When I read to an audience a fictional piece I had written about the Happy Endings Retirement Village, the name got a laugh. So did my description of 80 year old women, stringy and brown from endless Pilates classes and tanning sessions. But it's no joke.
Writing in a Sunday supplement Fred Redwood tells of a retirement development called Memory Lanes and of the "lively programmes...about interaction and stimulation, not leaving people to sleep through their days." I'm an advocate of not writing people off as too old to do interesting things, too early, but sometimes it concerns me as well that there could be pressure in the other direction. Maybe some of us just want to take it easy after a lifetime of work, and should not be made to feel guilty about it?
Talking of guilt, the same article quotes a property analyst reporting that few elderly people downsize their homes. The suggestion is that they should be prepared to do so for the benefit of younger people. Link this to the idea that elderly people need a lot of medical care that could otherwise be used for the problems of the young, and we are on a slippery slope.
Every life, young or old, is as important as any other. If the old want to rattle around in large properties rather than cram their possessions into a studio flat, we should let them.
Heather Hosking
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment