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Click on the links below to locate a specific column. Return to Camellia's current column You may also simply scroll down to browse through all the columns. August 31,2008 Don't let distance keep you from your grandchildren July 27,2008 Foster Grandparents receive a special blessing June 22,2008 Teacher will be missed, but lessons wou't be forgotten May 18,2008 Take time to get to know an elder this month April 13,2008 The arithmetic of Alzheimer's: Volunteers are part of the equation March 9,2008 Keeping nature alive is as important as ever for children February 3,2008 Foster Grandparents: helping one child at a time December 30,2007 Elders can help nurture a child's imagination November 25,2007 Service organizations need to get the younger generation involved October 21, 2007 Photo contest features picutres of old and young together September 16, 2007 A good life for elders makes life good for every generation August 12, 2007 It takes all kinds of families to raise a child June 8, 2007 Wealth can be measured in any number of ways June 3, 2007 Build up your social capital - volunteer April 29, 2007 A little kindness goes a long way March 25, 2007 Aging in community is an exciting idea February 18, 2007 Helping children, one small step at a time January 14, 2007 Senior Companions provide a valuable community service December 10 , 2006 Life would be dreary without music November 5 , 2006 Helping the elderly reach a place of peace before they die October 1, 2006 Foster grandparents make adifference in kids’ lives August 27, 2006 Grant helps families affected by meth addiction July 23, 2006 Elderly need relief from loneliness, boredom June 18, 2006 Shared sites' let kids connect with older folks May 14, 2006 Wisdom of the ages is now available on the Internet April 9, 2006 In the end, The Dice Game might keep the family together March 5, 2006 Raising an adolescent can be a difficult time for parents and grandparents January 29,2006 Senior volunteers teach the art of growing old gracefully - and fully
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August 31,2008 Don't let distance keep you from your grandchildren
My three year-old grandson ran into the kitchen. “Mom, come here! Grandma’s in there!” Grandma, who lives 2,039 miles away, had suddenly appeared out of no-where! It didn’t seem to matter that I was rectangular, flat and on a computer screen. Through a tiny web camera I was indeed in his living room, magically talking with my grandson and hearing all about what he ate for dinner.
When five of my children moved to California and one to New York City, I resigned myself to being one of many parents whose grown children have moved far away. Not only do I miss being with my children – I now miss being a part of the daily lives of two grandchildren. According to the Grandparent Information Center at the AARP Foundation, I am far from alone; 45 percent of grandparents live over 200 miles away from their grandchildren.
One of my solutions to this new state in life was to buy all my kids webcams. A webcam is a small camera, relatively inexpensive and easy to use, that attaches to a computer and transmits live images over the Internet through special free software. Through this amazing technology, I’ve been able to see my granddaughter’s beginning attempts at crawling and watch my grandson running around giggling in the sprinkler. I can talk with my daughter and her friend while they watch me cook and then take them for a walk through my garden. I’ve attended costume parties, backyard picnics and watched my grandson open his latest Grandma Box that had just arrived in the mail. The webcam lets me be part of all those small, everyday things that are the sweetest – the things I miss the most!
In between searching for cheap plane tickets, I’ve been collecting ideas for staying close to my grandchildren across the miles. Some require technology and some are just old-fashioned ways of keeping in touch. Here are just a few:
- Read stories, sing a lullaby or tell a funny family story to your grandchildren by making DVDs or audio tapes. Learn how to podcast a long-distance bedtime story! The website grandparents.com has non-technical instructions for producing a podcast in addition to hundreds of other ideas on all sorts of grandparent-related topics.
- If you have a computer, play Internet games together like Jeopardy, checkers and card games.
- Buy two of the same book and mail one to your grandchild. Make a bedtime date to read it together on the phone.
- There could never be anything as exciting as getting a letter or package in the mail! Tuck inside a finger puppet, a colorful band-aid, ice cream money or a photo of you.
- Send a Grandma Love box to have ready when your grandchild gets sick. Put in a can of chicken soup, a puzzle, a colorful box of tissue, a stuffed animal, a book, etc.
- Play Hide and Seek from a distance. Send a box of treats and notes, ask the parent to hide them and tell you where they are. Give your grandchild clues over the phone, in a letter or using the webcam.
Long-distance grandparenting is clearly a growing phenomenon. But grandparents are needed more than ever in our increasingly mobile world. Psychologist Dr. Lillian Carson, author of The Essential Grandparent: A Guide to Making a Difference, reminds us that grandparents listen differently than parents, offer stability in a constantly changing world, provide children with a sense of the past and the important understanding that they’re a part of a family with members near and far.
Grandparents can even be flat and rectangular - and we sometimes appear like magic!
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July 27,2008 Foster Grandparents receive a special blessing
In her poem, The Summer Day, Mary Oliver spends hours just lying in a field among the tall grass quietly observant of the creatures that cross her path. A grasshopper flings itself onto her hand and she deftly describes each tiny, intricate movement. At the end of the day she has spent strolling through the fields – after the grasshopper “snaps her wings open and floats away” – the poet concludes that although she doesn’t know how to define prayer, she does know “how to pay attention…how to be idle and blessed.”
Elders seem to instinctively know that the art of paying attention absolutely requires that one be “idle and blessed”. Foster Grandparents throughout Berrien, Cass and Van Buren counties are spending their summer days learning more about what it takes to reach that rare state of being.
Foster Grandparents volunteer twenty hours each week with children most in need of one special individual who knows how to be still, how to pay attention and how to truly listen. Volunteers assist children with learning, emotional, physical and developmental disabilities, those with incarcerated parents, children in correctional facilities, emergency shelters, migrant programs or in foster care and those who have experienced abuse and neglect.
Twelve Foster Grandparents are providing remedial help with math, reading and oral language skills at summer migrant education programs in Berrien Springs and Bangor. Paying attention often means recognizing when a child is discouraged or confused by a new word in their second language. Learning about Hispanic culture and attempting to learn some Spanish vocabulary themselves gives volunteers a greater understanding of the children in their care.
Through a grant from the St.Joseph/Benton Harbor Rotary Foundation, six Foster Grandparents serving at Fair Plain Northeast Elementary in Benton Harbor are focusing their attention on the most perplexing challenges they face in the classrooms with their assigned children. Meeting together each week, the “Rotary 6” share the challenges and successes of paying attention and exemplify the Rotarian motto: Service Above Self. Their summer days have been spent finishing a book they’ve been reading and discussing together – How To Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk.
Two Foster Grandparents are turning their attention this summer to children of all ages who walk through the doors of the Cass District Library. While parents have time to themselves elsewhere in the library, Grandmas are spending time with the kids playing games, reading books and tutoring.
Grandpa Ralph spends his days with teens at Blossomland Learning Center during the school year. This summer, he reports being blessed, but far from idle, while paying careful attention in a classroom of active three year-olds busy showering him with smiles and hugs.
Four Foster Grandparents are going on field trips and watching red worms turn banana peels into rich compost while giving their love and attention to kids at Harbor Harvest Urban Ministries in Benton Harbor.
Mary Oliver concludes the poem about her summer day with three questions: “Tell me, what else should I have done? / Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? / Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
For Foster Grandparents, what needs to be done is clear. They are spending the “retired” years of their wild and precious lives passing on their wisdom to a younger generation.
Paying attention. Noticing the clues. Waiting for a child’s response. Listening and helping a child identify their feelings. Talking over a problem and finding creative solutions together. Like Mary Oliver, just being idle and blessed.
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June 22,2008 Teacher will be missed, but lessons wou't be forgotten
I remember well the first day I met Louis Arthur Arent two years ago. My Dad had just died a few months before and “Art” had just moved in to the nursing home. I was sitting with my Mom in her room as I do everyday and heard Art slowly making his way down the hall – singing. He stopped at the door and said hello and I knew right away that he was someone I wanted to get to know.
Art would visit often with me and my Mom. We talked about his family and friends, his 65 years as a Boy Scout of America, his service in the U.S. Marine Corps, the bravery that earned him a Purple Heart, the needlepoint project he was working on, his Senior Olympics medal that was always around his neck and his deep religious faith.
He was perhaps most proud that he taught himself to play the harmonica when he was five years-old and he had been playing ever since for the past seventy-three years. When Art wasn’t singing going up and down the halls with his walker and the stuffed lion mounted on the front like a hood ornament, he was playing the harmonica.
I had tried several times to learn how to play what I thought was a wonderful but mysterious instrument. So I asked Art if he would teach me. He sent me right away down to the music store. “Only six bucks for a harmonica! Six bucks and you can have music with you wherever you go”.
On many occasions, I walked through the nursing home doors with my mind clogged in a tangle of deadlines, reports, meetings and budgets. Since Art was always up for a harmonica lesson, a few minutes of picking out notes of old-time hymns and folk songs slowed everything down. My Mom loved it all and yelled “Bravo! Bravo!” after every song like we had just concluded a performance on the stage of Carnegie Hall.
He had a simple but effective teaching technique: “Just watch my cheeks. When my cheeks go in – inhale, and when they go out – exhale. Every hole on the harmonica has two notes, one note when you inhale and a different note when you exhale.”
Art gave me a grade after every lesson – followed by homework. When there were introductions to be made, I was always referred to as his harmonica student.
As his health declined, he and I would start a song together and soon I was the only one playing. Art would take little naps with his harmonica still in his mouth. If I just kept playing he would eventually open his eyes and join back in wherever I was in the song.
Last month, a few days before he died, my teacher didn’t have the breath to play so I sat next to his bed and took requests. He still gave me a grade, of course – and homework.
Although I can now “have music with me wherever I go”, Art’s greatest gift to me was his example of contentment. From the day this gentle man came to live at the nursing home and his health made him gradually more and more dependent on others - he seemed to become happier and happier. In a world that prizes independence at any cost, Art understood that in reality, we are all dependent on one another throughout our lives. He possessed the ability to be happy wherever and however he was.
Someday I may be in his place of dependence as we all may be. When that time comes, I can only hope for a good grade from my master teacher and friend. For now, I’d better keep studying. I have a lot of homework to finish.
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May 18,2008 Take time to get to know an elder this month
Beginning at a young age, Marcus Miller knew that everything older musicians passed on to him was important. A Grammy award-winning bass guitarist, composer and producer, Miller’s latest recording, Tales, builds on this understanding combining jazz and spoken word by music legends like Miles Davis, Billie Holiday, Lester Young, Joe Sample and Roberta Flack.
The album blends old and new black music with stories passed on from an older musician to a younger one. "I want to show these two musicians that while they might think their music is so different, that it is really all the same. The stories, the tales, are the connection."
In a recent interview on National Public Radio, Miller eloquently described what he believes to be three levels of musical skill. The first level is learning scales and notes. At the second level, a musician develops technique and might become known as an expert.
"Level three is when you play as if you never studied a note," Miller says, "but you can express yourself as simply as when you're talking." Only a few, he believes, ever arrive at level three, noting Miles Davis and Stevie Wonder as having reached that pinnacle.
"There's a lot of trumpet players who, when you hear them play, the only thing that you think is, Wow, you must practice a lot," Miller says, "but when you hear Miles, you go, Wow! I had a girlfriend like that."
For many young musicians, he says, it’s easy to become entirely focused on the rudiments of notes, techniques and continuous practice. “Eventually you have to live life and you have to try to express that life that you live through your music. So as long as I'm experiencing different things and feeling different emotions, there's always new music to play."
May is Older Americans Month.
It’s a time to especially celebrate those among us who have reached the point of living life “as if they never studied a note”.
The ones who can tell us stories with the simplest words, the perfectly placed gesture and some wise advice. The ones who are still experiencing different things, feeling different emotions and know there is “always new music to play”.
You have to listen to a lot of jazz to distinguish the experts from the masters. You also have to hang out with a lot of older people to recognize the “Wow” moments when they happen – and distinguish the old-in-age from the old and magnificently wise.
We all know elders in the places we worship, in our neighborhoods and in our families. For those of us “new musicians” who are still in the process of learning the notes, scales and techniques, what better way to celebrate Older Americans Month than to spend time with someone we consider to be our elder.
We can ask if they would teach us something they’re good at, tell us a story from their childhood, describe their proudest and saddest moments, show us how to cook a recipe that’s only in their head and no where else, explain who all the people are in the photo albums, allow us to help with a chore, or draw a family tree.
Experiencing the perfect moment when stories and wisdom are passed on from one generation to the next can truly be like listening to fine jazz!
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April 13,2008 The arithmetic of Alzheimer's: Volunteers are part of the equation
Ten million baby boomers, one in eight of those born between 1946 and 1964, will suffer from Alzheimer’s.
The Alzheimer's Association 2008 statistical report, released last month, explains the increased rate is due largely to the fact that this generation will most likely live longer. Thanks to medical advances, fewer will die of heart disease, stroke and cancer.
Every 71 seconds, someone in America develops Alzheimer’s disease. By mid-century, someone will develop Alzheimer’s every 33 seconds. By 2030, those over 65 with Alzheimer’s will increase by 50 percent.
In 2007, 9.8 million unpaid family members, friends and neighbors provided 8.4 billion hours of care – an average of 16.6 hours of care each week - for a person with Alzheimer’s disease or another dementia. 40 percent of caregivers provided care for more than 40 hours a week. The economic value of this care was $89 billion. Astonishingly, included among these caregivers were 250,000 children age 8-18.
The toll on caregivers, averaging four to five years of care, was enormous. 59 percent were "on duty” 24 hours a day, one-third suffered from depression and 72 percent experienced relief when the person they were caring for died. Heart disease, hypertension, reduced immune function and hospitalization were all disproportionately high among caregivers.
Caregiving had a significant impact on businesses. 57 percent of caregivers were employed full time when caregiving began. Two-thirds took time off, 18 percent took a leave of absence, 13 percent reduced hours, 8 percent turned down promotions and 8 percent quit work entirely.
The direct and indirect costs to Medicare, Medicaid and businesses in 2007 amounted to $148 billion.
For additional support at home, the average hourly rate for a home health aide was $19 hour. Adult day centers cost an average of $61 a day.
Assisted living yearly cost was $35,628 and yearly private room nursing home care was $77,745.
76 percent of those currently at high-risk of needing nursing home care do not have enough assets to cover even a month of nursing home care after which Medicaid covers the costs. Medicaid spending will almost double when baby boomers reach the median age for nursing home care.
Looking at Alzheimer’s in an entirely different way, researchers at Harvard University and the University of British Columbia also reported last month that helping others makes us measurably happy whether we share money, time or talents.
So what’s the connection between the two reports?
Staggering statistics presented by the Alzheimer’s Association will require an unprecedented network of support for caregivers – such as the assistance Senior Companion and Family Friend volunteers already provide nationwide. Volunteers offer respite for family caregivers so they can take a break in their garden, go to the movies, attend a support group or just take a nap. They also help the person with Alzheimer’s to accomplish everyday tasks like meal preparation, medication reminders or transportation for errands and appointments. Most importantly, volunteers become trusted friends.
Robert Grimm, Jr., Director of Research and Policy Development for the Corporation for National and Community Service notes: “When people volunteer, they not only spread good will, they also solve tough problems and create tangible benefits for their communities. The evidence confirms that volunteering and high levels of civic participation are vital to a healthy society.”
"Volunteering isn't just nice, it's necessary for tackling our toughest problems," says Corporation CEO David Eisner. "Service and volunteering … are necessary parts of how our nation deals with its challenges…such as the millions of elderly people who need help to live independently in their homes.”
10 million baby boomers – one in eight - will suffer from Alzheimer’s. Millions of other baby boomers, however, have immeasurable skills, talents and life experience to offer solutions - through volunteerism - to the overwhelming arithmetic of Alzheimer’s.
To learn more about how you can be a part of balancing the equation – and add happiness to your life as well - call Senior Volunteer Programs at the Area Agency on Aging - 269-983-7058.
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March 9,2008 Keeping nature alive is as important as ever for children
The doorbell rang incessantly all winter. Opening the door inevitably revealed a bundled-up child with the recurrent request: “Mr. Pisegna, will you please jump on the pond for us?”
Dad devotedly put on his coat, connected the long rows of metal buckles on his galoshes and headed out into the cold to do his civic duty with a pack of kids trailing behind him.
It was a foolproof method. If the brawniest Dad in the neighborhood was still standing on top of the ice after jumping up and down several times in the middle of the pond, we were good to skate!
In our neighborhood, every kid owned a pair of skates. They were standard equipment as video games, computers and televisions are for kids today. Growing up, outdoors was definitely the most desirable place to be – an opinion shaped largely by my father.
Dad took the train everyday to the twenty-ninth floor of his Park Avenue office building in New York City, but he was absolutely most at home and ecstatically happy in the woods, working in the garden, building a tree house or testing the ice.
Winter was just another season of unparalleled beauty. Dad welcomed our requests to venture out on a frigid winter day to check out the ice. He also made sure we all knew how to build a good fire next to the pond to warm our frozen hands and feet while we spent the afternoon skating.
Among children being raised by their relatives who participate in the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren and Relatives as Parents Program, experience with the natural world is often vastly different from their elders’. Author Richard Louv, in his book Last Child in the Woods, says that kids are out of touch with fields, streams and woods that were once familiar playgrounds for past generations. While Louv acknowledges that computers, video games and television may stimulate certain types of intelligence in a child, only the natural world engages all their senses in the learning process. Kids today, he says, suffer from “nature deficit disorder”.
Many children who come to live with grandparents and other relatives have experienced traumatic events over months or years of crisis before family members assume responsibility for their care. Often parents are incarcerated or the children have experienced abuse, neglect, violence or suffered loss through their parent’s illness or death. Young people being raised by relatives are at high risk for low educational achievement, chemical dependency, early pregnancy, becoming involved in abusive relationships and entering the correctional system.
Environmental psychologist, Nancy Wells, points out that “nature buffers the impact of life’s stresses on children and helps them deal with adversity. The greater the amount of nature exposure, the greater the benefits.”
It is not enough to point to the door and send kids outside to play. Nor is it necessary to take a trip to Yellowstone. Louv explains that there’s a lot of nature in our backyards. He suggests leaving part of the yard rough with rocks to turn over and wildflowers to observe. Or just go fishing or take a hike.
Southwest Michigan’s natural treasures – Sarett and Love Creek Nature Centers, TK Lawless Park, Van Buren and Grande Mere State Parks, to name a few – are waiting to be explored. Many offer free or low-cost classes year-round and miles of trails accessible to both young and old.
As Louv points out, children gain an appreciation and interest in the natural world primarily through a parent’s or grandparent’s own enthusiasm for nature.
Biologist, author and ecologist Rachel Carson also wrote: “If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder…he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in.”
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February 3,2008 Foster Grandparents: helping one child at a time
In an era when countless relationships exist entirely over computers and millions of “conversations” happen every minute in virtual places like chat rooms and social networking sites, building true friendships among peers is becoming more difficult for young people. Intergenerational relationships between young people and elders are in danger of becoming even rarer.
Hundreds of children in Berrien, Cass and Van Buren counties are blessed with the opportunity to know a special group of elders not on a computer screen or cell phone, but in their classrooms, after-school programs and early childhood centers.
Foster Grandparents are senior volunteers who truly and visibly care about the children they spend time with every day – primarily children with learning, physical, developmental and emotional disabilities, children with incarcerated parents, children in foster care and those who have experienced abuse and neglect.
“Mitchell” is a child with significant academic challenges as well as tremendous turmoil in his family. He has a warm, friendly smile along with the capability of disrupting the entire class with a single angry outburst. Mitchell has the amazing ability to be just about anywhere but in his seat, his attention darting from one distraction to the next in rapid-fire succession.
When Grandma “Florence” arrived on the first day of school in September, it didn’t take long to decide where her seat would be in her fourth grade classroom. Right next to Mitchell.
The principal recalled the unbelievable insults, rudeness and outright hostility that Mitchell subsequently aimed directly at Grandma and his admiration that she kept coming back. Understanding there are reasons beyond her knowledge for Mitchell’s unpredictable behavior, Grandma has continued to show up everyday and take her seat beside her young friend.
During a recent visit to the classroom, I asked Mitchell how things were going with Grandma. With his head bent over his paper, he quickly mumbled: “I like her”. After a few moments, he slowly looked me in the eye and emphatically stated: “Actually, I love her! She’s my Grandma! And she helps me remember what I’m supposed to do”.
Over 100 local Foster Grandparents attended the monthly In-Service training in January where Michigan State Trooper Rob Herbstreith gave a presentation: “Who Are Your Kids Talking to On-Line?”
To illustrate the precarious on-line “playground” where young people are gathering in droves, Trooper Herbstreith used the example of a twelve year-old girl who posted information about herself on an Internet website. “Amy” soon developed a friendship on-line with another girl in middle school who shared many of her interests.
By following a few clues that Amy provided about her hobbies and school colors, her on-line “friend” – actually a man in his thirties - used an array of other Internet sites to locate and drive to her house three states away. He watched her from his car as she arrived home after school and retrieved her key to let herself in. Home alone, Amy became another unsuspecting victim of a sexual predator.
Foster Grandparents, Trooper Herbstreith explained, give children the opportunity to learn what it feels like to have a real, stable and trusted relationship with a caring adult. Every time Foster Grandparents praise even the smallest accomplishment, they are adding to a child’s bank of good feelings about themselves, making them less likely to seek approval and praise from strangers on a computer screen.
According to authors Charles and Ann Morse, “A child needs a grandparent, anybody's grandparent, to grow a little more securely into an unfamiliar world”. Grandma Florence, for one, continues to realize she is making a difference in Mitchell’s life. As Trooper Herbstreith reminded his audience of concerned but determined senior volunteers: “It’s one child at a time. Just one child at a time.”
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December 30,2007 Elders can help nurture a child's imagination
I hope it’s not too late! Maybe they’re still out in the garage!
After being overwhelmed by the endless expanse of blue, red, yellow and purple plastic toys unleashed from holiday wrapping, a child’s imagination might still have a chance.
After being barraged with new but oddly familiar lights, beeps, flashes and beats of new and improved electronic gadgets unwrapped and plugged in, there still might be hope that creativity can prevail.
That is, if it’s not too late! Hopefully – hopefully – the boxes that all the stuff came in are still in the recycle bin waiting to be rescued. And hopefully, children will become bored.
Boredom with an over-abundance of commercialized toys with predictable and controlled responses, stereotypical characters and prescribed formats may be the only way a child has a chance of discovering the incredible possibilities of a cardboard box. Boredom is often the crucial stimulus in igniting a child’s inborn sense of wonder, curiosity and imagination.
A cardboard box can take a child beyond the confines of an electronic universe or the sea of hard, plastic stuff to places entirely unknown to mass-produced toy manufacturers. Today the box is a castle, tomorrow a spaceship or maybe a cozy hiding place to read and take a nap – all done with the pure power of a child’s innate curiosity.
According to one wise father, a good toy is 10 percent toy and 90 percent child. The test of a good toy is its potential to be used in many different ways limited only by a child’s imagination. A cardboard box, especially a large refrigerator or washer box, is close to toy perfection. And no worries about lead!
As we provide support for grandparents and relatives raising children, we often listen to frustration when their social security or disability income can’t keep up with the latest toy fads and electronic gadgets. When families span several generations, raising children is a challenge for any grandparent or older relative. Grandparents have a distinct advantage, however, in the realm of play.
Grandparents remember.
They remember what it was like to play for hours shooting marbles, playing with jacks, building a house of cards, the once-popular activity of exploring outdoors or just sitting on the front porch daydreaming.
And grandparents remember lots of things to do with a cardboard box.
Children being raised by grandparents and relatives whose wishes for the latest and greatest gismos might have gone unfulfilled this holiday season are also at an advantage. According to David Elkind, professor of child development at Tufts University and author of the groundbreaking book, The Hurried Child, “simple toys prompt kids to spin elaborate storylines and disappear in the world of play while many modern ones that come with prescribed narrative or batteries or take place on screens engender little more than habits of passive consumerism”. Children who have lots of opportunities for imaginative play learn how to problem solve, have a greater ability to deal with stress and cope with problems and ultimately grow up to become creative adults.
Hopefully, it’s not too late and the holiday cardboard boxes are still in the recycle bin awaiting the magic touch of a child’s imagination. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be invited to a party on a submarine at the North Pole for New Year’s Eve!
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November 25,2007 Service organizations need to get the younger generation involved
Former British Prime Minister and novelist, Benjamin Disraeli, noted the significance of what we leave behind: “The legacy of heroes is the memory of a great name and the inheritance of a great example.”
Lions, Elk, Moose, Optimists, Jaycees, Rotary, Odd Fellows, Good Fellows, Junior League, American Legion, Kiwanis, Masons. A few of the “great names” displayed on signs as we enter cities across the country and around the world. Every parade, from small towns to big cities, includes banners carried proudly by members of these venerable service organizations.
Millions of members have rightfully been called “heroes” since the beginning of service organizations in the mid-1800’s. Public parks, scholarships, eyeglasses, medical care, clean water, summer camps, help for military families, drug awareness and English instruction for new immigrants are among a long list of service projects.
Although the focus of service varies from one club to the next, words like idealism, fairness, goodwill, leadership, patriotism, justice, citizenship, peace and cultural awareness are common throughout their mission statements.
Through my experience giving presentations and talking with members of these esteemed organizations, there seems to be one unfortunate common issue, however – a shortage of younger members to benefit from the “inheritance of great example” and carry on the legacy of good work.
The reasons for the decline in younger members are both numerous and complex. Every service organization, however, might benefit from considering outreach to middle and high school students as a way to ensure a strong legacy of service far into the future. The following are just a few suggestions for engaging young people:
- Organize an intergenerational meeting a few times each year with the agreement that members bring along someone of the younger generation. Provide refreshments, door prizes and speakers that appeal to both generations. Consider evening, weekend or summer meetings when young people might be more likely to attend.
- Collaborate with local middle and high schools on service projects that might complement school curriculum. Pair older and younger participants or form intergenerational teams that will naturally create opportunities for sharing things like personal interests, the history of your organization and your respective plans for the future.
- Help students fulfill the new Michigan high school graduation requirement: 20 hours of community service (for students graduating in 2008 and after) through intergenerational service projects.
- Offer tutoring among club service projects as a way to become acquainted.
- Consider forming an auxiliary version of your organization for young people with a student membership rate.
- For students who participate with club members on service projects, provide letters of recommendation for jobs or college applications. For young people who move away following graduation, offer recommendation letters to service clubs in their new location.
In all the above suggestions, “intergenerational” activities are those that allow sufficient time for older and younger people to truly get to know each other. Young people might recognize the names on parade banners but need to meet the “great heros” if the “inheritance of great example” is to be passed on to future generations.
For assistance in creating intergenerational opportunities within your civic service organization, contact Senior Volunteer and Intergenerational Programs: 269-983-7058 or 877-660-2725 X 714 or email camelliapisegna@areaagencyonaging.org.
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October 21, 2007 Photo contest features picutres of old and young together
At age fifteen, Elvis Checo was living in a rented room in the Bronx barrio separated from his family in the Dominican Republic when he began volunteering at the Jewish Home and Hospital. It was the beginning of a long and mutually life-changing friendship with Margaret Oliver, age 93.
A Tibetan grandfather, living as a refugee in India, holds tight to his grandaughter in an attempt to protect her from uncertainties in a welcoming but foreign land.
Six year-old Qwintral laughs in the arms of Foster Grandparent Ms. Barrow. Qwintral is among the children who receive Ms. Barrow’s undivided attention upon arrival at the emergency room at T.C. Thompson Children’s Hospital in Chattanooga, TN because of emotional and social challenges, prenatal drug dependencies, language disabilities, or abuse and neglect.
Eighty-three year old Ann Constantino and two of her young friends jump rope at the North Buffalo Community Center in Buffalo, New York. Two generations learn together to understand themselves and each other better while developing lifelong healthy habits.
These unique relationships between young and old are among those captured in winning photographs in the Generations United Annual Intergenerational Photography Contests sponsored by the MetLife Foundation.
Photo entries must be taken by a younger or older person of younger and older people together. Winners over the past seven years have been those who truly capture the power and beauty of intergenerational relationships and illustrate the important roles that younger and older people play in each other’s lives. The 2008 contest and deadlines will be announced soon.
First, second, and third place winners are awarded monetary prizes in addition to runner up categories including Celebration of Diversity, Emotional Expression, Humorous Situations, and Intergenerational Activity.
Contest details, as well as tips for taking a winning photo, can be found on the Generations United website – www.gu.org. As the website explains, a key element of winning entries is the introduction of the subjects and a description of the significance of the intergenerational relationship captured in the photo. Who is this older and younger person and what brought them together?
In preparation for the Intergenerational Photography Contest, MetLife Foundation is also providing seed grants (up to $2,000) to organizations for the development of their own intergenerational photography projects. Grant funds will be used to bring younger and older people together to learn about photography and take intergenerational photographs that will be submitted to the Generations United 2008 Intergenerational Photography Contest. Entries for seed grants must be postmarked or sent electronically by November 1, 2007.
As acclaimed photographer Diane Arbus explains: “I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn't photograph them.” A momentary connection, a flash of understanding or a special bond between the old and the young becomes frozen for an instant in a good photograph. Photos allow us to see what we might have missed were it not for the photographer’s vision and perception of an important moment. Relationships between elders and children are among the images most deserving of preservation.
Generations United is an organization in Washington, DC dedicated to improving the lives of children, youth, and older people through intergenerational collaboration, public policies, and programs for the enduring benefit of all.
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September 16, 2007 A good life for elders makes life good for every generation
It’s like having a whole family of Grandmas and Grandpas! Over the years of daily visits with my Mom, I have not only had the privilege of spending time with her but I’ve also expanded my family to include all the friends who live with her.
It’s a very big house!
When I arrived the other day the smell of homemade bread welcomed me along with the smiles of everyone around the table enjoying the pleasure of melted butter on warm rolls.
Mom’s never had such a diverse circle of friends. “J” and “B” remember times when they performed together on stage at supper clubs in Chicago. Sweethearts “L” and “L” sit for hours holding hands; they met at the Blue Bird dance hall in Benton Harbor and will celebrate 60 years of marriage this month. “A” started playing the harmonica when he was 8 years-old; at age 77 he’s been teaching me to play while my Mom sings along to the familiar tunes. “J” doesn’t have many words but has the warm smile of a true gentle man. Before I leave everyday, Mom’s roommate reminds me to drive very, very carefully because of all the hot rods out there.
The nursing home where my Mom lives has subsequently become like a second home for me and I feel welcomed there, like part of a big family. It has occurred to me many times that my Mom’s home would be somewhere I’d like to live even as a relatively young person. It’s a happy, warm and loving place inhabited by good and interesting people I would enjoy having as neighbors.
When I left my Mom today she was sitting in the cool shade of a big tree with a group of friends listening to a volunteer read Harry Potter.
With this experience of “home” in mind, it was interesting to read a recent Herald-Palladium article about a local planning commission’s delay in approving plans for the expansion of a different nursing home. The nursing home is apparently zoned “commercial”; the area in which the expansion would take place was intended to be “residential”.
The dilemma is not unlike issues faced by communities nationwide as the senior population increases dramatically. On the surface, the problem would appear to be simply a matter of zoning regulations. Inherent in any decision about livable housing for our elders, however, are much deeper issues for consideration such as inclusion of elders in the broader community, nurturing cross-generational relationships and creating opportunities for elders to give as well as receive.
Nursing homes are exactly what their name describes – homes - communal homes for elders who happen to need a high level of care and the benefit of daily companionship. As poet Emily Dickenson simply writes: “Where thou art, that is home”.
If a nursing home truly is a “home” for the elders who reside there, why would neighbors and the entire surrounding community not welcome them as part of a “residential” neighborhood?
Imagine the fortune when communities realize that making a better life for elders – a place that is truly home – is making life better for every generation.
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August 12, 2007 It takes all kinds of families to raise a child
It was a well-meaning “drive-by sermon” on a sign in front of a local church: “A parent’s life is a child’s guidebook” that happened to be juxtaposed with the Indigo Girls’ lyrics playing in my car: “I collect my information and I store it all away/Hang it in my separate window/Let it complicate my view/I could paint this picture/Anyway I see fit/The art of pain….”
It is a fortunate child whose parents’ life serves as a reliable guide. The song’s lyrics, however, might speak for millions of children who just “collect and store away” all the good-intentioned sentiments that should be true for all children but have little resemblance to their own lives.
What use would a child have for a guidebook some have inherited with ripped spine, torn pages, chapters left unwritten and held together with a rubber band?
Perhaps they would “hang it in a separate window, let it complicate the view” of the world that should be innocent, “normal” and complete with a dependable life-manual.
It is also the fortunate child whose grandparents and relatives have taken on the task of editing and often completely re-writing the guidebook for the children they are raising. Many have assumed care of children because of a parent’s death, serious illness or deployment in Iraq and others because of a parent’s incarceration, drug and alcohol abuse, family violence or physical and sexual abuse.
We can help all children make sense of signs along the road by remembering that there are many kinds of families providing nurturing and loving homes. Teachers, school administrators, clergy, camp counselors, therapists, mentors, librarians, those who provide after-school activities and anyone who spends time with children can use the following suggestions to be inclusive of all children in all kinds of families.
- When talking about Mom or Dad include Grandma, Great-Grandpa, or simply “the people who take care of you”.
- Include grandparents, aunts and uncles, foster parents etc. in Mother’s Day and Father’s Day art projects and discussions as well as occasions like mother-daughter luncheons and father-daughter dances.
- Select books that depict all kinds of families for read-aloud activities, book discussions and library collections including those that feature elders and children as the main characters. Thunder Cakes, Walk Two Moons, When I Am Old Like You, The Cay, Abuela, Big Mama and Indian Shoes are just a few books in the intergenerational library at the Area Agency on Aging.
- Introduce young people to films about intergenerational relationships such as Akeelah and the Bee, Whale Rider and Second Hand Lions.
- Provide an easy and confidential way for young people to share about their families – a “getting-to-know-you” activity that might include poetry, drawing or creative writing – on the first day of school, for instance. Let children “paint the picture anyway they see fit” inclusive of all the pain, uniqueness and joys of their real lives.
- Provide brochures, confidential referral forms or a hallway display for Back to School Night about the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren and Relatives as Parents Program. Request a presentation for a staff meeting, volunteer training or service group about the unique needs of children and teens being raised by grandparents and relatives. Call 269-983-7058 for more information.
According to the U.S. Census 2005 American Community Survey, 6.7 million children are being raised by grandparents and other relatives in addition to children being raised in other unique families. Millions of grandparents and relatives raising children nationwide share a commitment to maintain family ties, create stable and loving homes and provide children with custom-made guidebooks to set them on their own life journey. Such valiant dedication deserves our sensitivity, inclusion, support and especially our appreciation.
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June 8, 2007 Wealth can be measured in any number of ways
An amazingly large number of “sayings” are passed around written by “Anonymous” or “Author Unknown”. I imagine they are the inspirations of ordinary folks whose names are not recognizable because they’re not famous. I came across one such saying the other day written by “Anonymous”.
“The real measure of your wealth is how much you’d be worth if you lost all your money”.
It’s a radical thought in a world focused on financial security, insurance on everything from an actor’s body parts to the family pet and spending money according to what we want rather than what we need.
Guessing about the identity of “Anonymous” in this instance, I would presume this wise individual to be an elder who has seen both wealth and poverty in the course of his or her life - perhaps someone who has lived through both the Great Depression as well as relative modern abundance.
When I look back at my father’s life, I recall many small lessons and bits of wisdom he passed on to me including the importance of nurturing longstanding friendships as the only true “insurance” in life.
He taught me well about paying off credit cards entirely and on time every month. I could read the important parts of a stock page in the newspaper when I was ten years-old because he wanted me to understand what would be paying for my college education. He always had some slow and steady stocks – he was especially fond of Smuckers - along with high-yield riskier investments.
His advice was always seasoned with stories of his hard working father who would see daylight only on Sundays, his day off as a West Virginia coal miner.
When my Dad retired, he and my Mom moved back to the small town where I was born in Southeastern Ohio. They picked up where they had left off with good friends they had stayed in touch with over decades of moving around the country. A “real measure of wealth”. Not long before my Dad died, I learned that he had paid cash for every house and every car he had owned! He was in the process of teaching me the finer points of stock investment that I wish I had learned sooner.
Discussions about money are not always easy, however, between older and younger generations within a family. Disagreements can quickly lead to arguments and misunderstanding. The fact remains that elders are most often rich in lessons they’ve learned through financial decisions – both the good ones and the bad ones. Likewise, today’s youth are barraged every day with temptations to consume beyond their means.
How can young people tap into the storehouse of elder financial wisdom?
Generations United is an organization in Washington D.C. focused solely on improving the lives of children, youth, and older people through intergenerational strategies, programs, and public policies. Through a partnership with the National Endowment for Financial Education, they have launched a new website to promote financial literacy across generations: www.gu.org/NEFE
The interactive site provides grandparents and older adults with easy-to-use tools intended to facilitate conversations about good financial decisions. The website includes video segments before each chapter, useful forms such as the Spending Plan and Purchase Worksheet and quizzes to measure understanding and progress. Grandparents and older friends can go through the website together with young people with a computer and a phone even if they live in different parts of the country.
Invaluable life lessons, including how much one is worth without any money, are sure to arise beyond the structure of the website. Talk to a grandchild or young friend today about exploring this exciting new website together. An elder’s legacy extends forever through opportunities to share wisdom with a young person!
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June 3, 2007 Build up your social capital - volunteer
My kids are all rich! I’ve watched them gather up their treasures since toddlerhood and they’re still at it. No bank in existence could hold the amount of wealth the six of them have collectively accumulated over the years. Their network of wheeling and dealing is more complex than I can comprehend and stretches across the country and around the world.
What’s the secret behind their affluence? They all realized at a young age that to get along in the world you had to figure out what you need, what other people have that you need and what you have to give that will take care of someone else’s need in return.
Furniture, books, piano lessons, babysitting, apartments, rides, food, clothes, bike repairs, mountain climbing gear, decorating, house repairs, art supplies, cooking, tutoring. All this and more was, and continues to be, regularly deposited and withdrawn from their stockpile of social capital even as they’re in their twenties and thirties. They’ve designed their lives in a way that makes them at times dependent on each other and their wide circle of friends and at other times available to help others with what they have to contribute.
As we age, the need to rely upon the social capital we’ve build up throughout our lives increases. Those of us who try to take on aging by ourselves are in for a hard time as it requires us to work together and cooperate with other people.
With the anticipated dramatic increase in the 60+ population over the next several decades, social capital – the balance between giving and receiving – will become increasingly valuable to elders as the need for assistance becomes greater than professional and government programs can provide. In our mobile and independence-crazed society, however, social capital can be extremely difficult to maintain. Many seniors and people with disabilities can suddenly find themselves without family and friends close by when they need support and assistance.
Senior Volunteer and Intergenerational Programs recently received a grant from the National Council on Aging and the Frederick S. Upton Foundation to help replenish the “social capital investment” of those in Southwest Michigan who are, at the moment, on the receiving end of the balance.
Since 1991, The Family Friends Program has matched senior volunteers with children in need of extra support. Through new grant funds, Family Friends is expanding to match senior volunteers with older adults and people with disabilities who need occasional help with day-to-day tasks such as meal preparation, transportation for medical appointments or errands, reading a letter or respite for their primary caregivers.
Along with practical assistance, Family Friends provide companionship and relief from loneliness and boredom which so often accompany living alone. Playing cards, talking about pictures in a photo album or singing an old familiar song together are a few examples of memorable activities for both the volunteers and those they serve.
The Family Friends Program asks for a small donation to cover the cost of volunteer mileage reimbursement, training and staff support. Volunteers receive extensive pre-service and monthly In-Service training, background checks and excess liability and accident insurance.
Training for new volunteers is planned for mid-June. Volunteers must be at least 55. Seniors can volunteer individually, as a couple, with a group of friends or with a grandchild. Special trainings can also be arranged for religious congregations to provide assistance to their elder members.
Volunteers will receive recognition in many ways. The most priceless benefit will undoubtedly be the reminder that life is a constant and delicate balance between giving and receiving. When it’s our turn to give, it’s an invaluable investment for the inevitable time when we will need help ourselves.
For more information about the Family Friends Program: call 269-983-7058 or 1-877-660-2725.
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April 29, 2007 A little kindness goes a long way
Throughout news coverage, commentary and editorials on the tragedy at Virginia Tech, a recurring question rises to the surface again and again: “How could this have been prevented?”
As often as I’ve heard the question asked, I’ve been grateful to know of one solution happening everyday in Southwest Michigan.
The description of the troubled 23 year-old Seung-Hui Cho – a loner, rarely makes eye contact, always sits in the back of the room, depressed, unresponsive, negative, angry, lonely, shy, hard to talk to – could describe so many of the children from pre-school to high school matched over the years with Foster Grandparents.
Foster Grandparents are senior volunteers each assigned to three or four children most in need of their love, compassion and undivided attention. Everyday, these children know that their Foster Grandparent will show up in their classroom, shelter, detention center or after-school program bearing a rare and simple gift: kindness.
There are books to read, spelling words to practice and tests to review. Across the board, we know that test scores, reading levels, classroom behavior, social interaction and attendance improve when a child is matched with a Foster Grandparent.
The truly significant but immeasurable accomplishment, however, lies in the connection between an elder and a young person that happens through all the hugs, glances, facial expressions and words of kindness.
Through their relationship with a Foster Grandparent, children such as those with learning disabilities, autism, parents in prison or the scars of abuse, neglect and violence learn, at a young age, what kindness looks and feels like and therefore, have a chance of showing kindness themselves.
Children and teens who are bullied, ridiculed, teased, those who are painfully shy, quiet or “different” know there is at least one person in the world who asks them what they think, listens to their ideas or sometimes just hangs out.
Exactly what does this kindness look like?
It looks like the lunch table in the corner where there’s unofficial priority seating with Grandpa John. He often doesn’t know the children who gravitate to his table and talk non-stop about everything and anything. That clearly doesn’t matter to the kids who just know he’s always there and he’s always smiling.
“Let’s just talk today, Grandma”. Kindness is Grandma Mary’s promise to talk all she wants after her student reviews the multiplication flash cards.
Kindness looks like 10 minutes Grandpa Earnest always gives an angry child to be by themselves before he offers his gentle words or sometimes just his presence. “When you’re on your way to school today, find a dumpster and jump in it because you’re nothing but garbage.” Kindness is Grandma Norma who held the child on her lap and tried to find kind words to replace those he heard from his mother as he left from home that morning.
On the teen drama television series My So-Called Life, a character once remarked: “Sometimes someone says something really small, and it just fits right into this empty place in your heart.” That observation has “kindness” written all over it. Everyday the kindness of Foster Grandparents fills small empty places in the hearts of young people often without their even realizing it.
No one will ever know of all the tragedies kindness has prevented. What we do know are the countless stories of Foster Grandparents who see the results of their kindness - sometimes many years later - when someone they may just vaguely recognize walks up to them, graduated from high school or college, sometimes with children in their arms, and thanks them for being their Foster Grandparent.
In Shakespeare’s words: "How far that little candle throws his beams!"
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March 25, 2007 Aging in community is an exciting idea
Few things compare with a particular fear most of us carry with us throughout our lives, even unconsciously. We also have a verb – “put” – that we use almost exclusively in conjunction with this fear.
We “put” a book on the shelf. We “put” our car in the garage. We “put” our coats on the hook. We “put” our hands in our pockets.
We “put” Dad or Mom in a nursing home.
Without a doubt, few things elicit as great a fear as realizing that home may mean institutionalization when we grow older.
At the 2007 Joint Conference of the National Council on Aging and the American Society on Aging, over thirty seminars were devoted to the topic of home for adults 55+. Conference seminars highlighted ways in which the definition of home for older adults is being thoughtfully and creatively expanded in light of the unprecedented fact that everyday this year 7,900 people will celebrate their 60th birthday.
Among the most exciting developments is the concept of Aging in Community. Aging in place – being able to remain in one’s home – has, up until now, been the primary alternative to institutional care. Aging in Community happens when elders intentionally live near other elders and combine their resources in order to obtain the care they need. Aging in Community is an alternative to living alone and at risk of injury, boredom and loneliness.
Examples of Aging in Community exist across the country:
- Through pioneering legislation in New York State, NORCs (Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities) bring an infrastructure of services to neighborhoods where both healthy and frail elders have gradually, over the years, become the primary residents.
- Senior co-housing, reminiscent of the 60’s commune, is being created throughout the country where elders who need all levels of care and with all incomes combine resources and live independently but intentionally near a close group of friends.
- ECHO (Elder Cottage Housing Option) is a temporary housing unit that allows elders to live near their children or others involved in their care but not with them.
- Green Houses are smaller versions of nursing homes where no more than ten elders live in a home-like setting, hire their own medical staff and share in some capacity in daily household tasks.
- For elders needing higher levels of care, the Eden Alternative integrates children, plants and animals into nursing homes as well as resident involvement in all the decisions that affect their lives.
- Intergenerational design locates child care and after-school programs in the center of nursing homes.
One important question stood out at conference sessions as the measure of quality housing options for elders: Do elders have regular and frequent opportunities to serve as resources for each other as well as for younger generations? It’s a question that must be asked whether someone lives at home, in a communal setting or in a nursing home.
Alongside presentations on elder housing options was an important discussion on dependency. Dependency, it was pointed out, is a pattern that exists on a continuum from the beginning of our lives to the end and is not peculiar to elders. Dependency comes easier to those who are in the habit of giving and only becomes a negative force when reciprocity is eliminated from the equation.
Elders have “put” their minds to the task of creating innovative, cost-effective and community-centered homes. Aging in Community might one day change lifelong fears into opportunities to share wisdom and experience with a world that sorely needs both.
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February 18, 2007 Helping children, one small step at a time
I’ve had many opportunities lately to practice meditation. The method is a bit non-traditional. I’ve been perfecting it over the years but recent weeks have been especially ideal for long and serious contemplation.
With snow shovel in hand, it’s just me and the quiet snow. Lots of quiet snow. One meditative shovel-full at a time, the walks and driveway are cleared with methodic and persistent rhythm. The only threat to this mystical experience is when my eyes stray beyond the little pile of snow on my shovel. Thinking about all the snow that still has to be moved focuses my attention on the enormity of the task rather than on the small steps to achieve it.
Shoveling today, I thought about my son, Sean, hiking the Appalachian Trail a few years ago. I marveled then - and still do – that he managed to keep going along the 2,174 mile route. His mind-trick was a little like my snow shoveling meditation. Focus on one small part at a time. Set a goal each day such as the next shelter eight miles away and smaller goals in between like a distinctive tree in the distance.
As the snow keeps falling and I keep shoveling - one pile at a time - I’m reminded of our Foster Grandparents matched with children who have learning disabilities.
With often thirty students in a classroom, teachers make valiant attempts to assure that every child understands one lesson before moving on to the next. For a student with learning disabilities, however, missing one step or one direction can quickly detour attention down a divergent path. Foster Grandparents are often strategically placed next to children who need their attention focused and refocused throughout the day. Through pre-service and monthly volunteer training, a basic principle in working with children with learning disabilities is repeatedly emphasized: break up activities into small and attainable steps and find many small but specific opportunities for praise.
A Foster Grandparent’s intensive hours of service in a classroom - twenty hours each week - provides many opportunities to understand a child’s learning style and use it to a child’s advantage. What exactly is a workable and obtainable step for this student? What are his or her strengths? What sort of praise does this child respond to? If something isn’t understood, how can it be explained in a different way? How can an instruction be re-worded using simpler phrases?
Not only must steps be taken in small measure, they must often be repeated. Successes one day are often forgotten the next and so the steps are patiently retraced perhaps using multiple senses, color, movement or even smaller steps.
Artist and educator, Mary Caroline Richards writes: “A knowledge of the path cannot be substituted for putting one foot in front of the other.” With the advantage of being able to look back and see the small steps that brought them to accomplishments in their lives, elders hold a special advantage in encouraging children who might otherwise give up. As elders know well, small successes collected together can bring a child to an improved grade on a test, a hiker to the end of the trail or one who meditates to the end of the driveway - one shovel of snow at a time.
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January 14, 2007 Senior Companions provide a valuable community service
I’ve always been content to be just a bystander as jigsaw puzzle aficionados scan the seemingly dissimilar pieces and small groupings of connected chunks scattered around the table. As the pieces and chunks come together and the picture gradually reveals itself, I’m in awe at this particular skill of seeing subtle differences in colors, tones and shapes on tiny pieces of cardboard.
Ms. Gloria Worth’s life was a bit like a puzzle. Neighbors, the mail carrier, a grocery clerk and her son all could see only solitary pieces. A foreclosure notice on the door, a full mailbox, a complaint of not feeling well, her missed presence at the neighborhood grocery, no doctor, no visitors and no apparent friends were all isolated pieces.
Sadly, careful attention to any one piece by itself may have meant that Ms. Worth would not have died alone in her home and undiscovered for an entire month as the Herald-Palladium reported this past November 30.
Ms. Worth’s circumstances were similar to thousands of seniors nationwide who receive assistance from a Senior Companion volunteer. In our mobile and segmented society, many seniors find themselves suddenly without family and friends close by when they need support and assistance. Senior Companions volunteer twenty hours each week, at no cost to their clients, providing the assistance needed for a senior to remain living independently in their own home. Intensive hours of service make it possible for Senior Companions to alert family members and health care professionals to changes in their client’s health and behavior. Volunteers also provide invaluable respite for caregivers.
Senior Companions might help read mail, assist with cooking a familiar recipe, provide transportation to the doctor or grocery store, help put together a home emergency kit, reminisce over a photo album or just spend time laughing together over a funny movie. For elders living alone, Senior Companions are a critical link to the outside world and a blessed relief from loneliness and isolation.
Ms. Worth might also have enjoyed being a Senior Companion herself. In addition to the satisfaction of using their skills, talents and life experience, limited income seniors receive a non-taxable stipend, free transportation, a meal each day of service and a yearly health physical among other benefits.
The service of Senior Companions never goes in just one direction. Volunteers also find companionship and “family” among their clients and fellow volunteers. Volunteers will also testify to improvements in their own health as a result of staying active and focusing on the needs of others.
Fortunately, we’ve all been blessed with elders such as Ms. Worth in our lives: parents, relatives, neighbors, customers, someone on our mail route and countless other relationships. Unlike putting together cardboard puzzle pieces, there isn’t room at the table for bystanders when it comes to looking out for the elders around us. It doesn’t take special skill to see subtle – and not-so-subtle – clues that signal “help”. Just concern, attention and basic knowledge about programs and services available for seniors in our communities such as the Senior Companion Program and a myriad of other services provided through the Area Agency on Aging.
For more information about the Area Agency on Aging Senior Companion Program, call 983-7058 or 1-877-660-2725.
Gloria Worth’s life was a puzzle with pieces that, in the end, never all fit together. Our simple acts of caring could, at any time, make the critical difference in an elder’s life. They just might be the all-important missing piece to the puzzle.
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December 10 , 2006 Life would be dreary without music
“The best music…is essentially there to provide you something to face the world with.” Bruce Springsteen aptly describes the significance of music in our everyday lives.
When the first of my six children was in grade school, his choir teacher shared a rather simple thought with me that made perfect sense as soon as I heard it. “It’s impossible,” she said, “to be angry when you’re singing.” I figured if singing could handle anger, it could help with a lot of other pitfalls of growing up.
I took every opportunity to encourage my kids to sing and consequently was in the audience of countless choir performances and school musicals for over three decades admiring the talent and beauty of all their young voices. Music is still an inseparable part of their lives. My son Tim told me recently: “I always leave a concert with a revelation because music changes my perspective.”
I vividly remember the woman who stood crying in her doorway as our family was Christmas caroling several years ago. After a few songs, she opened the door and explained that her son had left home and she’d spent the day hoping he would come back for Christmas. Listening to us harmonizing in the snow underneath the layers of hats and scarves had lifted her spirits and ended the long day with a bit of happiness. My children have talked about that night every year since. The importance of family and the power of singing made a lasting impression on all of us.
Each month, 140 seniors who volunteer everyday as Foster Grandparents, Senior Companions and Family Friends attend monthly In-Service training. Last February, as we were concluding the training, one of the volunteers asked to recite a poem in honor of Black History Month. Her poem turned out to be an inspiration for others to share their favorite spiritual, blues and gospel songs and more poems. As one sat down, someone else stood up, one after another. The room was charged with emotions of pride, gratitude and praise that simply spilled over from the hearts of so many wise and remarkably generous people.
As with many people with Alzheimer’s and dementia, my Mom sometimes forgets what she had for lunch an hour ago but she can sing every verse of Glenn Miller’s familiar song In the Mood without skipping a beat. I never knew the song had lyrics, never mind singing them all! It is early-learned music and rhythm that remains locked in the pathways of the brain even when speech and recent memory disappear.
When my Dad and Mom moved together to the nursing home, he began a special ritual with her. Whenever she was wheeled into a room, he never failed to break into his song for her that always made her smile: “When your hair has turned to silver/I will love you just the same/I will always call you sweetheart/that will always be your name….”
One day, I suddenly realized that Dad had stopped singing….or listening everyday to his beloved opera. I should have understood the significance. Dad died a few weeks later. Was it premonition?
As children, parents, elders and sweethearts, it’s music that we all need everyday to “face the world”. “Music is a moral law,” wrote Plato. “It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and charm and gaiety to life.”
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November 5 , 2006 Helping the elderly reach a place of peace before they die
“The great thing about aging,” writes author Madeleine L’Engle”, is
that you don’t lose all the other ages you’ve been”.
For some, being able to hold on to all the facets of oneself regardless of the passage of time is an intriguing prospect. In old age we are left with the sum total of all the choices and relationships we’ve made along life’s path. Old age is a time to look back, sort out the pieces and consider what we’ve done with our lives as preparation for our death.
In her book, The Validation Breakthrough, Naomi Feil, M.S.W., A.C.S.W, explains that life has stages and specific tasks within each stage that we all must go through – facing fears, coping with losses, admitting mistakes, expressing feelings, resolving conflicts. Those who can successfully go through each stage of life arrive at old age with contentment and integrity.
Those who have left tasks undone are encumbered with heavy emotional burdens they bring with them into old age. Unresolved tasks from “the other ages we’ve been” are still there when they were thought to be buried long ago. In old age, however, we may no longer have the speech, logic, social restraints or the ability to change and find resolution. Hazy
present-day reality of Alzheimer’s or dementia may send us back into the vaults of the past to find memories that may be familiar as well as disturbing. As Feil explains: “This is not a conscious, aware movement to the past. It is a deep human need: to die in peace.”
Since 1963, Ms. Feil has worked worldwide teaching professionals, caregivers and family members simple techniques for communicating with elders who are traveling through the past in order to arrive at a place of contentment before they die.
Using Feil’s easy-to-understand techniques, caregivers can improve the lives of the people they care for and their own lives as well by validating feelings rather than trying to make sense of the confusion.
Fourteen techniques are based on the understanding that there is a reason behind all behavior. Techniques clearly described in the book include Centering, Using Non-threatening Factual Words to Build Trust, Rephrasing, Using Polarity, Imagining the Opposite, Maintaining Genuine and Close Eye Contact, Using Ambiguity, Using a Clear, Low, Loving Tone of Voice, Observing and Matching the Person’s Motions and Emotions, Linking the Behaviors with the Need, Identifying the Preferred Sense, Touching and Using Music. .
In addition to other instructional components, Area Agency on Aging senior volunteers who serve as Senior Companions receive training on communication techniques outlined by Ms. Feil. In addition to providing sustained friendship and assistance to other seniors and invaluable respite for family caregivers, Senior Companions learn to walk beside their friends with empathy and respect. As an added gift, volunteers may gain insight about their own unresolved life tasks and work on completing them before they reach very old age.
“The whole thing is,” wrote poet May Sarton, “if you’ve had your life, you’re ready to leave it.” Senior Companions have the tools - and most importantly, the heart - to help their senior friends find the peace they need, gather up “all the ages” of their lives, and get ready to leave.
Return to top of page October 1, 2006 Foster grandparents make adifference in kids’ lives
The calls begin even before school’s out for summer vacation.
“She’s coming back isn’t she?” “I’m counting on him being in my classroom next year.”
For more than 100 teachers in Southwest Michigan, their Foster Grandparent can be as important as textbooks and lesson plans on the first day of school.
Who are these highly esteemed and sought-after individuals?
By simple definition, Foster Grandparents are seniors who volunteer 20 hours each week with children and teens who could most benefit from special one-on-one attention. Volunteers all have limited incomes and receive a small tax-free stipend, mileage reimbursement and other benefits in return for their service. In Berrien, Cass and Van Buren counties, they are 113 strong, ranging in age from 60 to 94.
A much more accurate description comes through the observations and sentiments shared by the teachers who invite them to their classrooms every day. Sometimes teachers have summed up their relationship with their Foster Grandparent in one sentence. “When Grandma no longer serves in my classroom, I’m done teaching.” For another, “In all the decades I’ve been a teacher, with Grandpa in my classroom, now I can finally teach.” Others have stories to tell…..
“Joey” was placed in foster care because of abuse in his home. His day begins by walking into his pre-school classroom and searching for Grandma. If she happens to be holding another child, he inevitably tries to convince her to put them down so he can climb in her lap. One teacher recently talked about “Paul,” who is relentlessly argumentative and sorely tries her patience. But with Grandma “June,” he is responsive and respectful. She gently keeps him focused and provides little reminders of what he’s supposed to be doing throughout the day. He chooses to sit with Grandma every day at lunch when he talks to her so much he needs reminders to eat.
“When she’s gone,” says the teacher, “my day is very long.”
“Tommy” has many formidable challenges and demonstrated his complete frustration with second grade through extreme negative behavior. Everything changed when Grandpa Love – his real name – walked through the door. The teacher tells us how Grandpa immediately gave this child his undivided attention, something she could never provide. His attendance improved 100 percent and he is “now a happy child at school.”
Grandma “Smith” was talking one day with another staff person about a significant health concern. One of the teens she works with every day overheard the conversation. When Grandma answered the phone the next day a young man said, “You don’t even know me, but I would like to give you my kidney because you have been so nice to my sister.”
The teacher shares that Grandma always has a smile, a listening ear and encouraging words for the young people in her alternative education program. The widely noticeable change in one young woman’s life is testimony to this volun-teer’s simple but life-altering gift of herself.
Foster Grandparents bring many things with them on their first day of school: a desire to feel useful, a non-authoritarian presence, wise perspective, learned patience, a myriad of skills, unhurried time to spend with a child and a powerful conviction that they can make a difference in a young person’s life. As we begin a new school year, we extend our thanks to the many school administrators and teachers who realize the importance of intergenerational bonds and work with our program staff to make Foster Grandparents an integral part of their school community
August 27, 2006 Grant helps families affected by meth addiction
Among typical concerns of persons over 55 might be long-term care, arthritis, transportation, Medicare reform, prescription drug costs, or senior housing.
Methamphetamine is just not among the issues most of us would think of as a “hot topic” among older adults.
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At the Area Agency on Aging, however, methamphetamine is one of the most frequent topics of phone conversations and informal gatherings of grandparents and relatives raising children whose parent’s are addicted to meth.
Methamphetamine is a powerful drug that gives users an intense rush when dopamine is released into the part of the brain that controls the feeling of pleasure. Meth is highly addictive because its effects can last up to twelve hours. Unlike marijuana and cocaine, meth is a synthetic drug that can be made from ingredients commonly found in household products. Using “recipes” available on the Internet, meth “cooks” manufacture the drug in their homes, cars or even suitcases at little cost. (Generations United).
As in many other family distress situations, grandparents and other relatives open their homes and hearts to care for the children. In the case of parental meth addiction, relative caregivers have both a unique burden and a unique opportunity to improve the lives of children in their care and break the generational cycle of drug abuse.
Nationwide, placement with a grandparent or relative constitutes the vast majority of out-of-home care to lessen the disruption caused by removal of a parent, maintain familiar family ties and traditions and keep siblings together.
In Michigan, however, relative caregivers receive little or no support after grandchildren or relatives are placed in their care, unlike the support provided to foster parents.
Caregivers are often at a loss to deal with behaviors, emotions and financial needs of the children. As a result of their parents’ methamphetamine abuse, children may suffer from pre-natal exposure and subsequent physical and developmental disabilities and/or mental and behavioral disorders. Children may also experience multiple risks to their safety and well-being including increased physical and sexual abuse, family violence, exposure to toxic chemicals and temporarily losing their parents to incarceration.
Grandparents must redefine their relationship to their grandchildren since they now must parent with difficult obligations of discipline and other stresses. The children and grandparents must also struggle with their new relationship to the absent parent and the grandparents must readjust their households financially and physically for infants and young children. (Legal Services to Children of Prisoners).
Grandparent and elder relative caregivers need new tools, new approaches to childrearing and referrals to a broad array of community support. Relative caregivers need on-going support and up-to-date information on how to meet the physical, emotional, psychological, social and educational needs of the children in their care. In the case of parental meth addiction, caregivers need reliable information on the effects of sexual abuse, neglect, malnutrition and exposure to drugs including dangerous drug paraphernalia and chemicals used in meth production.
Thanks to a generous grant from the Michigan Gateway Community Foundation dedicated grandparents and relative caregivers in Cass and southern Berrien counties enrolled in the Area Agency on Aging Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Program will receive expanded services to assist them in the challenges of raising children affected by methamphetamine.
For more information on methamphetamine or other topics of concern, grandparent and relative caregivers can call 983-7058 or 1-877-660-2725.
Return to top of page July 23, 2006 Elderly need relief from loneliness, boredom
A complaint of a loud party at the nursing home has to be something the police don’t hear everyday over the scanner. Sure enough – when the squad cars arrived to investigate the disturbance, the partiers were out in the courtyard with families and friends clapping and cheering!
The revelry was almost over by the time the police arrived so the “rowdy” crowd surrendered without incidence. The elders gradually returned to their rooms to dream, perhaps, of that warm summer night suddenly lit up with explosions of sparkling stars and ribbons of color, one after the other, shooting up from the lawn and floating down out of the dark sky.
The annual Fourth of July fireworks at the nursing home turned out to be an especially memorable event this year!
Visiting my mom (one of the rowdy elders) earlier that week, I found her sitting near the oven with friends enjoying the smell of baking cookies and listening to karaoke. The resident puppy was hanging out next to her wheelchair and people were coming and going, laughing and stopping to say hello.
I marvel that mom has never had so many friends in one place in her entire life who truly appreciate and care for her. When I walked in on this happy scene, she remarked with a big, excited smile: “It’s so much fun here!”
In his landmark initiative, The Eden Alternative, Dr. Bill Thomas maintains that we must “transform social and physical environments where our elders live into habitats for human beings rather than facilities for the frail and elderly.” Dr. Thomas refers often to “the plagues of loneliness, helplessness and boredom which account for most of the suffering among our elders.” I can say that my mom has little awareness of these plagues.
Dr. Thomas’s reform efforts focus primarily on institutional care. However, there are many more seniors receiving care at home where loneliness, helplessness and boredom can be just as devastating especially if someone is living alone and isolated.
Remaining at home as we age is made possible through a variety of services coordinated by the Area Agency on Aging. In addition to providing for needs like health care and help with household chores, seniors living alone or with a caregiver can also receive relief from the “plagues” through the Senior Companion Program.
Senior Companion volunteers who are seniors themselves offer a unique solution to the problem of isolation - friendship. Being a friend can mean many things like helping to prepare a favorite recipe, taking a walk together around the block, playing cards, looking through a picture album, putting together an emergency kit, writing a letter or going for a ride to the doctor, the grocery store or to see the fruit blossoms in the spring. Who knows! There could even be fireworks!
Relief from loneliness, boredom and helplessness can mean the difference between good health and physical illness, debilitating despair and looking forward to the next day. As Dr. Thomas notes: “We know that enlivened environments, rich in variety and spontaneity can create a life worth living where pills and treatment fail.” Who better than a friend to add richness to life?
Return to top of page June 18, 2006 Shared sites' let kids connect with older folks
Always a gracious hostess, as soon as Mom heard his voice in the hall, she started waving her arm that wasn’t affected by the stroke, beckoning him to come in and sit down. He greeted her by name and told her the latest stories of life in the fourth grade. Mom always comments on his good manners – “Did you hear that he said thank you?” – after she gave him a carton of goldfish crackers.
Tobias makes frequent visits to the nursing home to see his grandmother but also spends time with other residents like my mom. It’s a place where he’s comfortably “at home.” Mom and I were outside last week planting some seeds in the courtyard garden. Tobias was watching from a window so Mom quickly invited him to come out and help. Her face lit up when she saw him running down the path toward her wheelchair. “Ah, here’s my buddy,” she said.
Tobias had never planted seeds before. We enjoyed his excitement as he picked the fat sunflower and pumpkin seeds out of Mom’s hand and put them in the holes he dug with wild enthusiasm. She supervised from her place in the shade, making sure he didn’t miss any steps.
He was a little dirty and wet from the hose when we were done, but as Mom said, “You know, he’ll never forget that.” It was an especially meaningful prediction from someone with dementia who struggles to grasp every thread of memory.
Thanks to a grant from Generations United in Washington, D.C., more of Mom’s neighbors will have the opportunity to make memories with a child. Every week, a small group of children from birth to age 5 are invited to participate, at no cost, in fun and learning activities with their own small group of elder friends at Lakeland Continuing Care Center in St. Joseph.
Children must be cared for by relatives – grandparents, uncles, aunts, older siblings – while their parents are at work. Child Care Resources of Southwest Michigan will provide training for child care providers (who will receive $ 159 upon completion of an eight-week course) while the children and elders spend time together.
Many intergenerational “shared-site” projects exist throughout the country. Only a few operate in nursing homes, where there are distinct challenges as well as especially poignant rewards for both young and old.
As Donna Butts, executive director of Generation United, points out, intergenerational shared-site programs are ongoing and have opportunities for mutual exchange, growth and learning. Their potential for building lasting relationships makes them different from events where groups of children perform songs, do crafts or deliver gifts for residents.
She tells the story of an Italian pensioner who recently placed an ad in his local newspaper: “Wanted: Family.” The response was overwhelming from total strangers welcoming him to share their home. The invitation he accepted was from a family he chose because the mother’s voice reminded him of his late wife.
As Donna notes, it’s imperative that we create a world where elders don’t need to place ads to find a family, where it’s normal for a child to have a 90-year-old friend and where we all would like to grow old.
Call the Senior Volunteer and Intergenerational Programs at the Area Agency on Aging (983-7058 or 1-877 660-2725) for information on how to enroll in the new intergenerational program and plant seeds that will last for lifetimes.
Return to top of page May 14, 2006 Wisdom of the ages is now available on the Internet
The questions come from all over the world. Not surprisingly, many are from teens and those in their twenties seeking what every young person wants but so many in our fast-paced world do not have close by. A grandparent. More importantly, a grandparent who will take the time to listen to the dilemmas and confusion of their day-to-day lives.
"I have no one else to talk to", is a common refrain.
Elder Wisdom Circle began as a way to open the door on our country's huge untapped storehouse of elder wisdom. Elders over the age of 60 are chosen after completing the application and screening process. They offer their advice and know-how over the Internet in response to questions they choose from the website database. Other elders volunteer to review advice before it's sent out. Many participate as a group at locations such as nursing homes and assisted living centers with the help of a facilitator.
Calling themselves "volunteer grandparents of the cyber-world" they are part of one of the largest providers of personal advice anywhere. Over 250 elders with more than 18,000 collective years of wisdom make up what the website describes as "a richly diverse patchwork of life experience".
When Elder Wisdom Circle formed in February 2006, most questions were about things like home maintenance, cooking and gardening. There are still a few questions about growing roses or how to get rid of termites. But the vast majority of questions have become deeply personal - about family, friendship, careers, marriage, children and love. One elder notes that many young people seem to seek guidance after realizing that advice from peers often results in a mess of all kinds of conflicting information.
Young people wisely turn
to a grandparent for help in sorting it all out. Confiding in an elder
is sometimes the first step a young person needs to take before they can
begin to talk with a parent. Letters from elders frequently include a
recommendation that the advice-seeker talk with a doctor, guidance counselor
or other professional.
Parents, school administrators, teachers, youth pastors, librarians and
guidance counselors can seek advice themselves but can also refer a young
person directly to this confidential, safe and easy-to-use way to connect
with an elder.
The need for a grandparent
is certainly not limited to youth. Advice-seekers of all ages ask the
elders for advice on topics such as aging parents, an abusive marriage,
fears about aging, in-laws or changing careers in mid-life.
After spending a little time on the website reading samples of responses,
stereotypes of elders being "set in their ways", "behind
the times" or "old-fashioned" will be quickly and absolutely
dispelled.
Many of the senior volunteers
who participate in the Area Agency on Aging Foster Grandparent, Senior
Companion and Family Friend Programs belong to Elder Wisdom Circle as
one of the elder groups.
Need advice from an elder or want to learn more about Elder Wisdom Circle?
Visit www.elderwisdomcircle.org. Imagine yourself walking down a country
road, sitting on a park bench, a front porch or under a tree with an elder
and the wisdom of a lifetime. It's a priceless gift free for the taking!
Return to top of page April 9, 2006 In the end, The Dice Game might keep the family together
Getting six children together for the holidays from all corners of the country seems like a miracle every year. The tree is decorated with sentimental ornaments collected over the years. The smells of traditional Italian holiday meals start early every morning. The house comes alive with their music, singing and laughter that go on into the early hours of every morning; no one wants the precious days together to end. I always cry when everyone leaves.
It’s all memorable and wonderful but without The Dice Game it just wouldn’t be Christmas.
All year I collect all sorts of weird, kooky and silly little things from dollar stores and garage sales. A huge pile of wrapped stuff goes into the middle of the floor surrounded by my wild-eyed children. We raid the Monopoly game for the dice, start the timer and the mayhem begins.
Keep in mind my children are now in their 20s and 30s.
The dice fly around the circle in one direction. If you roll doubles, you take a prize from the center – or from someone else’s stockpile.
Did I mention that $100 in big and little bills is tucked inside some of the prizes?
It’s all over in five minutes after a whole lot of screaming, diving, shouting, shoving and hysterical laughter. Ripping off the wrapping paper and laughing even more over who got what wacky thing or the most money lasts much longer than the game itself. Then we move into the swapping and bargaining portion of the evening.
When my father died last year the Dice Game took on new meaning. I had heard unbelievable stories about adult children suddenly turning into voracious monsters over material things after the death of a parent. Nasty arguments over even the little things - who was promised the marble-top end table, who deserves the necklace or who should really have the lawnmower – can obliterate years of close sibling relationship overnight! Those stories were always simply incredulous to me until I witnessed a similar mysterious, disturbing and sad transformation among my own siblings.
My children were all born within a span of ten years. They grew up together like a pack, always looking out for each other like a bunch of inseparable puppies. They all live far apart now but still keep in close touch. I like to think they recall my priceless pearls of wisdom when they are faced with choices in their lives. In actuality, if they’re thinking about doing something potentially stupid, it’s usually the fear of answering to their brothers and sisters that tips the scale.
My Last Will and Testament may be the only one in existence with instructions for The Dice Game. When I die, if there’s anything material – big or small – that two or more of my children would like to keep, it gets wrapped up and goes into the pile.
There is nothing on this earth and no amount of money in the universe that’s more priceless and worth keeping than the fierce love my children have for each other.
Make a wonderful meal, turn on some great music, set the timer and roll the dice. I’ll be listening for your laughter!
Return to top of page March 5, 2006 Raising an adolescent can be a difficult time for parents and grandparents
"Bringing up teenagers is like sweeping back ocean waves with a frazzled broom-the inundation of outside influences never stops. Whatever the lure-cars, easy money, cigarettes, drugs, booze, sex, crime-much that glitters along the shore has a thousand times the appeal of a parent's lecture."
Mary Ellen Snodgrass refers to the challenge of adolescence which dates
back to the Industrial Revolution when the term was first used to describe
the stage of life between childhood and adulthood. Up until that time,
simpler agrarian society required little space for transition between
child and adult. Most of the tasks needed for one's independence in the
world were simpler and less demanding.
Our ancestors at the turn of the century would have found it incredulous that approximately eight years of adolescence in the modern world would be devoted to study, leisure and socialization. Likewise, the complexities, sophistication and sheer volume of information that must now be attained in order to even approach maturity would have been unimaginable just fifty years ago.
Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo of Growing Families International explain: "Today we live in the Age of Information, microchips, cyberspace, virtual reality, fiber optics, Web sites, multitasking, and gigabytes. Both the volume and complexity of new information highly influences the length of adolescence. There is simply too much to learn. The intricacies of modern adulthood will not allow teenagers to participate on an equal footing with adults."
Among the intricacies of modern society comes the "glitter along the shore" carried in incessantly by the ocean waves. It is the skilled parent, indeed, who can wield the "frazzled broom" and still manage to talk with their kids at the same time.
The Grandparents Raising Grandchildren and Relatives as Parents Program at the Region IV Area Agency on Aging understands the special challenges grandparents and relatives face in raising teenage children of another generation. Grandparents growing up toward the end of the Great Depression, for instance, and teenagers growing up in 2006 can be loyal allies, mutual teachers, staunch adversaries or all of the above.
In addition to a variety of programs and services to support intergenerational
families, the Area Agency of Aging offers help with often hard-to-find
information for grandparents raising teens.
Where can I find out about movie ratings and storylines? How do I start an open conversation with my grandchild about sex and encourage more conversations in the future? What are poof, tweak, glass and L.A. ice?
What are the colors, symbols and clothing of the street gangs in my community? Where should my computer be located and how can I know the websites my grandchild visits?
How can I afford those running shoes for the track team? What are those Lil Kim lyrics? Why does my grandchild act one way one day and another way the next? What could be going on in her brain?
The ocean waves will keep coming, the glitter along the shore will always
be appealing and the broom will always be frazzled. But no one is alone.
Thousands of local grandparents and relatives raising children along with
friends at the Area Agency on Aging are standing along the shore to help.
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January 29,2006 Senior volunteers teach the art of growing old gracefully - and fully
What I know now about Foster Grandparents and Senior Companions would have prepared me. It all would have made perfect sense, but eight years ago during my first week at the Area Agency on Aging, I realized this would not be an ordinary job.
As I would come to learn, after 25 hours of intensive pre-service training,
each senior volunteer receives a framed graduation certificate, pictures
of their classmates, hugs and applause.
For many volunteers, some the children of sharecroppers who grew up in
an era when education was a luxury and their help on the farm or caring
for younger siblings was critical to family survival, the graduation certificate
is like a piece of gold.
In addition to the certificate, senior volunteers each receive a smock or vest as do each of the 15,500 Senior Companions and 30,000 Foster Grandparents nationwide.You never know when finger paint might land somewhere other than the intended mark. Or whether the encouragement for a friend recovering from a stroke will result in a bite of lunch reaching its destination – or a volunteer’s new shirt.
In training, we explain that smocks help with identification for school security, are a familiar visual cue for clients with Alzheimer’s and are, of course, protection from flying food and finger paint. There may be children, in addition to the three or four a Foster Grandparent is assigned to work with each day, who will know where to go for a comforting hug, a smile or even, on several occasions, to finally tell someone about abuse in their family. As one Senior Companion client with dementia insists: “I’m not going anywhere until the lady with the blue vest gets here.” The possibility of putting on their “uniform” and returning to their children and elder friends has inspired recovery from heart attacks, strokes, hospitalization, physical disability and sorrow after the loss of a spouse, family member or longtime friend.
After eight years with the privilege of knowing this army of compassion, self-reliance and wisdom, it would have made perfect sense to receive the news during that first week on the job that a volunteer had just died and asked to be buried in her smock.
Infamous fashion designer Coco Chanel understood the significance of our volunteer’s final burial wish. “Adornment” she said, “is never anything except a reflection of the heart.” January is National Mentoring Month. Our 150-plus senior volunteers receive recognition in all sorts of ways for their 233, 673 hours of service last