"This is for the Senior members of CS, those born before 1947. Baby Boomers and Generations X & Y are welcome providing you are over 18 🙂
But this is definitely for people who are facing the last long haul. We have survived babyhood, childhood, being teens and twenties... We have learned to read and write, to drive, have probably been married and the women have survived child birth.
The challenges are constant and the near misses of death are also there. If we have become a senior we have learned to survive so much, and along the way we have, of course, gathered a great deal of knowledge about life.
The belief that age diminishes us is not true, it changes us and not all of it is bad. Yes there can be various forms of dementia for some, but that is also a disease that can happen in younger people. Alzheimer's can also occur - it is another form of dementia and generally occurs in people over 65, although that can occur much earlier too and not everyone is going to get it.
Most of us keep our mental alertness up to the moment of death, even if we lose our hearing and our eyesight, but of course this can happen at any age too.
What changes is our physical strength, which diminishes but our mental strength and patience grows, it has to of course, to deal with this aging thing.
Arthritis, heart trouble, strokes - all these things associated with age can happen at any time in your life - arthritis can happen when you are a child but they don't like giving out new hips and knees until you are in your 50s and 60s or later. We can talk about that too.
Cancer can happen any time and that is also something we can discuss here if you like.
The point of this thread is to give the Seniors a chance to talk about how they are coping with age, the challenges it presents and the fears that can come with it... loss of hearing or sight, aging spouses, living alone, retirement villages, even death...
So I will ask that the Juniors treat us in kindly fashion and remember, all this is going to happen to you too - providing you avoid death before you get here 🙂
So, onward and upward. Let's go...."
Yes the years go too fast 😞 no freshie I can't remember 🙂
here's one for terra if I can get it working...
I REMEMBER THE CHEESE OF MY CHILDHOOD
And the bread that we cut with a knife
When the children helped with the housework,
And the men went to work not the wife.
The cheese never needed a fridge,
And the bread was so crusty and hot,
The children were seldom unhappy
And the wife was content with her lot.
I remember the milk from the Billy,
With the yummy cream on the top,
Our dinner came hot from the oven,And not from the fridge; in the shop.
The kids were a lot more contented,
They didn't need money for kicks,
Just a game with our mates in the paddock,
And sometimes the Saturday flicks.
I remember the shop on the corner,
Where a pen'orth of lollies was sold
Do you think I'm a bit too nostalgic?
Or is it....I'm just getting old?
I remember the 'loo' was the 'dunny',
And the pan man came in the night,
It wasn't the least bit funny
Going "out the back" with no light.
The interesting items we perused,
From the newspapers cut into squares,
And hung on a peg in the outhouse,
It took little to keep us amused.
The clothes were boiled in the copper,
With plenty of rich foamy suds
But the ironing seemed never ending
As Mum pressed everyone's 'duds'.
I remember the slap on my backside,
And the taste of soap if I swore
Anorexia and diets weren't heard o
fAnd we hadn't much choice what we wore.
Do you think that bruised our ego?
Or our initiative was destroyed?
We ate what was put on the table
And I think life was better enjoyed.
Author unkown
Yes, some rose coloured glasses happening here, but still it's pretty accurate for those of us lucky enough to have a family and enough money to live on.
I can remember kids that went to school without shoes 😞
I can remember 6 o'clock closing and the men getting as much beer in them before they were kicked out.
I remember Dicky seats where the boots of the cars are now - passenger seats that were open behind the car.
