Tag: Ageing

Harris Biden Her Time

(Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz) Wikimedia creative commons

Perhaps it is the circles in which I travel, but of late it seemed to me every person who thinks deeply about life had one thing to say about the USA: How is it, in a country of 336 million people, that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are the only candidates for president? * (There’s also a Kennedy offspring, whose name escapes me, who plans to run. Ed)

This rhetorical question became academic after President Biden’s selfless decision in June to step aside and not contest the November election. Maybe nobody else noticed, but Biden flagged this about a day before it was revealed he had Covid (again). “If a doctor tells me to, I will step down.”

FYI Ronald Reagan said the same thing when pressed about his age and his health.

Not so much a promise but to keep the media guessing.

And the world’s media sent packs of journos, analysts and photographers to the US to provide a running commentary (interspersed with cunningly edited faux pas from the debate the Democrats would rather forget).

It was clear that Joe Biden’s 64-year career in politics was coming to an end, as the inevitable ageing process caught up with him. Let’s not forget President Biden’s steady hand as Barack Obama’s vice president from 2009 to 2017. But he was becoming frail, and something had to happen.

Collectively, we kept waiting for an Obama or Kennedy-like personality to emerge from the pack. There is Kamala Harris, a black, female Vice- President whose media profile was below the fold, as they say. Biden’s decision to endorse her as the Democrats candidate will change that exponentially. Regardless of reports that Harris has fumbled various tasks allotted to her,  she is a 59-year-old, well-credentialled lawyer who has been in the White House for nigh on four years. If Harris wins the election and becomes President, she will be 64 next time round and hopefully will have a younger deputy by her side.

But should this debate really be about age or disabilities?

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. He was not only the longest-serving US president, but he was also the only president to serve more than two terms. This was despite being confined to a wheelchair and relying on leg braces for mobility. Roosevelt developed polio aged 39 and spent the rest of his life running the US from a wheelchair.

Donald J Trump, who can walk unhindered, is a political naif compared to FDR.  Trump stands out for unpalatable precedents, including surviving a court challenge that pending criminal charges should disqualify him from running.

A scrum of judges, when asked should Donald Trump be granted immunity from prosecution, answered ‘some’. Or at least that was the word headline writers grabbed from a lengthy judgement. As some wag posted on social media when this was announced: ”So the American Revolution was for nothing”.

According to the official White House bio, Joe Biden, 46th President of the United States, ran for the White House on a platform which said he would “restore the Soul of America, rebuild the backbone of America – the middle class – and unite the country”.

Did he in fact do as he promised? Furthermore, as a rising 82-year-old, could he promise more of the same for a tenure which would have seen him celebrate his 86th birthday in office?

My research unearthed only one other candidate who led a major western country aged in his 80s. William Gladstone won a UK election in 1892 aged 82, resigning two years later. He was, however, PM on three other occasions (1868–74, 1880–85, 1886), all packed into a 60-year career in politics.

Point being, Donald Trump is no Gladstone.

Talk show hosts, comedians and lefty social media influencers pounce on any nonsensical utterance from Donald Trump. He’s an easy target but (a) he doesn’t care, (b) he can work a crowd), (c) he’s a salesman whose pitch attracts those who share his views and (d) he doesn’t care.

There was much conjecture about Biden’s mental acuity, not much of it from medicos, I might add.

Surely this was the main reason Democrats and ageist people alike wanted Biden to step down. They’d been calling it long before the debate debacle with Donald Trump.

There has also been similar speculation about the mental fitness of former president Trump, who comes to the campaign with a lot of baggage. This year Trump turned 78. If he wins the November election he will be 82 at the next election (though he recently told Christians to ‘vote now and you’ll never have to vote again’).

As with many things Trump says, that is open to interpretation.

The long (too long) televised debate left Joe Biden under the spotlight long enough for his emerging vagueness to become obvious. His faltering gait, especially when climbing up to the Presidential jet, a more than obvious sign of ageing (or underlying health condition).

In Biden’s defence, his long battle to overcome a stutter could explain his faltering speech patterns. Moreover, his decision to stand down indicates he is still capable of wise decision-making.

From a Down Under perspective, it is clear we don’t like old people running the country. The oldest person to be appointed Prime Minister of Australia was Sir John McEwan. He was 68 when appointed to a six-week caretaker role after the disappearance of sitting PM, Harold Holt.

The oldest person ever to serve as Prime Minister of Australia was Sir Robert Menzies, who left office one month and six days after his 71st birthday.According to www.australianpolitics.com, 9 of 31 Australian PMs took office aged in their 50s. McEwen, William McMahon and Malcolm Turnbull all took office in their 60s, but none were the result of an election. McEwen was a stop-gap PM after Holt disappeared; McMahon and Turnbull overthrew their predecessors.

The youngest PM lasted only four months. Chris Watson (ALP) took office at the age of 37. Of all our PMs since Federation, only 9 were younger than 50 when appointed.

Compare this with the USA, where 12 presidents got the keys to the Oval Office aged 60 or older, and four of them (Biden, Trump, Reagan and George Bush), were between 64 and 78 when sworn in.

From my perspective as an elder, the weeks and months of people urging Sleepy Joe to go revealed a clear bias against older people as no longer being capable of holding down serious jobs.

There is no official retirement age in Australia (apart from judges who must stand down at 70 and Catholic priests, who can work until they are 75). The Age Discrimination in Employment Act forbids employers from forcing their employees to retire.

Much of the desire to retire revolves around when you qualify for the age pension (in Australia this is now 67).

An ABC report in 2023 cited Census statistics that showed more than 65,000 Australians in their 70s worked full time (3% of that age group). The 2021 Census also revealed that 5,200 people aged in their 80s worked full-time. About double that number worked part-time.

Our cohort continues to slave away when they should have their feet up, primarily because of punitive social security and tax systems, and/or personal circumstances.

We’ll get our chance next year to pick the (relatively young) politician who promises to do most for the disadvantaged. It won’t happen of course, but we will hear lots of promises from Peter Dutton (55 in 2025) and Anthony Albanese (62).

Domestic events aside, the US election in November is the most crucial since Nixon faced impeachment. It means a lot to Australia to be able to work with a capable, cogent, energetic leader and Kamala Harris seems to fit the job description.

The US media appears to have allowed Harris a brief honeymoon but do not think it will stay like that. It won’t.

 

Seniors becoming savvy about digital technology

Early PC, complete with floppy disk drives source Wikipedia

During a frustrating hour or two updating our websites, I realised I am more savvy than the average 74-year-old when it comes to digital technology. Or so I thought. Later, you will read about how Covid-19 prompted many older Australians to start interacting with Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp and other communications systems.

In what has been a busy month (editing the U3A newsletter, updating three websites, updating our self managed super fund and writing a new song), I am finding time to create a short course in basic computer skills for U3A members. Most of our members are in the over-70s age group and a few do not have access to the Internet. I am hoping some will find a use for U3A’s laptops, which have been in hibernation since Covid broke out in early 2020. In preparation to run the computer course, I took these laptops home and updated them.

It wasn’t too difficult, but these laptops were a reminder of how quickly digital technology becomes obsolete. I was reminded of that last Friday when the WordPress website which hosts this weekly essay “broke”. That’s WordPress community geek-speak for not doing what it’s programmed to do. Therefore, WordPress followers who had subscribed to the blog did not get last week’s email with a link to the website. The blog was still posted to the website, but the electronic sharing didn’t happen. It turned out I’d been ignoring reminders to ‘update your PHP’, which is the software within WordPress that interacts with plugins (or apps) that make the website work efficiently.

(That sound you hear is me snoring, having fallen asleep. Ed)

I am convinced that everyone who uses a computer has a ‘blind spot’, that is, a technological advance with which they cannot cope.

My blind spot would be anything to do with coding, editing the registry, updating drivers or any one of a dozen under-the-bonnet programming tasks. In this case, I asked Craig P from Inmotion Hosting to do the hard work updating PHP (the older versions are ‘deprecated’), and I’d take care of the detail.

Computer hardware and software companies are continually updating their products, to fix glitches in the system and to improve security. They also do it to sustain cashflow. There was a time when you could buy the complete Microsoft Office programme at a retail store and use it seemingly forever at no extra cost. Now they want an annual subscription (which includes updates and support).

I’ve been using a computer at home since the mid-1990s and came into daily newspapers at a time when they were leaving the old technology behind. I learned a lot, but don’t ask me about programming.

She Who Sometimes Shouts at her Computer told me the other day she studied Base 2 in grade seven. Base 2 is a field of mathematics that is particularly germane to computers.

As Wikipedia explains, the base-2 numeral system is that in which each digit is referred to as a bit, or binary digit. Because of its straightforward implementation in digital electronic circuitry, the binary system is used by almost all modern computers and computer-based devices.

Got that? You can log back into Facebook now and carry on regardless.

While kids are learning computer science and coding at school, we of the older cohort rely on the ever-changing versions of Microsoft Windows to make it easy. There have been 11 versions of Windows since 1985. Some, like Windows ME, 2000, Vista and Windows 8, were not perfect, so Windows moved on to 7, 10 and now 11.

One of my contacts in information technology tells me that Windows 11 is the best operating system yet because Microsoft has looked at security first and everything else second.

I haven’t upgraded from 10 yet. I limped along with Windows 7 until it got the point where Microsoft wouldn’t support it at all. As of this month, people with Windows 7 won’t even get security updates.

I set off with this idea of teaching older people how to take control of their computer because the conventional wisdom is that older people struggle with new technology. Our reflexes have slowed and we have leathery fingers – ask anyone.

But maybe not so much in Australia. A recent study by The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) set the record straight.

While older people have trouble navigating touch screen gadgets like smart phones and tablets, in the four years from 2017 to 2020, many were on an IT learning curve and probably still are. ACMA’s report, produced in May 2021, noted changes in the way older people engage with the online world.

While most use the internet at home, they also used a mobile phone to go online when out and about. Their adoption of other digital devices like smart phones, tablets and fitbits is also on the rise.

In mid-2020, ACMA found that 93% of older people had internet access in their home, up from 68% in 2017.

In 2017, only 6% of older people used apps and digital devices to go online. In June 2020, 26% of older people used five or more types of devices to go online.

ACMA says that parallel with their uptake of digital devices, more older people are using the internet for a wider variety of activities and tasks.

“Almost all older people now use email, while banking, viewing video content, and buying goods and services online have increased substantially over the previous 4 years, to become relatively common behaviours for this age-group.”

There was also a quantum leap in the numbers of older people who use apps like Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp to make voice calls, video calls and send texts. In 2019 the figure was 33% – a year later it was 55%.

The Pew Research Centre, which keeps tabs on this topic in the US, also noticed growth during the pandemic but observed that 7% of Americans aged over 65 are not online at all.

The Pew Centre said there were notable differences between age groups when measuring the frequency of internet use. Some 48% of those ages 18 to 29 said they were online “almost constantly”.,compared with 22% of those 50 to 64 and 8% of those 65 and older.

Joelle Renstrom, writing in ‘Slate’, an online magazine, said computer and digital technology companies are not designing devices that older people want. Renstrom cited research by Bran Knowles who studies how older people use technology.

Knowles says tech companies don’t see older people as valid stakeholders.

“That’s evident in how they fail to consider seniors’ needs, even when manufacturing products like the Jitterbug, a phone with extra-big buttons.

“Button size doesn’t dictate seniors’ decisions about tech use, and such presumptions highlight Silicon Valley’s bias toward youth.”

The people who drive tech development “can’t imagine what it’s like to be 80”, said Knowles.

Meanwhile, big organisations and governments continue to drive their customers/clients (young and old) to online accounts and digital apps.

RACQ’s Road Ahead magazine reports in its latest edition that drivers will have access to a ‘digital licence app’ in 2023. Queensland’s Department of Transport has been conducting trials since legislation was passed in 2020 to allow development of a digital licence (which will have equal weight to a physical licence). Drivers can store their digital licence on their mobile phone and use it for ID purposes as they travel. The Road Ahead article notes that the new digital licence will be ‘opt-in’ and not compulsory. Phew, we all said.

So, WordPress readers – did you get it?

Covid causing travel hesitancy

covid-travel-hesitancy
Overseas travellers 2012 to 2022 Source ABS

Some of my friends and family have decided to head off overseas (Covid be damned), and I’m just a tad jealous. Despite making plans to visit family in New Zealand in February next year, our last international adventures are now more than a decade ago. Anecdotes and photos have faded, alas.

It’s probably ‘normal’ for avid travellers to do less of it as they age, for financial and health reasons. In addition, as illustrated in this graph from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) website, the advent of Covid-19 and its aftermath certainly put paid to our collective travel ambitions.

A late 2021 study found that Australians were ‘lukewarm’ about travelling, ahead of international borders opening in February 2022.

The University of Queensland study found that only 51% of those surveyed were planning international travel, with New Zealand and Europe as key destinations. The research showed that 33% of respondents preferred to holiday in Australia, and 16% were going to stay home. Nevertheless, it has been five years since our last trip to New Zealand to visit whanua. There are new grandchildren – great-grandchildren, even. And my siblings are ageing, as am I.

As you will note from today’s chart, there has been a surge in overseas traveller numbers (inbound and outbound), but it’s a long way off the 2019 highs.

One outcome of the Covid pandemic and the lifting of travel bans is a dramatic shift in the way people plan overseas travel. A recent ABC segment found that hesitancy has changed the way Australians travel, with shorter lead times between bookings and departures. Pre-Covid, a large proportion of travellers made their own travel and accommodation bookings. But COVID-19 restrictions have led to a renewed interest in travel agencies.

Many people are nervous about what could happen should they catch Covid while travelling abroad. There are a couple of key flaws in Covid-tracking, and one is that sometimes people have Covid but don’t know it (asymptomatic). Then there are people (there would have to be some), that suspect they have Covid but keep on travelling regardless.

They might give it to a thousand other people, but as they might say in their own defence, our own chief health officer has said, it is “inevitable” most of us will catch Covid.

A friend who once swore she’d never visit Europe for all those reasons and more has just left for a six-week tour of the UK. In part, it is an organised tour and the rest independent travel. Our local friend, who we shall refer to as Zee, related a typical 2022 travel anecdote from the transit lounge in Vancouver.

“I never saw the person involved, but I gather he was a young man who had travelled via Alaska Airlines to Portland and then Air Canada to Vancouver. He had checked two bags with all his worldly possessions through to Korea.  However, apparently, they never made it on to the Air Canada flight and nobody has any idea where they are.  I know all this because he explained it in exhaustive detail several times to different people on a very long phone call. He was obviously distressed, and I felt very sorry for him. And I will never know if he ever got them back.”

 Zee has since landed at Heathrow and boarded a tour bus bound for Oxford (Ed: The Perfect Comma Tour?). After seeing stories in the media about airline passengers losing luggage, Zee opted for carry-on only. I suspect UK charity shops will be the beneficiaries of that decision.

We have all heard about or seen media coverage of people trying in vain to find lost luggage, waiting for hours in queues or being repeatedly bumped off flights. During its 18-month hiatus, the airline industry, despite attempts to revisit glory days running decades-old commercials, appears to have serious organisational issues. It comes down to a shortage of staff and trying to make old bookings systems work in a post-Covid world. Not that we are anywhere near a post-Covid world.

It may surprise you to know there are 28 countries which are not open to international visitors. They include a few countries most of us would never have on our destination bucket list. A few have onerous travel restrictions which would probably deter most visitors. Hong Kong, for example, requires you to return a negative Covid test and then go into quarantine.

A useful website (Kayak) tells us there are 163 countries that are open to visitors, and which do not require Covid-testing or quarantining. Another 33 countries require Covid testing before they will let you in and three that also require you to go into quarantine. The 28 countries that are open only to returning citizens or those under ‘special circumstances’ include China, Taiwan and Russia.

Kayak, an on-line travel agency, maintains a web page which keeps track of where you can go and what restrictions there are (if any). Despite Australia requiring all people travelling to and from the country to be double vaccinated, some countries (like Ireland) have an open-door policy. I would caution anyone with travel plans to check and double-check the entry (and exit) requirements as they change all the time.

The Kayak web page is also a one-stop place to check out how other countries are going with their vaccination rates. They range from Samoa (100%), Singapore (92%) and Germany (75%) to scarily low numbers in countries like Somalia (16%) and PNG (3.4%).

Our research into travel to New Zealand in six months’ time has thus far revealed it will be costly for comprehensive insurance. This is more to do with being 70+ than any other factor. Even though it is six months’ away, hire car companies seem to be short of vehicles. Of more pressing concern is planning ahead to avoid catching Covid and giving it to other people, namely elderly family members. We are fortunate to have an extended family in NZ who would find ways of accommodating us should we need to go into isolation (a bach at the beach, Cuz?). But it is best to make sure you factor another $1000 or so into your travel budget to cover contingencies.

As readers may have gathered over the eight years we have been communing on Fridays, I’ve done a fair bit of travelling in my youth. We also had some adventures later in life – in 2004 exchanging houses for six months with an English couple who lived in Godalming (Surrey). That was a great way to see Greece, France, Belgium, Italy, Scotland, Wales and other places, three weeks at a time then back to base to live the suburban life for a while. We visited relatives in Canada on the way over and re-visited Canada in 2010 for a family reunion. This seems to be the year for the Canadians to visit us. Brother Jon was here in May, making the most of the wet winter. Cousin Glen and his wife will be here in our Spring. They intended to travel in 2020 but we all know how that went down. There’s talk of a cousins’ reunion (probably in Seattle) in 2023. .

As readers may recall from recent essays about our trip to Tasmania, we found there’s a fair difference between taking on a 10km bush walk at 64 and 10 years on. .

Let’s see how we pull up after a month in New Zealand.

FOMM flashback

 

 

Spreading the word about U3A

U3A-birdwatching-education
(Photo by Bob Wilson): U3A Warwick birdwatchers checking out the shallow end of Storm King Dam while on a recent excursion.

One of the positives in retirement is that it allows one to volunteer with valuable community organisations like U3A. It’s not that uncommon to meet people who have never heard of the University of the Third Age (U3A), an international organisation with broad aims of helping educate and entertain its 450,000 members, who are now in their ‘Third Age’ of life.

U3A originated in France in 1973 as an extramural university activity. This was significantly modified in the UK where it was recognized that most people of retirement age have something to contribute. The UK model, which Australia has adopted, emphasises sharing without formal educational links, that is, ‘study’ without the pressure of homework or exams. Membership is open to people who are winding down to retirement or are already retired.

Australia’s first U3A began in Melbourne in 1984 and has grown to 250 U3As with about 100,000 members. These metropolitan, regional and rural chapters develop programmes of teaching and learning over a wide range of subject areas, dependant upon the membership’s own expertise, knowledge and skills.

For example, in our local Warwick U3A, the retired principal of Scots PGC College, Neil Bonnell, tutors two courses – China Today and the Bible as History. Mr Bonnell, a much-travelled senior educator, taught at well-regarded schools in England, Uganda and Australia, finishing his career with a year in China. Last year he started writing his memoirs, which have been published in the Warwick U3A Emag and quarterly newsletters. The final chapters can be found here.

In 2003 Neil began tutoring and giving bridge lessons for U3A Warwick. He is a founding member of Warwick Bridge Club and past-president and a long-serving committee member of U3A.

I started attending Neil’s up to the minute and insightful class “China Today” this year. The advantage of being a member of a U3A course or class is that you can sit back and soak up someone else’s great knowledge and experience for a very modest annual subscription. All tutor and committee roles are voluntary. Local U3A chapters are supported by State and Territory Networks; organisations which help local committees with more complex issues (like developing a Covid policy).

Queensland U3A Network president Gail Bonser reflected on the struggle to keep U3As going through the pandemic and restrictions which saw some classes postponed or cancelled.

“Managing a U3A during the COVID epidemic has been taxing for many. Quite a few U3As have experienced a reduction in numbers and with it a reduction in their income.  All were closed for several months during 2020 and because of their special circumstances, some did not reopen during the remainder of that year.

“During the shutdown, the Network formed a communication group which enabled U3A Presidents or their representatives to keep in touch and to share ideas, experiences and management techniques.  Once Level 3 restrictions were introduced, it became possible for U3As to recommence classes and activities and members of the group exchanged documents such as COVID Safe Plans.”

Ms Bonser said associations were hoping for a COVID free start to 2022 but the Omicron spike intervened.  Most U3As cancelled their January Enrolment Days, made alternative arrangements and/or delayed the resumption of classes to early February.
“Thankfully it seems that U3A members have largely avoided the worst effects of the disease. That may have been one of the few positives.”

I joined the Warwick committee at the time we were looking for someone to edit the quarterly newsletter. The former editor had been producing a monthly Emag as well as quarterly newsletters. I took the job on the proviso I’d phase out the monthly magazine. Since then, my role has been extended to include updating our website and posting new content as appropriate.

Our chapter hosts outdoor activities including Tai Chi, bush walking and birdwatching. There are language classes, card groups, art and craft classes, meditation, music appreciation and this year, two new dance classes – Line Dancing and Scottish Country Dance. A new gardening group was formed in 2022 and retired teacher Stephen Jackson is next term resuming his popular opera class. Some courses are so popular there is a waiting list (wood crafting, for example).

Two of the four groups I joined require getting out of bed early – bush walking and birdwatching. Both activities depend on what the weather is doing at the time. Last year, our bush walking group’s expeditions included a day at Girraween National Park and a visit to Cunningham’s Gap nature reserve. The birdwatching group also travel afield and in February visited a private property at Storm King dam near Stanthorpe.

I was recently talking to a younger friend in Brisbane (late 40s) and mentioned U3A. He had not heard of the organisation but after I gave him an overview, he said it sounded like something his Mum would enjoy.

U3A members are from all different backgrounds, but it is not uncommon to meet people who have had a university education and a professional career. Perhaps that is why we have not one but two book clubs. One is a formal book club (everyone reads the same book and then the group critiques it). A new course started this year involves re-reading old Australian classics, starting with Peter Carey’s True History of the Kelly Gang.

Our U3A has about 125 members and is currently running 27 courses, so there is a lot of choice. There is also provision for members to take part in other activities through U3A Online.

As for volunteering in general, I recommend it for older people (70+) as a way of keeping your brain sharp and sharing your life experience with others. I started volunteering in 2021 as an occasional tour guide at Glengallan Homestead, a grand country home from the 1870s that was rescued from ruin. Then I joined a local refugee support group and along the way stepped up my involvement with U3A. In a way, volunteering is like one of the main aims of the organisation – to encourage people to try something new.

As someone remarked after I accepted the position of chair of the Southern Downs Refugee and Migrant Network – “You’ll grow into the role, Bob.”

The only problem with U3A (if like me you have a 40-year-old brain), is that you only ever meet people your own age (early 70s) or older. While that firmly cements me in the demographic to which I belong, it can also be a gratifying experience. Those of us who lost our parents relatively early in life can always benefit from the wise counsel of an older friend.

The message today (for readers under 50) is to subtly suggest to your parents (or grandparents) that they check out U3A. A year of absorbing activities and new friends for the price of a pub lunch. As for my peers, you don’t have to just sit there and watch daytime TV or play Solitaire on your computer. Go for a regular walk, join a seniors’ gym class, interact with grandchildren and look into U3A. Do as I say, not as I do (says he, flexing his ab). As they say, physical and intellectual activity can enrich and prolong life in one’s later years – just ask me!

FOMM back pages

Birthday musings about ageing and mortality

old-man-and-birthday-dog
Old man and dog – photo by Bob Wilson

So I’ve picked a table at the combined 70th birthday party, met the woman next to me and nodded to her husband. It’s an outdoor setting for 40 people with five big tables and much background noise from kitchen activities. We say hello to the hosts, and, according to the way their lips moved, they reply “glad you could make it to our birthday”.

After a while, I set my hearing aids to ‘noisy room’ which basically meant I could talk to the person on my right and She Who Sits on My Left. After the main meal I got up and milled about, having one-on-one discourse with people who tended to lean towards me and say things like “Sorry I missed that?”

The birthday girl made a short but gracious speech without benefit of microphone. We were all lip-reading like billyo.

“It’s good to see you all – and as Keith Richards said, ‘it’s good to see anybody,’ ” she quipped.

The birthday boy also spoke briefly and said that while it was lovely to see us all, he doubted he’d ever see all of us again in the same room. It was just the right sentiment for a 70th, where the guests were either approaching that day or had passed it some years earlier.

Crikey, this is becoming a habit, raising our glasses to people crossing the threshold of seven decades. Who’d have thought?

The conversations ranged around ageing, mortality, health scares, belief systems, technology and Donald Trump. I told someone mortality rarely occurred to me these days though when I turned 40 I’d lie awake observing my heart beat and wondering if and when it would stop. Neurotic, yes, but you knew that.

Comedian, actor and writer George Burns, who died at 100, once said “You can’t help getting older, but you don’t have to get old.” Burns also said that when he was a boy, the Dead Sea was only sick. So he carved out a later-life career making fun of his ability to live into his 90s and still smoke cigars.

Making A Movie About Moses

Some people seem able to reach a great age staying mentally supple. I picked up a book in the library by one Herman Wouk, author of the Caine Mutiny, et al. Turns out this book (The Lawmaker, about a new Moses movie), was written when Wouk was 98. He followed up at 99 with: Sailor and Fiddler: Reflections of a 100-Year-Old Author. He described the latter as “…the story of my life, light-hearted because I’m an inveterate Jewish optimist.” It was released in January 2016 to mark his 100th birthday. Wouk married Betty Sarah Brown in 1945. Betty, who was also his literary agent, died in 2011, aged 90.

I felt a surge of guilt about my long-neglected habit of keeping a daily journal when I read that Wouk has been doing this since 1932. What a trove for historians.

Like Wouk, George Burns advocated staving off old age by continuing to work.

“Age to me means nothing. I can’t get old, I’m working,” he said. “I was old when I was twenty-one and out of work. As long as you’re working, you stay young.”

Yeh, maybe, but Burns also said the key to longevity is to avoid stress and tension. Just how you do that and keep working is a secret many of us have never learned.

So we of the nearly-70 brigade return to our routines, tucked away in our semi-rural house, fans set on high, watching Breaking Bad and waiting for the next invitation to an event that isn’t a funeral. No wonder so many older Australians buy a road rig, preferably with the bumper sticker ‘adventure before dementia’, and traverse this big red continent.

In our society, siblings resolve between them the decision about caring for elderly parents. Some take care of their parents in their own homes, or under the one roof. Others hand-ball the folks to a retirement village, preferably one with an associated nursing home.

The onset of dementia usually accelerates the decision to admit Mum and/or Dad to an aged care facility. It’s not easy caring for people with dementia and it can only get worse.

In some societies, this outplacement of old folk is not culturally acceptable. Seniors, demented or not, are the respected elders of the tribe and take their rightful place at the head of the table.

Global Agewatch maintains an index which measures income security, health, personal capability and whether elders live in an “enabling environment”. Indicators include life expectancy, coverage by pension plans, access to public transit and the poverty rate for people over 60.

Switzerland is the best place to be if you are past 65 and wondering what comes next. Norway and Sweden are 2 and 3 in this important global index, which is to be updated in 2018.

Australia is ranked 17th, below countries including Canada, the UK and New Zealand. Australia ranks highly in some domains (health, social connectivity) but it ranks lowest in its region in the income security domain (62), due to high old age poverty rate (33.4%) and pension income coverage (83%) below the regional average.

So yes, some societies revere the elderly and there is never any question about one’s parents being moved to a retirement village or aged care facility. In China and Japan there is the Confucian code of filial piety, in essence a system of selfless subordinate relationships. An article by Mayumi Hayashi, however, considers the myths surrounding family care, filial piety and how these systems can break down in urban Japan.

Hayashi says the limits of family care were recognised by successive governments in the 1960s. But public residential care was restricted to people lacking financial means and family support. Other problems with Japan’s system include family ‘care’ that involves neglect and abuse. From the 1970s, large numbers of ‘abandoned’ older people became resident in hospitals, often with little need of medical care. This ‘social hospitalisation’ remains stigmatised, says Hayashi, and an option of last resort, like Obasuteyama.

The latter is a Japanese custom of the distant past where frail aged relatives (usually women), were allegedly taken to remote mountain areas and left to their fate. The practice was said to be most common during times of drought and famine. It was also sometimes mandated by feudal officials (although Wikipedia notes a citation is needed to verify this).

Myths persist of similar practices among other societies – for example the Inuit, placing their frail old ones on ice flows and letting them drift off to a certain death.

The notion of a loving son or daughter propping their old Da up against a tree in his favourite part of the forest has (for me) some appeal. The alternative, 24/7 care in an aged care facility, has none. The denouement is the same.

More reading:

Founder and former chairman of National Seniors Australia Everald Compton, now in his 80s, continues to campaign for seniors.

Kathryn Johnston’s blog Scattered Straws has lately has been focussing on the (financial) plight of the Naked Retiree.

 

Old dogs, new tricks

Chunky the bulldog is pictured in the world’s first stair lift for overweight dogs. Photo: www.rcagroup.com

You may have noticed last week how I skilfully bypassed National Seniors’ Week and wrote about the IT/social media stuff that engrosses 30-somethings. Physiotherapists love this ‘old body-teen brain’ syndrome. They get a lot of ongoing business from 70-year-old men falling off ladders while pruning trees with chainsaws, or moving a full filing cabinet only to have all four drawers roll out at the same time. But I digress.

For me, the young at heart feeling is quite acute this week as we rehearse for a couple of gigs at a folk festival in our home town. It’s hard to think of yourself as old when you’re wearing jeans and a T-shirt, guitar around your neck, singing songs about love and peace and a dead man’s shirt.
The subject of age came up the weekend before last when staying with rellies at their new abode, which has a flight of polished wooden stairs that lead to a sunken lounge. The problem with the see-through steps is that the 15-year-old poodle can’t do them. He tries: a tentative paw, a quizzical look, a tiny whimper and there he stands, quivering, for however long it takes for someone to take pity and carry him up the stairs.
“You need a Dog Stairlift,” I jested (before looking it up on a search engine and finding that, yes, someone has already thought of that).

Adapting to arthritis and ancientry

What a marvellous idea, and multi-purpose, too. You could adapt this for aged cats, your pet python; banjos, anything small but heavy you don’t want to carry up or down the stairs.
The truly lazy could arrange the sunken lounge just so; the sofa’s here, the remote is there and the lift is within arm’s reach (“Send down another Merlot and some cheese and crackers wouldya?”)
As we age and our bodies start to let us down, we adapt in almost imperceptible ways. We stop using the bottom shelves of the fridge, the oven and the dishwasher, so much less crouching down. Stooping we can do. We put the recycling bin out every fortnight, not waiting until it is so full of empties you can’t drag it anywhere.
Old dogs too are good at adapting, despite what they say. The poodle has worked out how to exit the downstairs back door and run around to the front, whining and pawing the screen door. When we had a German Shepherd and she got old and arthritic we went to a $2 shop and bought a big plastic box we could put on the ground at the rear of the station wagon so she could get in without having to jump, like she used to. Only took her one go to get that right.

I was telling Mr Loophole that I was having trouble getting up from a crouching or kneeling position. Mr L, who does stretching exercises every day of his life, showed me his patented way of becoming upright with the least effort; I parried with the Dru Yoga lever-yourself-off-the-floor-in-a-spiral move.
As my Scots Auntie (90-something) said, last time I was there, prising her old bones off of the sofa: “Ach, this getting auld is’nae for the faint-hearted.”
Or as Billy Connolly says, “You can tell how old someone is by how long it takes them to get out of a beanbag.”

Man, you gettin’ old (P.Simon)

The latest demographic studies confirm what we have suspected for a while, the old and increasingly infirm will soon outnumber the upcoming generation.
As you stand around the water cooler at work, you can use these figures to impress people how much you know about how the world’s population is growing—and aging.
The National Institute on Ageing says very low birth rates in developed countries and birth rate declines in most developing countries are projected to increase the population aged 65 and over to the point in 2050 when it will be 2.5 times that of the population aged 0-4. That’s a big change from 1950, when there were 335 million children in the 0-4 age group and just 131 million people ages 65+.
United Nations Population Division estimates for mid-2010 said there were 642 million persons aged 0-4 and 523 million aged 65+ .( We assume people ages 5-64 make up the rest of the 7.2 billion). So the UN is projecting the 0-4 age group will decline between 2015 and 2020 (a historical first), having peaked at around 650 million. The 65+ population is projected to rise from 601 million in 2015 to 714 million in 2020 during the same period. Crikey, that’s just five years away.

Masters, not just a degree

Medical science, meanwhile, coupled with elevated community awareness of “wellness”, means that more of us will live to be 80, 90 or even 100 years old. So my tongue in cheek song about a 100-year-old Morris dancer who challenges the new squire of the team to a dance-off is maybe not that far-fetched.
Even in my somewhat atrophied social circle you can find people like Mr L, still playing basketball at 68 (“And I’m one of the young ones,” he’ll say). People who have always played a sport or kept fit frequently progress to Masters Games status. The last competition held at the Gold Coast saw 91 year old swimmer Joyce Faunce winning a gold medal in the 50m freestyle. Heather Lee (85) set two new world records in the women’s walking events (category 85+) at the Masters Games 2014. She walked 3,000m (3km) in 23 minutes and some seconds, backing up with a win in the 5,000m (5km) walk in 40:06:97. These high-achieving oldies put a new twist on the meaning of life, making the dragging of two wheelie bins up a 100m driveway seem like a doddle.

Rumination can be fun

I was persuaded to think about age and its complexities this week when engrossed in one of Clare Russell’s Dru Yoga sessions. The stillness and body awareness quickly makes one aware of what parts of one’s body really hurt. The Dru Yoga ethos is you don’t do it if it hurts. So there are things one doesn’t do, but one does enough to feel it in the body later.
I’m very bad at relaxation/meditation. Random thought keep swooping in – don’t forget eye drops, shoelaces and taco shells on the way home – oh no, I should have gone to the toilet first – did Bill Shorten lose the leadership ballot or did I just have a microsleep and dream that? – what will I write about on Friday and should I correct things I got wrong last week? All kinds of ruminative thoughts surface, dive and resurface, over and over. At one stage I invented a tiny leprechaun with a little rubber mallet and mentally trained him to run around my head walloping me, saying encouraging things like: “Take that, ye eejit.”

As a thought-stopping exercise it was shite.

Last week:
• Correspondent Barbs wished her son could have studied Latin but she steered him into German (for the sciences), not the other way around;
• Fiddler on the Roof tells me that Si hoc legere scis nimium erudittionis habes! means ‘if you can read this you are over-educated’ (just in case someone adopts it as a tattoo).

Postscript:
Listen to Ann Leung’s interview with us played on 612ABC this morning ahead of the Maleny Music Festival which starts tonight.