It’s official. The 70s are going to be the best time of your life. Even if AARP didn’t come out with a recent survey that indicated people in their 70s were the happiest, I myself was feeling pretty darn happy, just so you know.

You can click the link for the AARP/National Geographic “Second Half of Life Study, but the bottom line is that people in their 70s are in one description, “doggedly optimistic” about their life and the future. Keep in mind, these people were interviewed post-COVID and they are still thinking positively about their lives and what’s ahead. Thirty-four percent of adults 80-plus and 27% of those in their 70s report they are “very happy,” compared to 21% of those 60 to 69, 18% of those 50 to 59 and 16% of those 40 to 49. According to the survey: 90% of respondents in their 70s said they were happy, compared with 81% in their 60s and 80% in their 40s.

Some observers have noted people in their 70s might be referred to as Generation X, for the lack of attention that they receive. It’s all about people in their 60s who are on the cusp of retirement, or people in their 80s who are beginning to face physical and cognitive limitations. You could say we’re the Rodney Dangerfield Generation, since we don’t get any respect.

How do we account for this extraordinary level of happiness? The simple, unscientific answer is that we’re boomers. Our generation is known for its sense of optimism and willingness to explore new things. These are people who flocked to San Francisco for the Summer of Love and hitchhiked to Woodstock without much more than a few dimes in their pockets. Now we are hitting the road again to see and do things we’ve not done before. As one observer put it, the seeds of being boomers in their youth are now growing into a sense of tranquility that other generations can only aspire to gain.

I congratulate you if you are 70+ and reading these words. You’ve made it, found more happiness than most, and can just focus on enjoying the years ahead. For those not yet 70 –  the best is yet to come.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon.

“Hey, honey,” my wife said as we barreled along M53, “There’s a park up ahead. Sandy Pines. We’ve never been there.”

I had. A year before I met her. 52 years ago. But I didn’t want to tell her that. To get into all that.

“Let’s stop for lunch,” she suggested. “The site says there’s a nice little waterfall near the picnic area.”

There is, I recalled. My girlfriend at the time had my mind in a cloud of cotton candy. But yes, there was…is a waterfall, still, I presume.

So, we pulled in. Lunched. Then walked the acorn strewn path to the railing overlooking the waterfall. I felt strange. Like I was cheating, perhaps because I was not sharing my side of the story, the memories running behind my eyes with each step.

Not everything was the same. There was a kind of dock or station, now, weatherproof boards, worn and warped, not plain gravel and dirt. The railings were shiny from the sunscreen forearms of a thousand visitors, not the bark covered poles from my time. I didn’t realize how much I remembered, how golden that moment had been. How painfully shortened when she dumped me on the way back to town.

So, yeah. The same but different. Changed. New boardwalk around the swampy ground near the falls. Same damp, misty, mucky smell…smells yank you back. More people. Maybe there were a lot of visitors back then. But I guess I just didn’t notice them. And I can’t remember where she lived when I picked her up. And how long we had been dating. But I did remember where I first met her at a friend’s cottage and we played king-of-the-mountain in chest-high water and I could hardly move my neck and shoulders for a week after.

So, okay, a trial run on the way to the real thing. But even at the remove of all these years, is it worth sharing those splashes in the muddle of memories with my wife? Nah. Not so much. Not that she would be jealous, or feel diminished somehow. It would just be irrelevant, too long ago or maybe just too personal. I mean, some memories should stay in the shoe box of photos in the back of the closet right behind the newer one still being filled.

Retired trainer, and writing instructor, Joe Novara and his wife live in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Writings include novels, short stories, a memoir and various poems, plays, anthologies and articles. Read more at https://freefloatingstories.wordpress.com/

2006. Remember where you were or what you were doing? I had to stop and think about where I was living and working. Oh, right. I was the Creative Director at DesignConcept and had this idea that since everyone was blogging about something, it might be a good time to create a blog devoted to being a baby boomer. It had a funny name at first, but then we settled on BoomSpeak because that seemed to fit for a blog that would give boomers a voice and an opportunity to express their thoughts on growing up and aging as boomers. We thought it might make money by selling ads. Ha! Another fantasy crushed!

Thanks to longtime contributor Harpeth Rivers for suggesting that we put out a collection of the best of BoomSpeak. As I note in the subtitle, I think they are all great or I would not have put them in the blog in the first place. Thanks also go to all our faithful readers and contributors for sticking with us for the long haul, and to Jim Fanzone @ DesignConcept for the cover art.

It was surprising to scroll through our online archives and realize how many contributors we have had in sixteen years. We selected what we thought were the best posts and that was not easy — there were so many gems. You have our most sincere gratitude for selflessly allowing us to share your words and thoughts.

We hope you find this BoomSpeak anthology entertaining, and thanks again for coming and going along for the ride.

If you ever contributed a piece that we published, you might find it in this anthology. A sneaky way to get you to buy the paperback or Kindle version?? Yeah, so what? It would be the first time there was any monetary profit to putting out this ezine for 16 years.

Click here to order your edition, and thanks again for being part of the BoomSpeak experience. Much appreciated.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon. Best of BoomSpeak is now available in paperback and Kindle on Amazon.

We’re melting. Well not really melting, more like shrinking. No, shrinking isn’t the right term either. We have muscles, but they are slowly wilting.

Wilting is a better word. But the actual loss of muscle mass is a bit scary. Starting at age 40, 8 per cent of our muscle mass just disappears. If that wasn’t bad enough, the research indicates that we then continue to lose another 8 per cent each decade.

Stay with me now. That means you lose 16 per cent of muscle mass by age 60, 24 per cent by age 70, and 32 per cent by age 80. When I see these numbers, I start to imagine that we’re going to be just skin and bones in our 80s. Come to think of it, that’s what our parents did look like in their 80s.

Are we going to just take this lying down? Because we’re just too weak and lacking enough muscle to stand up? NO!

Okay, maybe. If we do nothing to change the course of this wilting muscle mass phenomenon, we will be limp noodles that can barely pick up a cup of java in the morning (a loss of unparalleled magnitude for many).

Or, and you know what’s coming, we pick up the free weights and start lifting. And the TV remote does not qualify as a free weight. We are talking about those little barbells that come in 4, 6, 8, 10, 12-pound varieties. You lift them up out to the side, over your head, and in any other approved motion. Some people even use water bottles if they don’t want to bother with the free weights. AARP has loads of info on strength training.

The objective is to keep the muscle mass you have, not to end up looking like Popeye. Not that the Popeye look would be so bad, it’s just over the top when you’re 80 years old.

Boomers are getting butt lifts, neck lifts, breast lifts, cheek lifts, hair plugs, and a raft of other procedures that are generally designed to tighten up their bodies. Spending all that money and time on these procedures without addressing diminished muscle mass means they could still end up being a bag of bones.

If you want to lift something for a better body, go out and get some free weights. Tell them Popeye sent you.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon.

According to so many ads on TV, online, and in magazines us older folks require a whole arsenal of walkers and stair climbers and walk-in bathtubs not to mention hearing aids and orthotic insoles. Well, we certainly can use some mechanical support devices. But the adaptations and accommodations we most lean on, don’t come from factories. It’s our friends and family who brace our tracking and recall issues.

Like, for example, when one of us abruptly jumps topics in the middle of a conversation. The other night, a gaggle of us oldsters were bemoaning the high price of groceries when one woman suddenly started talking about her damson plum cake. My first thought was she suffered from an attention deficit disorder or, for a differential diagnosis, general scattiness. But then in a bolt of empathy, I recognized my own recent difficulties hanging onto a slippery thought through the give and take of a lively conversation. It’s so frustrating to have a perfect rejoinder or insight scroll through my attention span like I’m on a subway pulling up to the platform and I have only a moment to shove my thought out before the train disappears into a dark tunnel ‘neath the streets of Boston, never to return.

So, I smiled to let her know that I ‘got’ her plum cake bit. She nodded back, ever so slightly, pleased to be understood. Her train of thought had probably gone something like, ‘Yes, fruit is expensive. Plums are too. Good thing we’ve got that damson tree in our yard. It’s loaded with free, ripe fruit this year and I love the chance to make my special cake with them. Let me jam this into the conversation before it moves on or I forget what I wanted to say.’

We also, I’ve found, accommodate and put up with each other to bridge temporary memory gaps. Like the couple talking about great dining experiences. One guy says, “We really had a great meal last week.”

“Where at?” his buddy asks.

“Hmmm, what was the name of that place?” He pauses. “I’m thinking of a flower that has pickers on the stem and red petals.”

His buddy goes, “A rose. You’re thinking of a rose?”

“Yeah, that’s it. Rose, honey, where was that place we ate at last week?”

We all need some buddies to lean on.

Retired trainer, and writing instructor, Joe Novara and his wife live in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Writings include novels, short stories, a memoir and various poems, plays, anthologies and articles. Read more at https://freefloatingstories.wordpress.com/