Elder Journey Schedule

Second and Fourth Tuesdays
1:30 – 3:00, Fireside Room

Date	Facilitator	Topic
8/24	Misao Sakamoto	Attendent home care
9/14	Rev AMY	Life changes in 2010
9/28	Philip Hodge	Have we lost our senses?
10/12	DAN Harper	Life begins at 40?
10/26	Joan & George	Vision problems with expert
11/9	Rev AMY	Groups I have joined
11/23	DAN Harper	What does the Thanksgiving holiday mean to me?
12/14	Misao Sakamoto	Christmas Party
12/28	(NO MEETING)	MERRY CHRISTMAS, ETC.

NOTES

All meetings begin at 1:30 PM and run for an hour and a half. Meetings are held in the Fireside Room unless otherwise specified. All “elder” members and friends of the UU community are welcome to attend – and you can make your own definition of “elder”. For more information, send an email to elderjourney-info@uucpa.org

Philip Hodge, Court Jester

August 24 – Attendent care at home

Misao Sakamoto has arranged for two guest speakers at this informational type of meeting. Oscar Garcia, President/CEO, Chamber of Commerce, Mountain View, works full time outside of his home but still managesto care for both of his parents in his home. He will discuss the importance of utilizing community resources and attendant care at home as an alternative to institutional institutional care for his parents.

The second speaker will be Michelle Rogers, owner of HomeInstead Care Service. She will share information about the kinds of services available thru an established service agency which enable a person to remain in his/her own home during illness or recovery.

Misao notes that she met Oscar Garcia at a recent Senior Conference they both attended and that he in turn referred her to Michelle Rogers.

September 14 – Life changes in 2010

Rev Amy would like to know what has happened to each of since we last saw her at Misao’s party last December. Is your life significantly different now that it was then? If so, can you pinpoint a particular event associated with the change? Are you happy with the change? If it hasn’t changed, why not? Have you just drifted, or can you pinpoint an event that caused you to reconfirm what you are doing now? I suspect we may have a large turnout at this meeting since it will be a “Welcome Back” to Amy, so give a little advance thought to what you want to say. We want to be sure everyone has a turn.

September 28 – Have we lost our senses?

I’ll lead this one. In the broad meaning of the word, things you read in the paper are pretty convincing arguments that, “Yes we have lost our senses, and what’s the point of our little group talking about it?”.

No, I’m more concerned with the following facts:

Everybody writes smaller than they used to
People mumble all the time
The difference between a fresh-picked rose and a not-fresh baby’s diaper is less that it used to be
I can still distinguish between Texas Chili and plain cottage cheese, but everything else tastes the same
That knife felt dull, but it still made my finger bleed.

How about you? Notice any of the above? Any ideas for dealing with it? What’s the bright side of some of these changes? Any good stories to tell about one of them? We should have a nice relaxing afternoon visit.

October 12 – Life begins at 40?

In 1935 when Will Rogers starred in a movie titled “Life Begins at 40”, the title-phrase was already part of American culture. More recently, ScienceDaily (Feb. 18, 2008) published an article headlined “Older People Are Happy: Life Begins At 40 And 50 And 60” which starts out— “Growing old is a happier experience than many of us imagine - that’s according to the findings of a study conducted at Queen’s University, Belfast, on behalf of the Changing Ageing Partnership.”

Referring to this study, our leader Dan Harper, writes:

I was interested to learn that Americans tend to be least satisfied with life when they are about 40 years old, and that after age 40, people report an increased level of happiness through at least their seventies (that is, assuming no major health problems). I would love to hear from Elder Journey participants if that has been true for them -- does life get better after age 40, or not?

As for me, I have always held that Middle Age is halfway between me and the oldest person I know – and Old Age lies beyond that. Come tell us what YOU think.

October 26 – Vision problems with expert

Hosts Joan Welles and George Martin will invite a vision expert to discuss vision problems as we grow older and what we can do about them.

November 9 – Groups I have joined

Groucho Marx once said, “I don’t want to belong to any group that would accept me as a member.”

How about you? What has been your exerience with groups? Is there a favorite group that you do or did belong to? What was special about it? Were you ever rejected by a group you wanted to join? Have you ever joined a group and wished you hadn’t?

Our host, the Rev Amy, doesn’t expect you to answer all of the above questions. Just tell us about your most memorable group experience.

PS. Don’t be late for this meeting. The “group experience” will start with our IceBreakers.

November 23 – What does the Thanksgiving holiday mean to me?

Our MRE Dan Harper suggests, “I always want to hear people's stories, so I might ask people to tell some stories about Thanksgiving to illustrate what they're saying”

December 14 – No topic!

Since December is so filled with other holiday activities, we will have only one session this month on the second Tuesday. Rather than host her usual “infomational” meeting, Misao Sakamoto has graciously invited Elder Journey members to a friendly relaxed pot luck luncheon at her house, starting at Noon. All interested Elders are invited, but it is absolutely necessary to RSVP (email elderjourney-info@uucpa.org or call Misao or me) if you wish to join us.

Philip Hodge, Court Jester

Unitarian Universalist Church of Palo Alto