They have been called “the Golden Years”. They even made a successful TV show about them. A new version is coming back by the way. Let’s talk about the seventies. They come after the sixties when many of us are finishing up our careers and looking forward to retirement, travel, grandkids, no money worries, if we thought about saving for retirement in our twenties, thirties, forties and fifties, and for some us, golf. This is followed by the eighties…maybe. While many good things happen in the seventies, our bodies and minds start tell us, “Hey, you’re not as young as you used to be.” You will find yourself talking to friends about heath issues, your latest doctors visit, and what medication you’re taking. There is nothing like old people sitting around comparing ailments. In your seventies, you will have friends who have joint replacements, heart issues, like afib, cataracts, memory loss and more serious conditions that start to put a timetable on your life.
It’s a time when friends or people you worked with or grew up with start to leave you. I’ve lost several men I worked with when I was much younger. When I read their obits, I realize some were not much older than me. You also read about movie stars and ball players passing on who you grew up watching. You remember the movies and the many ball games that enriched your life. It shows you that life moves on and it makes you reflect on your own. We’ve all experienced the good and bad things, the joys and regrets. We think about the impact we’ve had on other lives and wonder if we did enough.
I have an aunt and an uncle who in their early nineties. My uncle reminded me that only sixteen percent of people live past ninety, he was proud to say, “the rest are dead.” They both lost their spouses and siblings and are fortunate to have children helping them around the final turn. I treasure the stories they tell about their lives and reveal things I never knew. My father died suddenly at seventy-four. That’s how old I’ll be on my next birthday. I have so many questions that I will never get answered. My father-in-law suffered a debilitating stroke when he was seventy-four and lived for fifteen years. It was during those times he spoke about memories of fighting in World War II that he never revealed before. I think he was freeing himself from the burden he carried all his life.
The average life expectancy for white men is about seventy-five, for black men about sixty-nine, for white woman seventy-nine and black women seventy-six. If we stay active and healthy, the experts say we will live longer. Many of us will make it to the eighties and beyond. Even to that sixteen percent my uncle bragged about. In our decade of destiny, we should remember the good things in our lives. It was eloquently expressed by the poet Robert Frost.
”I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all difference”
from “The Road Not Taken”
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