Tag Archives: elders

It’s the ’60s Again…

By Don Arnoudse | Bio

My wife and I recently visited seacoast New Hampshire to celebrate our wedding anniversary. After leaving historic Union Chapel, the scene of our wedding 26 years ago, we were in a nostalgic mood as we drove into the center of Portsmouth. As we left the car to stroll through the town center, we heard quite a ruckus. To my surprise, the cause of all the commotion was a crowd of white-haired people holding signs in the town square and loudly shouting slogans in protest of the Iraq war.

I
was immediately transported to those days in the late ‘60s when I was
marching with my classmates in protest of the Vietnam War. We closed
down Michigan State University in the spring of 1970 and spent our time
in tents on the campus lawn engaged in intense discussions about
politics and war. We sang protest songs along with Joan Baez and Bob
Dylan. We erupted in fear and rage when a blood-covered young man ran
into our Tent City

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N.O.P.E.

I want to create a new organization to stamp out stupidity and indifference and restore common decency and good will into society. I think I’ll call it the National Organization of Pissed-Off Elders (N.O.P.E.).

What’s pissing us off?

A lot more than just ‘aging’ issues like Social Security, pharmaceuticals and our sex lives.

First, it pisses us off that the people in charge are squandering away the
opportunities they had to make the world work, or at least be a better
place.

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How Old Would You Be…?

By Lauren Selman
Bio 

When do you start to get older? After reading the comments about aging,
I ask, “When does aging begin?” Aging is placed in the context of those
entering their thirties and beyond, but for me, I believe the process
of aging began the day I was born.

When I was a little girl, I
was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up and I simply responded, "I
don’t want to grow up." But the truth was I was growing up as I was
saying those words.

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Taxis in Turkey

By Elizabeth Russell
Bio

Thinking about the place of elders in other cultures, I’m reminded of my days in Turkey. Although I wasn’t, by American standards, an elder (I was in late middle age at that time), I was considered so by the people in that culture.

My
first experience was in Izmir, Turkey, where I was teaching English at
Ege University. Some of the time, I took a dolmus (share taxi) to and
from the university. I had no problem getting a space in the taxi going
to the university because we lived at the beginning of the route, but
coming home was a different matter.

The first few times I was
waiting at the taxi stand, I noticed that the taxis coming by were full
and so I backed away from the stop. Then one

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