Let me hear from you. Contribute your experience and thoughts. I can’t promise to answer every email, but as common themes emerge, I’ll publish some responses and try to faithfully relay the range of points-of-view. rbs@AgileAging.net
In your most private moments, what do you think about aging? Does advancing seniority fill you with distaste, or with relief? Apprehension or contentment? Are you grinning or grimacing?
What image of aging first pops into your mind’s eye? More memory-making with the grandkids? More midnight shuffles to the bathroom? A lengthening shelf of unpronounceable pills? A closet-full of business attire dry-cleaned for schlepping to Goodwill?
Have you dreams deferred or nagging irritations? A Danube cruise? Elusive words on the tip of your tongue? Performing with the Community Players? Being nibbled to death by ducks?
Like most of my peers, I’m aware the aging glass is both half-empty and half-full. We have to take the sour with the sweet. But it’s my impression that we tend to over-emphasize seniority’s downsides. If that’s correct, this reflexive pessimism exacts a high price. Not only can it impair our mental and emotional health. It can also neglect and undervalue seniority’s rich offsetting opportunities, passions and pleasures. This blog is dedicated to helping rebalance the scales. I want to make the case for a positive approach to growing old.
CURRENT POST
As I prepare this final post of 2021, I’m in the mood for retrospection. What were the past year’s defining developments from this aging Californian’s perspective? How did those public developments influence and intrude upon my private experiences and impressions?
Two tensions are complicating my reflections. Somehow, late-December’s news headlines are jerking the year around. 2021 won’t hold still long enough for me to complete a coherent profile. Compounding the reporting challenges, my national impressions were mostly unsettling, even ominous; my local recollections are distinctly more calm and contented. How can I share the latter affirmations without coming across as an oblivious shuffleboard enthusiast on the deck of the Titanic?
My December 31 publication deadline is fast approaching. Let me give this personal recap a try. If coming to terms with 2021 holds interest for you, please send your own interpretations. What did it feel like for you as a concerned senior to navigate this roller-coaster ride? rbs@agileaging.net
Russell Sunshine worked for 40 years in 40 countries as an international development lawyer and independent policy advisor to foreign governments. Now retired back in America, he’s writing non-fiction and practicing agile aging on California’s Central Coast. Russell’s memoir, Far & Away: True Tales from an International Life, is available on Amazon. Click Here