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Aging from a useful man to something considerably less
For the first 70 years of my life, I made my living and earned my place being useful. I have been fixing, building, and designing everything from salvaged homes to consumer electronic products since I was 17. As an electronics engineer, I have been a designer, a manufacturing engineer, a manufacturing and customer service manager, a field clinical engineer (in medical devices), and a reliability assurance engineer. Along the way as my family's single income source, I have bought and upgraded five houses. I did almost all of the repairs to our family vehicles, my own motorcycles, and pretty much any piece of equipment related to work or home.
Since passing 70, my ability to do all or any of those things is rapidly in decline. About the only car repairs I do now is oil changes. Due to myasthenia gravis and vision issues, I sold my last motorcycle 2 years ago and, after 60 years on two wheels, I'm down to an occasional local ride on an e-bike. So far, I have been able to do all the repair work on my e-bikes. 😉 I have had an electronic shop in a garage or room of our homes for more than 50 years, but early this summer I started selling and giving away those tools and parts.
Between my job and chores and hobbies, doing stuff has been core to my self-identity. The stuff that I can do is rapidly shrinking and, with it, goes a good bit of who I have always thought I am. I know there have to be a lot of people in the same situation and I would love to know how you have handled it.m
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@kjoed53 I don't think the point was that you should be outraged at their returning. I think the point is that you should be worried that we are no longer attractive to immigrants with exceptional skills and we are not producing our own. And my point was that places like Canada are poaching our own talent.
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3 Reactions@twday67
That's capitalism, liberty and freedom in practice! Foreign born people are not always embraced in our society. We've raised a generation that doesn't have the same work ethic that we were raised with, and don't have the same goals. Learning has changed drastically since our day. Not only has technology advanced considerably, but it does the nitty gritty technical work that was done manually prior. The world cannot be judged the same as it was 50 years ago. The view is much different. It's as if we're looking out a window and revolving slowly so that what we see is continuously changing. Change is not always bad and not only good, but it's constant. To worry about the things you cannot change and cannot control is counterproductive to good health.
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3 Reactions@twday67 Let's get back to my original "ask". I am looking for stories that demonstrate the relationship between science research and the quality of live we enjoy. If you have anything in that category, please send it to me. I will put it to good use.
Good science definitely helped me…I had large CRC tumor and immunotherapy worked wonders for me…i only hope that research gets the support it needs !
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1 ReactionHey, TW.
Wish you were my neighbor. I'd be picking your brain and trying to learn some of your diverse skills. You're clearly much more of a handyman than I.
I'm sure there are many others. like me, that would love to have you as a "fixer-upper" mentor.
On the over all topic being discussed: I recall the advice of Dirty Harry (from one of his movies): "A man's gotta know his limitations." A very safe way to live longer in our retirement.
The fact that you're aware of your situation, and actively seeking a solution, tells me you're on your way to finding the best answer for YOU. Just be a little patient... you'll find it.
All the best!
/LarryG
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7 ReactionsI am totally on board with Dirty Harry's A man's gotta know his limitations." I wrote a motorcycle for almost 60 years and it was my primary transportation for about 20 of those. I taught motorcycle safety classes for 19 years and about a decade ago, as I watched so-called "Experienced Riders" fumble their way through basic riding exercises, I created a baseline for myself. I even committed to documenting it in a motorcycle column I used to write called Geezer with a grudge. The article was titled "Creating a Baseline."
https://geezerwithagrudge.wordpress.com/2017/06/26/creating-a-baseline/
Due to a collection of medical issues and rapidly declining upper body strength, I started selling off my motorcycles, one at a time, in my early seventies. I was down to a 250, that I loved, 2 years ago when that baseline bit me in the face. I may be a lot of things, many of them negative, but I have always tried to be consistent. And when I failed to meet that Baseline, I sold the motorcycle and a lifetime collection of riding gear and tools. I wish I could say I haven't looked back, but I look back a lot. But it still was the right decision.
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6 ReactionsHaving been working at it for about six years, I can say that planning and making changes to age in place is not a process that we finish...until we're finished.
This week I'm completing a permanent ramp over the back steps so that, if anyone needs wheelchair access to the house, it's ready. We have a temporary ramp used when my wife had surgery, and I came to admit that if I were the one who needed wheelchair access, I would not be able to install the ramp for myself. And it could be me who needs it next!
I rather frequently ask "What do I really want to do for the rest of my life and how can I do it?"
I have a lifetime of musical scores, mostly for instruments I'll probably never play again. As I look toward the eventual possibility of moving everything to our downstairs, the space holding those scores might be needed for clothing.
I keep my bookshelves to 40 feet of references and beloved books, as it will be pretty simple to crate them to the used book store when I'm gone. It's an indulgence.
I've grown less active in the workshop this year, and really wonder if I will need all the tools I've gathered. Some I've moved to the community shop, not so hard to do because I'm the community barn master.
I'm struggling to express myself. I would say that I'm becoming more aware that this question really matters, as one way or another the time will come that I must give up more, and I want to do it gracefully, honestly and with a sense that I'm continuing to take care of myself.
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7 Reactions@twday67 Your column was a great read! My husband recently bought a 2026 CanAm Spyder R3 with all the bells and whistles. He has another CanAm Ryker, plus a 2006 GoldWing 1800 and a Suzuki V-Strom. Too many wheels on the ground! Oh, plus his two trucks and a Jeep. He has over 400K miles just on motorcycles. His 2002 Goldwing 1800 had 207K miles on it when the transmission gave up. He is very understanding of your philosophy of knowing limitations, which is why he is moving to 3 wheels, as he is not ready to give up the cage-free style. We have had to make concessions for aging, definitely a hard admission.
Ginger
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2 Reactions@edsutton this may be totally useless advice for you, but I quit playing music in the early 80s, mostly, to commit myself to working in the studio on the other side of the glass and because pretty much everyone who came into the studio played infinitely better than me. A weird side effect of being stuck in New during the first year of my retirement, followed by covid isolation, got me back into play a lot in 2000.
I started working with Apple's Logic, to record the music friends and I were playing online during the covid lockdown. If you are so inclined, computer wise, Logic and several other DAWs have pretty spectacular orchestration capabilities. If nothing else, that would allow you to hear your compositions.
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