Henrietta Hay's Column

On turning 50, Gloria Steinem was told that she didn't look 50. She replied, "What does 50 look like?" For that matter, "What does 60 look like, or 70? I guess it looks like anybody who is 60 or 70! Whatever we look like, Seniors are finally being accepted in society as interesting, or maybe dull, individual human beings who happen to have been around for 60 years or more. That is, of course, because so many more of us are doing it.

But this acceptance is far from complete. I often have someone express surprise that I am still so active and involved. What the person really means but is too polite to say aloud is "for my age". The comment is meant as and taken as a compliment, but what does it say for our modern society? Do even the baby boomers still suspect that life ends at 40? A century ago, it generally did. Today it does not. More and more of us who were not born yesterday are finding tremendous satisfaction in being alive.

Sure, we are a bit slower physically, but so what? Babies are active, but they can't talk or play golf, Athletes are active, but they may not know nuclear physics. We need not equate physical strength with brains or interest or enthusiasm. Seniors are major customers of companies that produce hobby equipment. There are more and more seniors who are financially better off than they have ever been in their lives and they are quite willing to spend money on golf and boating and travel. You have seen the bumper stickers on the big RV's that say, "We are spending our kids inheritance". In the field of politics, Alexander Hamilton was in his early twenties when he helped write the constitution. Today when a man of 32 was appointed to the Colorado Legislature many seasoned pols protested that he was too young. Most of our present leadership, state and national, is over 60. We are healthier than 70 year olds were in former generations. Of course, there really weren't many 70 year olds then.

All of this is not to ignore the black fears that lurk, the illnesses of age or the disgraceful condition of the poverty-stricken aged. But I am saying that age does not have to be stereotyped by rocking chairs and knitting needles - unless, of course, one really likes rocking or knitting.

Writers and philosophers have been discussing age for centuries. Most of them have been depressing. From Plato to Shakespeare, the old men are bemoaning their fate. But the philosopher, Santayana in his "My Host the World" said this: "Never have I enjoyed youth so thoroughly as I have in my old age . . . I have drunk the pleasure of life more pure, more joyful, than it ever was when mingled with all the hidden anxieties and little annoyances of actual living. Nothing is inherently and invincibly young except spirit. And spirit can enter a human being perhaps better in the quiet of old age and dwell there more undisturbed than in the turmoil of adventure."

The spirit is there in all of us. We have found it - and we like it. We are learning to enjoy being Seniors.

So what does 70 look like? It looks like whoever happens to be it.