Guest blogger - Lynn Mobley - WE are "the media"

I’m starting to think I’m not meant to watch the evening news. I don’t have acid reflux, I got enough calcium during my formative years, and when I want to sleep, I count glasses of merlot. So, during the moments I’m not busy admiring Brian Williams, I feel like I might be watching the wrong show.

It’s clear that younger people aren’t watching the news. Otherwise, they’d run funny ads featuring Neanderthals and lizards and ducks and beer, and ducks and lizards drinking beer. Apparently, Madison Avenue thinks that everybody who watches network news is pressed close to the old black-and-white, straining to catch the names of new chemicals that reverse the ravages of time, while they weigh the side effects - weight gain, weight loss, death, erections that can last for more than ten hours - all rattled off at breakneck speed by folks who sound blithely unconcerned.

Is it the ads or is it the news? The economy is frightening, the war is devastating, the candidates have to resort to throwing dirt because we voters get so easily bored with issues. Used to be that some government agency would point out the benefits of global warming two or three nights a week, but even that spot of brightness has burned out. And the station breaks just make it worse.

Apparently younger people get their news from “other sources.” They don’t seem to need that quiet half-hour to digest after a home-cooked meal, before Seinfeld or Jeopardy. Or maybe there’s another reason...

Maybe they don’t watch the evening news because, like me, they get, like, totally bummed by the ads. The litany of things I can look forward to before I shuffle off this mortal coil makes me want to end it sooner rather than later. Once, I could count on the news to remind me how lucky I am. Now, unfortunate people around the world are getting rockets dropped on their houses, and all I can think about is the heartbreak of psoriasis?

We need a network for health-care ads, with no other programming, where people who speak more slowly than auctioneers can go in-depth on symptoms and counter-indications. I know there’s a market for it. I’d even pay for it, just so I could focus on the news.

Wait a minute - I’ll bet there’s one on cable...

---Please share your thoughts on this topic with us, or submit your own blog ideas to PrimeTime@aarp.org

Richard Cohen and "citzens of disability"

A recent guest of ours on Prime Time Radio put the world in a different perspective for me. At various times I am reminded of the truth of what Richard Cohen said to me in talking about his book Strong at the Broken Places. The truth is that people in our society who struggle with disabilities are seldom, if ever, regarded as persons in a whole sense.

He reminded me, in his portrayal of five different people, all with fatal or debilitating conditions, of how easy it is to dismiss them. As one of his subjects asks: “Why should anyone make a friend of me when there are so many normal people out there?”

One of Cohen’s subjects has ALS—Lou Gehrig’s Disease—another man non-Hodgkins lymphoma, a young woman Crohn’s disease of the intestines, another, the youngest, is a college student with a rare and virulent form of muscular dystrophy while the last has bipolar illness so severe that it can induce suicide.

All of these people are coping, in one way or another, with what is for some of them a death sentence and for others a life-sentence. Cohen copes with the latter being a victim not only of two bouts with colon cancer in the late 1990s, but an even longer life under the limitations of advancing multiple sclerosis.

I spoke with Richard Cohen four years ago in our AARP studios, He walked with a cane then. Now he relies on the cane, his vision is fading and his voice is notably weaker and shakier. Yet he copes, admittedly with the help of anger that stimulates his struggle against limits on what he can achieve physically.

What he has achieved in his latest book is a reminder that we cannot afford to overlook the myriad aspects of human character, behavior and thought that go into the making of a person.

Listening to Cohen and reading what he learned from his fellow “citizens of disability” forces thoughtful members of his audience to recognize the possibility that disability—in one form or another—is to be faced by almost all of us at some stage in our lives. It also allows us to see that disability can enrich rather than destroy a person and that focusing on the enriching factors is far more valuable, both to the disabled and to us, than pity or turning our backs on them and their diseases.

Talking with Richard Cohen, whose wit and erudition have not been stilled by his diseases, is more rewarding than talking with many, if not most, non-disabled persons. To focus only on his cane, and his vision would be to ignore him as a person—and what a waste of his time and yours that would be.

Aging

It’s not surprising that we have many guests on Prime Time Radio whose expertise is the process of aging. Two diverse guests resonated with me recently and caused me to think more about aging than I usually do.

Aging is something I find it easy to not think about since there is not too much I can do about it. But Anne Kreamer’s Going Gray reminded me that many of us believe that, by changing our external appearance, we can appear not to be aging. This is sheer delusion, of course, but as Kreamer realized, she had spent over $65,000 in the past twenty years coloring her hair to avoid going gray.

(Listen to my conversation with Anne Kreamer with Real Audio.)

Yet she was not a day younger after all that investment. She is clear: that the perception is that women with gray hair are regarded as more antique than their tinted sisters and she may be right. Except that she found many successful women, youthful in mind and action, who had gone gray long ago.

Then there was Lillian Rubin, author of 60 on Up: The Truth About Aging in America. She is in her eighties and recently began a new career as an artist. She sold her first painting at the age of eighty-two. Her book is a sometimes-brutal look at aging.

She points out, for instance, that we spend millions of dollars on keeping men and women alive but a fraction of that, if anything, on ways to make their old age more comfortable or even tolerable. Life, it seems, is more important than how that life is spent.

She points out: “We say we want to die with dignity and mean it, but we’re so frightened of death that we submit to often painful and undignified medical procedures in the often vain hope of putting off our meeting with it just a little longer.” Perhaps that is a human failing, like the desire to believe that tinting our hair to cover the gray does something significant for the way we age.

(Listen to my conversation with Lillian Rubin with Real Audio.)

Both books made me assess how well I’m handling aging. At times, the best times, with equanimity and rational acceptance of what is. At other times, the worst, a frustration at the lack of control it is possible to achieve over the last decades of life.

I do not enjoy counting pills every morning and every night; pills that lower my blood pressure, control my cholesterol, shrink my prostate and take away inflammation from my knee. I do not enjoy looking at menus and seeing things that I know I can’t have if I want to control my blood sugar. But it is all part of aging that I must accept because there is little alternative.

My hair is gray, my knees man-made; my back is never what it used to be and I am shrinking. I hope I can approach the rest of aging with the dignity that Rubin talks about. I plan on it. But another part of aging that we cannot escape is that things change. What I fear most about aging is the loss of the ability to adapt. So far, so good.

I wonder what you fear most about aging and how you’re coping. Share it with us by clicking "comments" below. We post your comments soon after you send them.

It Takes a Village

Today, there are a growing number of options for housing which allow older Americans to avoid moving into big independent or assisted living facilities. In an extensive feature story in today's New York Times the focus is on "aging in place."

Here's a sample from the Times article:

"Urban planners and senior housing experts say this movement, organized by residents rather than government agencies or social service providers, could make “aging in place” safe and affordable for a majority of elderly people. Almost 9 in 10 Americans over the age of 60, according to AARP polls, share the Allens’ wish to live out their lives in familiar surroundings."

Listen to a segment from Prime Time Focus with host Alyne Ellis on a Washington, D.C. project called Capitol Hill Village. Real Audio link.

Find more from AARP about housing choices, in this special web module.

More on Beacon Hill Village, and similar options, from AARP Bulletin.

Policy and Research from AARP for professionals in the field of aging.

Watch this short video about Capitol Hill Village, from AARP Broadcast (click play to get it started):

David Brooks on 'Being Old'

In a column in today's New York Times, conservative pundit David Brooks talks about a fascinating book he discovered on a road trip. "Autobiography of an Elderly Woman" was published in 1911, and contained what Brooks considers to be true insights into aging in an earlier era. He quotes the author:

“I do not know when the change came, nor do they, if indeed they realize it at all,” she writes. “There was a time when I was of their generation; now I am not. I cannot put my finger on the time when old age finally claimed me. But there came a moment when my boys were more thoughtful of me, when they didn’t come to me anymore with their perplexities, not because I had what is called ‘failed,’ but because they felt that the time had come when I ought to be ‘spared’ every possible worry. So there is a conspiracy of silence against me in my household.”

The column is thought-provoking but oddly ambiguous. And what does Brooks mean when he concludes "I don’t know how many of her opinions will ring true to today’s oldsters. Now, elderly are richer, more active and more engaged than their cohorts of a century ago, but are they still living in a different dimension?

"Is it now a dimension of their own choosing?"

If you subscribe to Times Select, you can read the column here. We'd like to find out what you think. Send us comments and we'll post them.

Retirement (by Prime Time Radio Host, Mike Cuthbert)

Every possible weekend, which this summer has meant every weekend, I drive up the highway to West Virginia and spend at least two days playing golf. I don’t play all that well, which frustrates me, but I spend a lot of time with the Men’s Golf Association where we have our summer place and I learn a lot.

Many of the men I play with live in retirement at the resort; many are like me: weekenders. Every week the question of retirement comes up and I am fascinated by the responses. About half say they are delighted to be retired, though they’re not sure about how their wives feel about it. The other half are like me, convinced that they will work until they drop.

I feel that way largely because I have never been confident that I would ever have enough money in the bank to be able to do nothing to earn more. Another reason is that, if I wake up in the morning with literally “nothing to do,” I feel strange, as if I’m ill.

On a recent show we talked with Mark Freedman about “encore” careers and it occurred to me again that there’s another way. [after August 14th, check local listings]. Freedman talks about people who get up in the morning and want something to do but they want whatever they do to have a wider impact than their first career, which was for themselves and their families. At the same time, he makes the point that volunteering is nice, but everybody takes what you do more seriously if there is some recompense. [More about Freedman on his website Civic Ventures.]

So, as I face my second total knee replacement in five years next week, I’m starting to look around for things to do to replace the golf I may not be able to play next summer. I’ve got some ideas that could help people while earning a little recompense. I wonder how many people are doing the same thing, even if they have both knees?

Retirement? I still can’t imagine it. But I’m working on some alternatives and that’s reason enough to get up in the morning.

Nelson Mandela and "The Elders"

Last week, former South African president Nelson Mandela announced the formation of a new organization to tackle the world's most difficult problems. Here is part of what he said:

"In today’s world, many of the problems we face are global in nature. These include climate change, pandemics such as AIDS, malaria and TB. And of course, that entirely human created affliction: violent conflict.

"The structures we have to deal with these problems are often tied down by political, economic or geographical constraints. As institutions of government grapple – often unequally – with challenges they face, the efforts of a small, dedicated group of leaders, working objectively and without any vested personal interest in the outcome, can help resolve what often seems like intractable problems.

"We have the makings of such a group...Let us call them Global Elders, not because of their age, but because of their individual and collective wisdom.

"This group derives its strength not from political, economic or military power, but from the independence and integrity of those who are here.

"They do not have careers to build, elections to win, constituencies to please. They can talk to anyone they please, and are free to follow paths they deem right, even if hugely unpopular.

"It is now several years since Richard Branson and Peter Gabriel came to me with their idea for The Elders. Since then I have watched the concept grow, gain structure and strength, and become a real, viable, and pragmatic initiative.

"I believe that, with their experience and their energies, and their profound commitment to building a better world, The Elders can become a fiercely independent and robust force for good, tackling complex and intractable issues, especially those that are not popular....

"The Elders can speak freely and boldly, working both publicly and behind the scenes on whatever actions need to be taken. They will reach out to those who most need their help. It is those who have the least and who therefore suffer the most. It is those who are rarely heard. This group of Elders can represent them and make sure they are not ignored.

"I am also certain that that they will support courage where there is fear, foster agreement where there is conflict and inspire hope where there is despair....

"...I wish them well, and hope they succeed in bringing light to some of the darkness that afflicts our world, and new energy to areas where others have become weary because of the endless conflict."

Visit The Elders website for the complete speech, and much more information about this initiative.

Deferring Retirement - DC Panel Addresses Workforce Transformation

Yesterday on Capitol Hill, Senator Herb Kohl welcomed a group of experts to discuss the rapidly changing nature of midlife careers, and to explain legislation he has introduced to support the ongoing changes. The panel was hosted by AARP's Director of Workforce Issues, Deborah Russell. Here are some highlights:

Marc Freedman talked about his new book, "Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life." He predicted historic changes in the American workplace, where the time between the end of what he called "midlife careers," and the beginning of what used to be called "old age" is stretching into decades. What pathways will be created to find and train workers in that stage of life and help them find work that is meaningful to them?

Freedman talks about the book, and the issues, with Prime Time Radio host Mike Cuthbert in this extended conversation from the August 14th edition of Prime Time Radio. Listen with Real Audio.

Phyllis Segal, who's on the faculty of Harvard Law School, is a Senior Vice President of Civic Ventures, which spotlights innovative recruitment and hiring strategies targeting workers over 50. As she said, "old notions of retirement are in the rear view mirror." Because they have to, or want to, or because industry needs them, people will continue to work as they get older. She said older workers are looking for "both meaning and compensation." And this often leads them to non-profit organizations, or public agencies.

Jeri Sedlar is a senior advisor to The Conference Board. She's also the author of "Don't Retire - REWIRE!" She believes that workers over 50 want to move "from success to significance." And from "profits to passions." These desires, she says, are moving older workers into the nonprofit sector.

There was general agreement among the panelists that "debris" left over from outmoded ideas about retirement is one of the main obstacles to creating fresh opportunities. These stumbling blocks include mandatory retirement ages and the abrupt ending of work-related benefits at the time when workers "retire." Kohl's legislation would give employers a tax credit for establishing flexible work schedules that enable older employees to stay on the job without losing healthcare or pension benefits.

More on this subject in the New York Times of Sunday, July 22.

Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) Defends Himself on Senate Floor: "My Only Adversity is Age."

On June 28, West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd responded to critics who have recently suggested that he may be too old for his job.

The 89-year-old Democrat is the longest serving senator in history. Commentators had recently pointed out that Byrd seems to be growing infirm, that his signature was shaky, and his attention often wandered.

Here's part of his reponse:

Mr. President, I feel compelled to address head on the news stories in recent weeks that have pointed out the shocking discovery that I am growing older. I find it no surprise, but then I have had some time to become accustomed to the increasing distance between the year of my birth and the current date. I may not like it, but as Maurice Chevalier put it, "Old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternative."

A recent Associated Press story ran in West Virginia's Charleston Daily Mail. The headline read, "Dramatic change in signature shows that age is catching up with Senator Byrd." The newspaper offered as proof the signatures on my Senate financial disclosure forms from last year and this year. It is true that this year's signature looks like I signed it in a moving car. Some days, the benign essential tremor that I have had for years now is worse than on other days – just as it is for the approximately 5 million other people in the United States who suffer from similar tremors. It is annoying, but hardly evidence that I am at death's door.

Nor should it come as a surprise that I use canes to help me get around, or that I am not always as fast as I once was. I am not aware of any requirement for physical dexterity in order to hold the office of U.S. Senator. The often grueling hours that work in the Senate requires are tough on far younger Senators, and I am no longer one of the younger Senators. But to worry in print that I have missed one vote this year? Really?! Out of more than 18,000 votes in my career, to miss one or two votes every now and then is surely excusable. Even old people can be allowed a sick day or two now and then, can't they?

That is really the crux of the matter here. In this internet-savvy, media-infused culture, we have forgotten that people get older. Even, dare I say it – old. Television is full of pretty, young people. The few white-haired heads that one sees on television are made up and glamorous. Off-camera, though, most bear little resemblance to their tv persona. In a culture of botox, wrinkle cream, and hair dye, we cannot imagine that becoming older is a good thing, an experience to look forward to and a state worthy of respect. If I were 50 years old, and used canes due to some injury, or had a disease-related tremor, the news stories would be about my carrying on despite my adversities. But my only adversity is age....

Abraham Lincoln once rightly observed that "…In the end, it's not the years of your life that count. It's the life in your years." My only adversity is age. It is not a bar to my usefulness as a Senator. I still look out for West Virginia. I still zealously guard the welfare of this nation and its Constitution. I still work, every day, to move the business of this nation forward, to end this reckless adventure in Iraq, and to protect, preserve, and defend the Constitution against those who would reshape it to suit partisan agenda. And I will continue to do this work until this old body gives out. Just don't expect that to be anytime soon.

I believe that all ages and all occupations should be part of a truly representative body. I also believe that society works best when the energy and idealism of youth pairs with the experience and wisdom of age. America is the land of opportunity. I don't think our some 36 million citizens over the age of 65 are disqualified from participating in the life of the country we helped to build. Our country rejected those kinds of arbitrary barriers long ago -- and this Senator loudly and proudly rejects them now.

Read the complete speech here.

Zimmers

This video has taken the web by storm, but you should also be aware that it has a sophisticated message: the people who created it believe that older folks in Britain aren't treated very well, and they wanted to draw attention to that unfair situation. Do you think they succeeded?