They Call Us The Elderly
They call us the elderly, but how many realize all that we have seen, experienced, and accomplished during the precious time we have spent on planet Earth?
“Many of us have already passed away due to old age, health reasons, or while serving our country in the armed services.
Those of us who remain are commonly called “the elderly.”
We were born in the 40s-50s-60s and grew up in the 50’s-60’s-70’s
We attended schools in the 50s-60s-70s-80s and we got married while discovering the world in the 60s-70s-80s-90s.
Most people of younger generations don’t think about how much things have changed during our lifetimes.
- We’ve gone from landline phones with operators for long-distance calls, to phone booths, to the ability to place video calls worldwide.
- We’ve gone from slides to YouTube, vinyl records to online music, handwritten letters to emails and texting.
- Live games announced over the radio, to black and white TV, color TV, then HD TV and video streaming.
- We went to the video store for cassette tapes, then discs, and now we watch Netflix and a variety of movies and programs on our computer, smartphone, or via streaming to our TV.
- We’ve known the first computers, punch cards, and disks and now we have gigabytes and megabytes on our smartphones.
- Instead of TV antennas, cable or satellite services bring entertainment into our homes, with some people, like me who don’t live in urban areas using low-earth satellites from StarLink to gain access to pretty much anything via the Internet.
- We wore shorts all through our childhood, then trousers, pants or mini-skirts, Oxfords, Clarks, Palestinian scarves, jumpsuits, and blue jeans.
- We avoided childhood polio paralysis, meningitis, poliomyelitis, tuberculosis, the swine flu, and death due to COVID-19.
- We’ve gone from tricycles to bicycles, motor scooters, to vehicles powered by gasoline or diesel, and now we drive hybrids or EVs.
- We played horses, cops and robbers, red light green light, checkers, marbles, and Monopoly, now there’s a myriad of game choices on our smartphones or tablets.
- Instead of reading novels by opening the pages of a hardback or paperback book, many read them on tablets, Kindle, or a similar device.
- When we were kids, our schoolmates’ religion was not something that ever came up.
- We drank water and lemonade in glass bottles, and the vegetables on our plates were always fresh. Today we can pretty much whatever we want delivered to our front door.
- For most of us, nothing was handed to us on a silver platter. We were fortunate to have a solid work ethic handed down to us by our parents, and realized how lucky we were to be born in America, the land of the free and the home of the brave. And so it was…
I could go on, but I guess you’ve got the point by now.
Yes, we have experienced a lot of things throughout our time here, but what a beautiful life many of us have had have had!
Some might describe us as “ex-annuals”; people who were born in this 50s world, who had an analog childhood and digital adulthood.
We’ve pretty much “seen it all”!
Our generation has lived and witnessed more than any other in various dimensions of life.
Our generation has had to literally adapt to “CHANGE” time and time again.
A big congratulations to all the members of a very special generation, which perhaps should be called UNIQUE instead of ELDERLY “