@mystery-ak @txradioguy @INVAR@FreyaI read that. I saw this after my husband died and I retired. I went to live at our lake house. It was a closed community with a guard gate. We had a restaurant in there and people, most of them retired, would go there to eat and communicate with others. I heard over and over people say what they "used to be". They were doing nothing now, just stuck in what they "used to be". I remember thinking I'm not doing that, I will not be a "used to be".
We didn't have a hospital in the nearby town and only one elderly doctor had an office there. We had a volunteer ambulance service and they would come get you IF they had someone to drive the ambulance at the time. I was in my late 50s, early 60s then, so I took an EMT course, I was the oldest in the class but made the highest score on the Texas test, and provided emergency medical care to those in there until the ambulance could get there, or if it didn't get there, the person was taken by car to the nearest town where there was a hospital.
I was also the person in charge of the guard gate/house and found sometime the ambulance couldn't find the house of the sick/hurt patient. So, I developed maps of every house in there. Then, I bought a radio that received the 911 calls and put that at the guard gate. When the guard heard the call, they circled the house of the sick/hurt person and handed it to the ambulance driver when they went through the gate. They would find me already at the person's house with their vital signs taken and written on a form along with their insurance info. written on there and what the medical emergency was. They could load the person immediately with that information given to them.
Seeing those retired people give up the way they did, was not me. Some of you have trouble with my being older, well, I'm not going to sit in a chair and knit for the rest of my life and say what I "used to be". I teach a Bible class, will teach it today, and yes, I am writing books.
This is from the article:
"Connection also comes from giving back and helping others, even through small gestures like helping a neighbor, opening a door for someone or smiling to a stranger. 'Even if you are lonely, it is important to remember you still have a lot to contribute,' she says. 'Research shows that when we help others, we get mood boost. We feel more valued and valuable –because we are.'"
If you are retired, getting older, it doesn't mean you are worthless now so sit there until you die or kill yourself. It means look around and find something worthwhile to do for others. John, the Apostle, the "beloved Apostle", had only one sermon in his later years as he was physically carried to churches, "My little children (meaning all of us), love one another." That was his whole sermon. Someone asked him, "Master, why do you always say only this?" He said, "It is the commandment of the Lord, and if this only be done, it is all-sufficient."
All on this board could benefit by following John's sermon, "Love one another."
