Enriching Your Life Through Community

As the nation experiences the retirement of the baby boomers -- much of the focus has been on providing them with health care and Social Security. But some experts on aging have also begun to think about the opportunities and challenges that the boomers will pose as they seek new ways to get involved in their communities.

It’s me that those “experts” are talking about. I’m a Baby Boomer, part of that group of folks once referred to by a Seattle Times editorial writer as “a kiwi fruit bulging in the demographic python.” I don’t think I’m so different from other Boomers. Oh, unlike some, I’m not freaked out about aging. Of course, it’s no fun to get aches and see the makeup not going on so smoothly, but, hey, it’s another life challenge! Yes, I grew up in an era where there has been an obsession with youth. Though there are some, I do not believe that all Boomers are so insecure they don’t want to associate with others who are aging.

In my 40s I got involved with Senior Centers when my dad who, in his 70s, had just moved to Seattle. It’s true, I wasn’t thinking of the role of a senior center in my own life at age forty-nine when I set out to help him find new friends and activities. Crossing the threshold of a Seattle senior center, I saw what I see today at Wallingford Community Senior Center, a group of interesting and interested people and a facility creatively using its resources to enrich lives. I will be forever grateful that I was led to Seattle’s senior community through a senior center. One of the best decisions of my life was making time in my schedule to share something of myself with this new community that was welcoming my father. I volunteered to teach a writing class one morning a week. Twenty-five years later that class continues every Thursday afternoon at Wallingford Community Senior Center.

I’m now legitimately a senior and I continue to love helping to fuel the creative souls of those who come to write. There were always bonuses for me. I developed a strong community of friends. One of those dear friends mentored me in learning the art of Indian cuisine. I’ve learned so much from classes and programs in which I’ve participated and from minds who’ve experienced far more than I. In the writing class I’ve laughed and cried with folks who had found a place in which they felt comfortable opening up about their lives and experiences. I’ve celebrated accomplishments of folks who might have thought “at their age” they’d done about all they could. All those people and experiences are now a part of the fabric of my life—and a richer life it is.

Whatever your age, check out a senior center. If you haven’t been to one lately, come back and please encourage others in your life, your friends, your neighbors and even your kids, to come. People of all ages participate in and create activities. Step through a center’s doors, look around, try a program, join or lead a class, play your guitar, come for lunch or join a board of directors. You’ll find yourself amidst others who’ve realized that senior centers are special places in their community that provide all kinds of ways to enrich their lives.

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Marilyn Michael teaches a Thursday afternoon writing class at the Wallingford Community Senior Center in Wallingford’s Good Shephard Center www.wallingfordseniors.org