It's so refreshing to hear a perspective on life from someone older than 35. We had a "senior panel" in my Development class tonight, with three rockin' old ladies between the ages of 63 and 82, and an 84-year-old man (who appeared to be past his truly rockin' days, but still had quite a bit of zip). But they were no ordinary senior citizens. The prof warned us ahead of time that they wouldn't be a representative sample, and one of the panel members even admitted she doesn't usually hang out with people her age, "because they bore me most of the time, to be quite honest."
Bob gets up at 5am every Friday morning and gets in his new Toyota Prius, goes to pick up Lydia, and they go to an activists group in LA that has met every week since 9/11. They've both been arrested. Helena grew up in the depression, has traveled to over 60 countries, and - having seen life from a less indulgent perspective - said that she often wants to follow the garbage trucks in a truck of her own, pulling out the things we waste that are still perfectly useful. Barbara started out teaching preschool, hated it, and worked her way up through nearly every grade until she finally found her niche teaching GED prep classes at adult school. They all, either explicitly or implicitly, reminded us that who we'll be at 85 is a continuation of who we are now.
Best quote of the evening? When someone asked if they had any regrets in life, Lydia grabbed the microphone from Bob and blurted, earnestly, "I could have gone to jail more often."
Most poignant moment of the evening? Bob reading a piece he wrote during the Korean war, predicting that at the end of the current conflict, the vacuum would be filled with further conflict. "I hope," he said, "that you won't be too hard on us for the way we left the world for you."
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