Finding life through "Grandma"

Old people come in all shapes and sizes. What we do about old age will depend in part upon our education, our religion, our ethnic or national identity, our family, our past or present occupations, our fields of interest, and many other things. I visited my grandmother in a nursing home in Maryland every year. I feel as though my grandma is dealing with aging very well. For being 80 years old, this "hot ma on wheels" has a lot of years to go. Of course, that is what she told me. I believe every word of it. All I had to do was ask her, what makes you so strong and content with life, and she got on her high horse and talked about her learning experience, growing old. She made it so easy for me to understand aging, that now I look forward to growing old gracefully. She was talking to me, not only about herself in general, but of all the older generation and the growing experience they are blessed with.

"Old age (?)" - Unknown Painter from the Low Count...

Peter Wessels Old Age Home (Community Reached Out)

Portrait of Granville Stanley Hall (1844—1924).

"The prime time to think about old age, of course, is when you are old. Old age often comes as a surprise. It creeps up and catches people unaware, often because we have deliberately not watched for it. It is not the kind of thing we can learn about from experience, because it happens only once in a lifetime. We know only what we have learned from watching old people, either in real life, or on television, and from reading about it in stories and articles." Many people simply look at old age along with all its disadvantages as weakness. She put up with the pains and losses and resigns herself to suffer in silence. Others resent it, and protest it and do not do...