for the festivities---nothing that’s a big deal but, yikes, some unhappy person will make a big deal over it because he or she is carrying some heavy freight from past injuries, real or imagined.

2. Present behavior. Rich, rich rich is the depth of opportunity for getting upset with family over the holidays. It may be your sacred habit to open presents on Christmas Day, never before. That’s your gift code. But your son’s new wife opens them Christmas Eve. Is she not clueless beyond redemption? Or maybe your grandson Johnny smokes and though he’s outside, the smoke drifts in the house and you wonder what he smokes, anyhow. And why won’t he listen to you about his lungs?

Well, you can fill in your own situations. Think “fraught” and you’ll have many a holiday story to tell. My own worst moment: when my mother and step-father announced their divorce on Christmas Eve. I still feel sorry for myself 40 years later, which shows how long the half-life of family freight can be.

So What To Do?

            There are ways to keep family holidays upbeat. Not completely upbeat, of course, for the seasonally disgruntled will do their gruntling no matter what. (That’s why the story of Scrooge has such wide appeal. We all know someone like Scrooge. Heck, we all are Scrooge at times.) But there are ways to morph families into a fun mode so they won’t scrooge up their time together.

            Generate A Comedy Hour: It’s hard to be mean when you’re laughing. Snug in with the family during the holidays with some classic comedy DVD’s or some old Bill Cosby videos. Make it three-generational entertainment if that is your audience. And no, not George Carlin.

You can even tell your own one-liners. Really. Here’s one you can do Thanksgiving Day:  When people go around the table saying what each one is thankful for, you say: “I’m thankful I didn’t get caught”. And then refuse to say more.

As for other family comedy, even our dogs get into the act. I confess Tiger has been dressed up with a reindeer antler headdress. We think it’s funny, but then we are easily amused. He seems proud of it---like a crown.

Do A Holiday Movie Night: Movies are the universal, cross-generation language. Everybody has an opinion about a movie: Wasn’t he cute? Hated the casting. Great story. What’s the best holiday movie? A Christmas Story? It’s a Wonderful Life?

If you are stumped for ideas because the youngest in the family may not love Miracle on 34^th Street the way you did, then check out this book: The Best Old Movies for Families: A Guide for Watching Together by Ty Burr.

Words to the Wise

            The fun and nostalgia of old movies is a positive thing for families, but it’s entertainment generated outside the family. Instead, maybe the most meaningful input over the holidays comes from family members themselves---when they tell you what they do, think and feel.

So ask about their lives. Do you know what your marketing director son really does in his job? What about your grandkids? Ask them to tell you about YouTube, MySpace, text messaging and the latest video games. And ask the little ones: What was the best holiday present you ever got? Then tell them about yours.

This is a humbling exercise. I discovered what I don’t know about my family is amazing. But then, what they don’t know about me is amazing, too.

            And yes, I am thankful I never got caught.

Grandparenting 101

            I always thought grandparenting would be a piece of cake. You’ve raised one set of kids and now there’s another set in the family. How hard can it be? You already know how to change a diaper. It’s just deja poo all over again. And the rest will follow along from there. Right?

            Probably not. It’s a whole ‘nother thing to be a grandparent and after 12 grandkids, I begin to think I should have gone to grandparent school. Even the best of us will make mistakes, offering advice when we should shut up, buying the wrong presents, over-helping, under-helping and just generally screwing up when it was really our intention to be wonderful grandparents and to receive, unasked, a license plate holder that announces to the world we are the best grandparents in it.

Help for Hapless Grandparents

            Well, parents have their guidebooks for raising children, but until recently, the older generation didn’t have much in the way of readable resources for good grandparenting. But now, there’s a magazine called GRAND and I recently interviewed the founder and CEO of the magazine, Christine Crosby, a grandmother herself so she knows the turf. Christine told me there are 6 top mistakes that grandparents make. (Only six! I figured she hadn’t been watching me. I batch-process mistakes in this area.)

Here are the top six mistakes:

1.                  Telling the world about an upcoming baby before the parents have a chance to do it themselves. Wait until they want to announce the pregnancy.

2.                  Offering your unsolicited opinions about the naming of the baby. Yes, parent might pick something so off-the-wall, you’ll wonder what they were thinking. But shut up.

3.                  Offering your unsolicited opinions about upbringing. Yes, you and I are Spock-certified, hardened by field experience, but times change and so does parenting advice. My rule: unless they are about to step off a cliff, be quiet.

4.                  Hanging around their house like the King and Queen of the family, instead of helping with dishes or babysitting. The most valued grandparents seem to be the ones that pitch in. (My contribution is small, but tasty. I teach some of the older grandkids how to make slow cooker meals for their parents.)

5.                  Buying gifts before you ask. Some parents have very definite ideas about what toys are allowed in the house, what kinds of clothes they want for their kids and what kind of electronic gadgets are OK. There’s also the danger issue. Some products may be great for the older kids in a family, but bad for the smallest. You may want to buy a set of Legos for the first-grader, but the rug rat in the family may like to eat Legos. So ask.

6.                  Not following the parents’ rules. You may not agree with the rule that little Johnny can’t never eat candy or isn’t allowed out on Halloween, but again, it’s their call, not yours.

Words to the Wise

            GRAND magazine is available with a free trial subscription at www.grandmagazine.com or 800-810-0260. The content is wide-ranging with info about health and life in the older lane plus profiles of famous grandparents like Tina Turner and Mick Jagger. (I am seriously glad he is not my son-in-law. Imagine following his rules.)

            

Un-Worrying: Lesson One

     What me worry? Well, yes, but not what I worried about 20, 40 or 60 years ago. Because each stage of life has its own fears. A baby may worry about the next bottle, an adult about the next job, a mother about the next birth. By later life, enough worry categories have accumulated that we older people don’t have the mental storage space for the load we carry. Me, my brain doesn’t have enough cubbies for the clutter.

     I have an entire worry wardrobe, age appropriate of course and up to date---I worry about the war in Iraq, not the one in Korea. And am I like you….wildly eclectic? I worry about my arteries, deer in the garden, the hearing of iPodded grandchildren, my husband’s devotion to pizza, the mercury in the water, the unavailability of Breck shampoo, the state of my soul, leaves in the gutters, dust mites in the pillows, bears in Alaska, the pain in my shoulder, the botulism shots so popular with the barely wrinkled young. (We avoided botulism in our canned green beans, they shoot it into their lips. Go figure. Or rather, go worry about it and keep me company.)

Lightening the Load.

     Actually, maybe it will do both of us good to lighten up our worry loads. Worry is about as useful to us now as a poodle skirt or a zoot suit and like the old clothes in the back of the closet, the worry wardrobe doesn’t really become us, is probably out of date and doesn’t fit anymore. So what to do? You can’t give your worries to the thrift store. 

     Professional organizers say the first step to reducing actual closet clutter is to take everything out of the closet for evaluation. Does it fit? Is it useful? What do you get out of keeping it? Well, maybe the same technique works for reducing worry clutter.

     Take out each worry and examine it. Above all, is it useful? I think the answer is that worry is seldom useful unless a spur to action. Worried that the roof leaks? Then fix it. Worried about politicians? Then vote them out of office. Worried about the fact the earth will someday crash into the sun? Stop it. You have no control of the universe.

     And listen to my mom, she who told me she worried about something for 45 minutes and if she could not come up with a solution, the worry went into the dust bin. It got discarded and if it popped up again---a nasty characteristic of worries---she just threw it out again.

     But first do an inventory of your worry load so you’ll know what to toss. Me, I sorted my worries into bins. There was the family bin, the world bin, the health bin, the money been---(I mean bin)---and so forth.

As for the family bin: I decided not to worry about my husband. He’s old enough to worry about himself. And decided not to worry about the grandkids as their parents do it for me.  And so I went through my messy mind---throwing out what was no longer necessary or could be delegated and I am down to a manageable worry load.

Words for the Wise

     Now the one worry that every older person has is fear of dying. Face it, the gray hairs let us know we are within dying range and a daily scan of the obits rubs it in. But I have a solution here and it isn’t a firm belief in angels or major drugs or even a lobotomy. It is enjoying your life.

     Don’t ask me why, but when you are having a good time and are in the groove, on the beam, doing right by yourself, you just are not so bothered by the thought of death. Maybe you are too busy having a good time.

So that is my prescription. Rx: Enjoy yourself. Yes, it is later than you think, but when you are having fun, you don’t give a damn. Poet John Dryden figured this out in 1685:

“Happy the man, and happy he alone,

He who can call today his own,

He who, secure within, can say:

Tomorrow do thy worst

For I have lived today.”

            

Only Dead Is Too Late

I hear it. All that whining. I’ve done it myself and it goes this way: I’m too old to be creative. Too old to write a novel. Too old to take up music, painting or poetry.

Well, you are only too old if you think you are and yes, maybe physical limitations are dragging down your dreams---you can’t hike the Pacific Crest Trail on those old feet. But here’s a story about a creatively-blocked woman whose arthritic hands were so painful at 76, she had to give up her favorite hobby, needlework.

So what did she do after that? Give up and turn into a geezer droid? No, she took up painting. No lessons. Just do-it-yourself. She started painting at an age when her peers had already packed their dreams away in the attic.

Her name was Anna Mary and maybe you have heard of her for she is known as Grandma Moses, America’s most famous folk painter. Born in 1860, she lived to 1961and painted over 1500 pictures between the ages of 76 and 101.

Grandma Moses was a major celebrity in her 80’s and 90’s. She exhibited her work across the US, in Europe and in Japan and painted what she knew---rural New England, often nostalgic images of her youth---farms and village landscapes. One of her paintings hangs today in the White House and another was recently valued on Antiques Roadshow for $60,000.

Some hobby.

Inspiration Is At Hand

            If you want to absorb the mentoring lessons of Grandma Moses and take in a bit of her can-do creative spirit, the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento has a treat for you. Starting tomorrow and running through January 6 is an exhibit called Grandma Moses, Grandmother to the Nation. It’s a rare chance to see her paintings and learn more about her enormous accomplishments as an older woman who, while she was ancient chronologically, was young in aims and ambition. There’s even free admission for grandparents on Grandparents Day, Sunday, September 9. Find more info at www.crockerartmuseum.org or call 916.264.5423.

Not an Isolated Case

            Now it’s easy to dismiss Grandma Moses’ accomplishments by saying they were a once in a blue moon kind of thing, but almost every day I see evidence that people are extending their productivity into the years that used to be known as retirement. Here are just a few examples from the various fields that seem to intrigue people:

Memoir: Many older people think they have a memoir inside them and they are right. So they should get a lift from the experience of eighty-something Marjorie Hart whose memoir, Summer at Tiffany, was published this year by Harper Collins. This is Marjorie’s first book. She went to a writer’s conference and was spotted there by the editor of a major publishing house.  The rest is history---I mean, memoir.

Poetry: Are the 80’s and 90’s too late to write poetry? Not if you are Anne Porter whose first book was published when she was 83. Her most recent book of poetry, Living Things, was published at 95.

Like Grandma Moses, Anne Porter is inspired by ordinary things. Cleaning her purse, she found a ticket that said: Keep This Ticket. So here’s what she wrote:

I keep it carefully

Because I’m old

Which means

I’ll soon be leaving

For another country

Where possibly

Some blinding-bright

Enormous angel

Will stop me

At the border

And ask

To see my ticket.

Words for the Wise

            Give your inner artist or writer a chance. Take a course. Read a how-to book. Or just fling yourself into it willy-nilly. And don’t be discouraged by first paintings or first drafts. Mostly, they will stink. But over time they will stink less and sometimes begin to be pleasantly fragrant. And last, remember what poet Anne Porter proclaimed---that doing art of some kind may be the only thing that extreme old age can’t ruin. As she said: “You can’t dance anymore, you can’t drive anymore --- but you can still write.”

            Amen to that.

The Incredible Disappearing Retirement

I love the kind of exercise that requires nothing physical. That’s why I love free speech---the exercise of which is just about my favorite thing after cookie dough ice cream. Which is why I will tell you about an idea that is not yet widely accepted, but one that you may need to prepare for even though it hasn’t yet gone mainstream:

Retirement as we know it may cease to exist.

Yes, the old retirement script had men dropping out of work at 62 with a gold watch and spending the rest of their days playing golf in plaid pants. Women were housewives who didn’t retire---frying the bacon that the men bought home with their pensions---and both sexes died before they could get bored with retirement or each other.

Now we live 30 or 40 years more than our grandparents. Now most women spend some time in the workplace, which, believe it or not, in my lifetime, was an astonishing idea, so women today have their own part in the retirement picture. And now, bottom line, people have time after leaving a conventional job for a whole ‘nother life and a whole ‘nother script.

Two lives---at least--- for the price of one.

What’s not to love?

Boomers Believe It

            Boomers, the people born between 1946 and 1964, already get this new idea. Several surveys by the AARP show that about 80% of Boomer workers plan to continue working at least part time after they hit 65. So they are already tearing up the old life scripts, which is what you’d expect from people who did sit-ins in the dean’s office.

            On the other hand, some older people, those born before 1946, are caught in the middle of this social change. They were born too early to surf the new wave of Boomer non-retirement and too late to relax into the old patterns of their fathers. The sounds you hear are these older people being crunched between two conflicting ideas---no work in retirement versus work in retirement.

Example: My own experience with people born before 1946 indicates that some of them---I don’t know the percentage---wish they had not retired at all, wish they had not bought into the old way of thinking about the later years. They miss the workplace---the work itself, the income, the social life and perhaps most of all, an identity the workplace bestowed upon them.

So the question for many of these crunchables is what do they do now?

Some volunteer at meaningful tasks---running food banks, housing the homeless, keeping the local music scene going, raising funds for libraries, day care centers, rehab groups and hospitals. Some seek out part-time work with previous employers. Others are starting their own businesses---maybe on eBay, maybe in a storefront or selling their wares at craft fairs. A few have taken up parenting again---taking care of grandchildren, usually because the parents have gotten into trouble, drugs or jail.

So the peers I know are trying, but society is slow to take advantage of older people who want to go beyond volunteering back into the workplace. One issue: the pay scale of experienced workers is higher than the pay scale of younger people. So companies may go with the cheaper workers, foregoing experience and an established work ethic in favor of lower personnel costs. 

            Well, luckily, it looks as if Boomers, the about-to-be-geezers, will avoid some of these hard issues. Times will change, working in the later years will be considered natural and Boomers will continue to work, either because they want to, because they have to or because they like the things extra income can provide in later years, like enough money to take that cruise to Alaska.

Words for the Wise

            If you want to continue working, stay healthy. It’s hard to carry on if you can’t walk or have heart trouble. And get fixed---no, not that way---but if something doesn’t work on your body---hips, knees, eyes---find the most experienced and most consistently recommended surgeon and get your body into the shop for repairs.

            You do it for your vehicles. Now do it for your body. So you can keep on truckin’.

A Post-Retirement Affair With The Stars

            Retiring can be a jump out of the frying pan and into a fire. Yes, there’s no more job stress, but what pops up next in the life cycle is identity stress. Who am I now that I don’t have a job title? And then another question: What will I do next?

            Well, as a newly retired person you will someday answer who you are going to be for the next 20 plus years. No, probably not a rock star, but something else will begin to form a comfortable mold for your life.

One road to a fresh identity: trying out various pursuits---trying out hobbies that can turn into passions or volunteer work that can turn into a calling. So here’s this week’s hobby suggestion: Look up! Look up at the moon and the stars. The night sky used to be the TV set of the ancients---the stars moving in slo-mo through the night.

Backyard Astronomy For Dummies

            Now you don’t have to be Galileo to get a bang out of the night sky. And you don’t have to be a scientist to raise those binoculars and look for the rings of Saturn. You just have to be curious: What’s out there?

            Wowie! What’s out there will knock your socks off. Science writer Robert Lee Hotz recently summed up the latest news from outer space: At last count there are 246 other planets going around other sun/stars. There’s one planet that is 17 times the size of humongous Jupiter and scientists working with the Hubble Space Telescope estimate that there are as many as six billion hot Jupiter-like planets.

            So we may not be alone and thank goodness for that---all that planetary real estate and just us in the universe? What a waste. Centuries ago, I would have been put in jail for suggesting this, but if we are the only life in this unimaginably vast universe, I’ll eat my binocular strap.

The Rewards of Skywatching

            So what do you want out of a hobby? The challenge of learning more and more, worlds without end? You got it with astronomy. How about mystery? Well, where did the Universe come from? Or do you want action? Billions of galaxies slamming into each other? Or galaxies exploding into super novas? You got in it with astronomy. Even on our home planet, all is not quiet. The moon probably came from another planet smashing into Earth. And do you like history? How about a story that is billions of years old and still going? And how about the really deep questions? Like what the heck is dark matter and how come it gobbles up galaxies? So there’s food for thought in astronomy and if brain activity is good for brain health, you’ve got it when you are a skywatcher.

What Do You Need To Start?

            A pair of skywatching binocs with a tripod. A star map. A flashlight topped with red cellophane so you can see in the dark without the light interfering with the viewing. A nice lean-back deck chair so you won’t fall backwards.

            Also, go to a star party. These night skywatching events are held at the old Nevada City Airport and announced regularly in The Union. Generous science educators and sky fans like Alan Stahler are there with telescopes and guiding advice.

            Then, to learn more, google websites like these:

Space weather; astronomy picture of the day; Hubble site; Sky and Telescope magazine; Astronomy magazine. And for grandkids, go to www.dustbunny.com. Actually, this site is a great place for any age to begin.

Words for the Wise

            If you want the thrill of a skywatcher’s lifetime, plan a trip to a bed and breakfast in Benson, AZ that offers big telescopes for night viewing in the desert. You can hire your own private astronomer from the University of Arizona to guide you through the night sky. Check it out at www.astronomersinn.com.

            So don’t say there’s nothing to do in retirement. Older people can take on the universe. Begin August 28 with an eclipse of the moon, 2:52 to 4:22 AM. I’ll set my alarm if you’ll set yours.