Aging with Pizzazz

I have some courses I teach to help people like me get a handle on their lives. This serves two purposes: it allows me to connect other people to my lessons learned, and it reminds me what I need to be doing more consistently.

Probably the most relevant course for my generation, that 76-million pig-in-a-python Baby Boomer bubble, is Aging with Pizzazz. Aging is a good thing; it means we are still alive. But of course, it has its downsides. How do we deal with them in a way that enriches our lives and those around us? This class has probably undergone the most evolution over time as, coincidentally, I have aged.

Pizzazz is a relative word and means different things to different people. For one person, it may be looking 40 at 60. (Does Joan Rivers come to mind?) For another, a tattoo. For many of us, it means having the vitality and health to do what we want, to keep physical limitations at bay. That certainly is a viable definition of pizzazz and one inherent in my life philosophy. Recently I had an “Aha!” revelation for another dimension of pizzazz.

My new slant on pizzazz impacts this scary old world in which we find ourselves. We must become more involved with long-overdue change, whether we’re talking about the lonely senior up the street, health care reform, immigration, global warming, homelessness, or foreign wars. We seem to have abdicated all that to special-interest-embroiled lawmakers. What happened to the government of the people, by the people, and for the people? According to the system, we choose legislators who represent our wishes and send them off to Washington, (or Jefferson City, or Sacramento, or wherever). There, they discover that to get anything done, they have to scratch a lot of backs.

We can’t leave real change to our legislators. We need massive grass roots involvement, starting with one person, to let special interests know what they can do with their pork barrels. Which brings me to Aging with Pizzazz: We are former hippies, children of the 60s and 70s. We understand the power of activism. We also understand that part of our ongoing responsibility is to embarrass our children (and now our grandchildren), but also to teach them that activism is not age-defined. We can use our 60s heritage to make our mark.

One of the biggest complaints I hear from my older students is that to younger people, they are invisible. Now is our time to be visible, to return to our activist roots. Let’s let this country know the power of 76 million “I’m mad and I’m not taking it anymore” Boomers. We can truly age with pizzazz by caring enough to fight for our passionate issues, to raise awareness, and to ignite our smoldering frustration in a way that can have real effect for us and generations to come. It starts by finding and channeling our passions into something that has a positive effect on other people. It starts by letting our pizzazz shine, one person at a time.

Competing Causes

Focus is essential. There is a lot in our world that needs fixing, especially if you live in the United States. Other countries have their own problems; ours just seem to be more visible. After having visited remote tribes living for generations on atolls that are three inches above sea level, I returned from the South Pacific passionate about combating global warming and our changing our administration’s pigheaded blind eye to the doom awaiting us. I was even more passionate because of the effect on other places I’ve been, rare and precious places. When I climbed Kilimanjaro 13 years ago, I had to tromp across a dense snow and ice field to reach the top. The snow is almost gone. Antarctica had breathtaking icebergs and floes which now pose a threat to penguins and other Antarctic fauna because they get separated from the land and carry them far out to sea. Yes, global warming is indeed a good cause.

I’m a nurse and a health educator/medical writer. I write about all the new technology and research breakthroughs that could save people’s lives if they could afford them. But 24% of our population is either minimally or uninsured. The technologies that could save their lives are out of reach. A record number of bankruptcies were filled last year because of medical bills. For some people on Medicare, the Medicare Part D “benefit” actually costs them more for prescriptions than before. And hey, I have a pre-existing condition. If my insurer drops me, as they are doing at a record pace, I couldn’t get coverage. We hear Medicare will run out of money just about the time I’m eligible. Health care reform: another cause I could really get behind.

While the administration attempts to distract us by playing on public fears of a flu pandemics and frivolous spending, we are giving all our tax money away to hundreds of other countries, and supporting all their citizens who sneak into the U.S. to get a better life. What about our homeless, our destitute, our lost children, and disenfranchised citizens? Boy! That really gets my dander up! We need to do something about that.

The point is there are countless good causes worthy of our hearts and souls and efforts. But meanwhile life goes on. There are jobs to do, houses to be relocated, grandchildren to be cared for, vacations calling. So whose job is it to fight all these big fights? How do we focus on one at the exclusion of the others? By making a choice. If we choose just one, a cause or a person we can help; if we all are vocal about our vision--however small--of a better world, and if enough people share that vision, change will happen. It has to be small enough and defined enough that we can realistically make a difference. The alternative is that we will all sink together.

So in order to put my money where my mouth was, I had to choose. I decided I could do two things besides my American Red Cross volunteer work: I could improve every daily encounter for the other person, and I could get people to lose the plastic (bags, not credit cards). So I started the Plastic Bag Lady blog to give tips (I am a writer, after all) on how to painlessly move toward reusables in our daily lives. I practice what I preach. We have cloth bags everywhere. Never do I walk into any kind of store without one. I take my own coffee mug to Starbucks, and carry a reusable water bottle. Stay tuned here for upcoming tips on decreasing waste for the holidays.

I believe we are here for a reason and for a very short time in the whole cosmic scheme of things. That belief and the power of even one person’s action can keep our lives from ever being inconsequential. People who take action are never invisible. # # #