(Note to reader: this is the first of a new series, which I am calling simply “Life Stories” and will post these from time to time.)

Humbling moments, we all have them. Here is one (of many) that I remember.

In 1968 I was in my final year at Union Seminary in New York. I had struggled with theological issues and matters of faith for some time but had decided to stick it out at Union, lacking other better alternatives. Besides, by my last year at Union, I had managed to finagle a fieldwork assignment at the New York City Department of City Planning, and I was taking city planning courses at Columbia. My senior thesis was titled something like “Making Public Housing Human: Creative Playgrounds in New York City.” I still wonder why Union allowed me to get away with these activities. But, hey, it was the Sixties, and everything was up for grabs.

While I had struggled along the way at Union, I had not thrown in the towel yet and told myself to close things out I should take a least one more course in theology. I chose a seminar on contemporary theology taught by the famous theologian, Daniel Day Williams. Professor Williams was a kind and gentle person, who had written many books on theology and had a world-wide reputation. The seminar was open only to Union Seminary seniors and PhD students from various universities in New York City and very hard to get into. I still have no idea how I made the cut, but I did and realized the first day of class that I was in the Big Leagues. While it was labeled a seminar, there were probably around twenty people in the class, mostly graduate students from Columbia University and a Catholic institution of some sort. There were only a couple of other Union seniors besides me in the class and a lot of very enthusiastic PhD students. The atmosphere was electric, sitting at the foot of a theological icon, one of the few intellectual giants left at Union after the departures of Paul Tillich and Reinhold Neibhur. Everyone had to choose a theologian, write a paper on that person, and deliver a presentation of about 20 minutes about the person and his or her theology.

The first day Professor Williams passed around a paper with a list of famous theologians. I was one of the first to see the list as it was passed around and jumped on Paul Tillich, putting my name in the designated space. I could see others beside me frowning and sighing when they saw his name crossed out. I had hit the jackpot. Paul Tillich, probably the most famous living theologian in the world at the time, recently retired from Union and now teaching at Harvard, and I had lucked out in getting to write about him and his views.

Now Tillich was not new to me. In fact, in some ways he had already had a profound impact on my life. During my senior year at Davidson, Tillich had accepted an invitation to spend three days on campus and deliver a presentation each day in the school’s assembly hall. I attended all three lectures (which later became part of one of his books), sat in the front row of a jammed auditorium, took copious notes, and concluded he was the most profound thinker I had ever heard. That had happened four years earlier, and while I remembered the experience I could not remember exactly what he had said. This would be my chance to dig deeper and to come closer to the meaning of life. So I jumped in and got to work, reading several of his books and most of his opus magnum, Systematic Theology.

My presentation did not happen until week number four, which meant that I had three chances to listen to other students make their presentations. I had never seen anything at Union like the enthusiasm or engagement of my fellow classmates, with eager hands raised after each presentation, and thoughtful questions. During this preparation period I worked hard knowing that the pressure was on to reach the high standards set by the six or seven students who had made brilliant presentations before me.

There was only one problem. The more I read of Tillich’s writing, the less I understood. What he was known for was using terms like “ultimate concern” and “ground of being” to help make religion more relevant to the modern world. But the more I read, the more confused I became.

As the deadline approached, I started to panic, and the night before my presentation in desperation I called a PhD student at Union and a good friend and told him of my plight. He calmed me down, invited me to come to his apartment, and we began around eight in the evening to go over the main points of Tillich’s work. At six the next morning we were still working on it. My friend was extraordinarily patient and went over each concept as long as it took for me to understand it. I had never pulled an all-nighter before (or since), but by nine that morning I thought that I finally had Tillich figured out. I went back to the library and revised my paper and presentation, finishing by three in the afternoon, an hour before the seminar would begin.

I was the second of three presentations that day. The first was by a PhD student at Columbia about some obscure theologian I had never heard of, but whoever he was, he must have been profound because hands immediately went up around the room with questions, comments and replies. Just like the several presentations before hers, there was warm applause at the end and a smile on Professor William’s face.

Then it was my turn.

I walked to the front of the class, and bleary eyed, looked at the eager faces in the room, took a deep breath and launched into my twenty-minute presentation on the theology of Paul Tillich. When I finished, I smiled with satisfaction. I was so exhausted, I could not remember what I had said but felt a great sense of relief that I had managed to deliver my report and thanks to my friend, I had confidence I had nailed it.

 There was complete silence. Professor Williams, with a puzzled look on his face and raised eyebrows, asked the class, “Any questions?”

There was not a single peep. Some people were looking down at their desks to avoid eye contact.

“Thank you, Mr. Howell, you can now go to your seat,” the kindly professor said trying to manage a smile. There was no applause like all the other students had received.

“Well,” I said to myself, “I have either knocked the ball out of the park or somehow have totally missed what Tillich was all about.”

No one spoke to me when the class adjourned and as other student presenters were being congratulated.

I suspected that it might have been the latter, but I did not have a chance to talk to anyone about the presentation and was afraid to talk to the revered professor, so I kept quiet for the remainder of the class and for the rest of the semester, sitting at the back of the room and speaking to no one. I told myself that I could have been so profound that no one had any questions or maybe I could have been so awful that people were speechless. Better just forget about the whole ordeal. So, I shrugged it off and stoically finished the course. I would know soon enough when the semester ended and when I would receive my grade. Who knows, maybe I had nailed it. The final grade would tell. I could have gotten an A+. 

When the grades came in at the end of the semester, I held my breath and opened the envelope to discover a grade of C–, the lowest grade you could get at Union and equivalent to an F in most other graduate schools. There was not a single comment on the paper.

 I had my answer, but by this time the semester was over, Union and Columbia were on strike due to one of the student protests in the Sixties, and in the fall I was headed to planning school in Chapel Hill. A just and proper ending for my three years of suffering through theological education (and occasional anguish) at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. And one of my life’s many humbling moments.

 

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Now that Embry’s two-year term as Senior Warden at All Soul’s Episcopal Church is up, she has been busying herself with finishing up writing the history of All Souls Church. Just for fun she fed the basic facts she had been gathering regarding liturgy at the church into her computer, hit the “Google Copilot” key and in less than a minute appeared two pages of perfectly worded prose, which was accurate enough for any final report. Oh, my Goodness!

 AI can certainly be your friend. If you have ever been a church goer or perhaps more unlikely still attend church, think of how many bad sermons you may have heard. AI could fix that in an instant if a clergy person identified to AI a Biblical chapter and verse, gave it a preferred length or time limit, the intended audience (liberal, conservative, MAGA, etc.) and bingo, out would come a meaningful and compelling sermon. Who knows, this may already be happening. Ditto for teachers, college professors, writers, editors and many other professionals. Your friend is patiently waiting for you. Just provide instructions and guardrails.

But be careful. Ai can be crafty. This week we are with our son Andrew’s family at a beach town on the New Jersy coast. Just for fun, his wife, Karen, suggested we feed AI  one of my recent blog posts critical of Trump and ask AI to rewrite the post in the style and language of the President.

Here is the blog post Karen fed to AI:

Every day it seems there is a new revelation of a Trump atrocity or excess. This week it was about all the money he and his family have made the past year, most of it after he was inaugurated—a net worth increase to the tune of $2.9 billion, according to Forbes (April 2025)—and we are now only at the beginning of his second term. Trump casinos, Trump championship golf courses, and Trump high rise luxury hotels seem to be on the drawing boards all over the planet, and there appears to be no end in sight. The new “Executive Branch” in Georgetown, a club just started by his oldest son, which hints of special access to the President for a mere $500,000 membership fee, is reportedly already a hot ticket item, and Trump’s bit coin business is booming. And having your own personal, multibillion dollar, luxury jumbo jet, compliments of Qatar, is shrugged off by the President as nothing unusual. Nor has there been a peep of outrage among members of the Grand Old Party, which in days of yore has stood for good government, anti-corruption, and fiscal responsibility. Fearing being “primaried out” by MAGA extremist candidates financed by Elon Musk and other billionaires, formerly moderate Republican senators and congressmen have caved. Using Trump’s words, “The world has never seen anything like it.”

 

 

Here’s that passage rewritten by AI in a Trump-style voice:

The fake news media is at it again, folks! They’re going absolutely crazy – and I mean crazy – because we’re so successful, so incredibly successful that even they can’t ignore it anymore. Forbes – and by the way,  they used to hate me, now they have to admit the truth – they’re saying we’ve increased our net worth by $2.9 billion! Can you believe it? $2.9 billion!

We’re building the most beautiful Trump casinos, the most magnificent championship golf courses – probably the best golf courses in the history of golf courses – and luxury hotels that are so spectacular, so amazing, that world leaders are calling me up saying “Sir, we’ve never seen anything like this before.” It’s true!

My son – and he’s a very smart guy, gets it from his father – he started this fantastic club in Georgetown. The Executive Branch, they call it. Very classy! People are paying $500,000 just to be members because they know quality when they see it. The waiting list is tremendous, absolutely tremendous.

And the bitcoin business? Through the roof! Nobody does crypto better than Trump, believe me. Even the haters have to admit it. Qatar gave us this incredible jet – the most beautiful jet you’ve ever seen – because they respect strength. They respect success.

The Republicans are finally learning how to win again! They see what we’ve accomplished and they’re saying “This is how you make America great!” No more of the old, weak politics. We’re making deals like nobody’s ever made before. The world has never seen anything like it – and that’s the truth!

Be careful. AI  can also be your enemy. You may get more than what you asked for. And who knows how much damage has already been done and how much more is to come? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Today (August 11) in The Washington Post is a front page story that hundreds of FBI agents are being deployed to fight crime—primarily street crime—in the District of Columbia and a similar article in The New York Times that in addition to the FBI, Trump is planning to send in hundreds of National Guard troops this week “to keep order” in the nation’s capital. All of this is happening at a time when the crime rate in the District of Columbia is close to historic lows. Several previous articles in various newspapers have said he is planning to abolish home rule, fire all DC elected officials, and appoint lackeys and sycophants to do his bidding—which includes his plans to expand the White House by constructing a gigantic ballroom. Such an action would normally take years for approval by regulatory agencies. Not if Trump’s henchmen are running the show. Trump was also quoted that within a matter of days there would be no signs of homeless people or encampments in DC. What does that mean? What does he plan to do with those people? And this is happening at a time when masked ICE officials with ambitious arrest quotas are now arresting people on the streets in poor DC neighborhoods and adjacent counties who look like they may be immigrants or speak with a dialect. And what about the massive prisons being constructed around the country to be run by private prison companies to house undocumented people in cages and to separate families? I tell myself that this is just a bad dream. But it is happening.

So how worried should we be?

According to the U.S. Constitution, checks and balances are in place to prevent autocratic rule in the United States. There are three branches of government—the executive, legislative and judicial branches—which share the responsibility for governing. But what if  both other branches are compliant with whatever the executive decides? Republicans control both the House and the Senate and have a majority on the Supreme Court. It appears that there is nothing Trump can do that will cause more than one or two Republican Senators or Congressmen to break rank. And the final guardrail—the Supreme Court—is shaky. Many lower courts have ruled against Trump’s agenda, especially those courts where a majority of judges have been appointed by a Democrat. Ultimately most of the controversial cases will end up in the Supreme Court where Trump seems to have four solid votes for whatever he wants and three justices appointed by a Democrat who will fight his moves, leaving the outcome to be decided by Chief Justice Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett, both Republican appointees. In times past the Supreme Court has been the final guardrail keeping our democracy from going off the cliff. Not so much today.

So how worried should we be?

It is too early to know what kind of pushback will happen regarding sending in the FBI and National Guard to take over law enforcement in DC and what the chances are that Trump will be able to pull this off. But what if he does? What does this say about our democracy and our way of life not only in the District of Columbia but in our country? If Trump can pull this off in DC, which cities might be next?

So what should those of us who are horrified by Trump’s actions do? I written checks to the ACLU and to CASA, nonprofit advocacy organizations which are championing the immigration cause, and attended last week a session about what we should do when we see ICE arrest someone (mainly document with our cellphone cameras), but that does not seem like very much. We can support Democrats running for the Congress and the Senate in 2026 but that seems like a long way off, and so much damage can be done between now and 2027 when Democrats would have a shot to having a majority in at least one of the legislative chambers. We can speak out and demonstrate when given the opportunity, join marches, and post blogs like I am doing now, but all that too seems futile.

And the fundamental question is this: why do good people turn a blind eye or sit on the sidelines when they know that what is happening is wrong? Most people, I believe, are fundamentally good and want to do the right thing. Hillary got into trouble when she said something like all the MAGAs are not evil people (implying that a lot are). I do not believe that all Trump supporters are bad people. What I do believe is that we Homo sapiens are fundamentally herd animals. We have the capacity both to love and to hate and fight back when we feel threatened. This is the nature of our species. We have evolved over many thousands of years from being the hunted to the hunter and for now due to our tribal organization we rule the roost on the planet Earth. Tribalism has enabled this to happen. But every tribe has a leader. That is why good leaders are so important and bad leaders are so dangerous.  I think you could make a good case that the critical factor which determines whether a country tilts toward good or to evil is the leader of the tribe. The Germans under Hitler were not all evil people. Nor were Italians under Mussolini, the Spanish under Franco, the Russians under Stalin or the Chinese under Mao. Yet many in those countries did terrible, evil things because of their tribal leaders. That is what we humans do.

And that is the situation we are experiencing today. The tribal leader of the United States is a narcissist wannabe dictator. The challenge for us today is how do get out of this mess. The main hope we have, I believe, is for strong new, younger leaders to speak out and to rally us herd animals to a vision of inclusiveness, fairness and kindness—all of which are part of our human nature, just as much as our capacity to do bad things to one another. Who will that be? When will that happen? How much time do we have?

That is why today I am announcing my candidacy to become the next President of the United States.

Send money.

(Ok, just kidding.)

But that does not answer the fundamental question of how worried we should be or what we should do about it. What do you think? What are you planning to do?

 

 

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So instead of complaining about how bad Trump is and how he is taking us down the dark road of authoritarianism, let’s ponder another cheerful topic, death. Now that Embry and I live at Collington, a continuing care retirement community of over 300 independent living units plus assisted living and memory care, it is impossible to ignore that all human beings die. Collington has over 400 residents whose average age has got to be in the mid-eighties or even older.  Between 35 and 45 people die every year averaging close to one every week. You might conclude that being reminded on a regular basis that there is a beginning and an end to human life is depressing, but  it is not. That is just the way it is for us Homo sapiens on the planet Earth. Most old folks here at Collington—as is true I suspect for all CCRCs– are survivors. We have lived long lives, outliving our life expectancy at birth by many years. Many here like us have much to be thankful for—wonderful children and grandchildren, satisfying careers, strong friendships, and generally good health. We all have also have made  mistakes and have had our share of hard knocks. Many of us have lost spouses. But I would say that in general we are the lucky ones. Most of us, I also suspect, focus not on the inevitable end of our lives but rather on getting as much out of life as we can in this moment, running our last lap. I have called it squeezing the last drops out of the lemon.

It is also true that the checking out process is much more difficult and painful for some more than it is for others. Disability, pain and memory loss are the major culprits, and few get a totally free ride. Like many my age, I occasionally glance through the obituaries in The Washington Post and am amazed at how many obits compiled by funeral homes start off with “so-and-so died peacefully, surrounded by friends and loving family.” Really? I don’t think that is the way it usually works, and sadly for some the experience is very painful. Some have been dealt very bad hands for the checking out process. Life (and death) is not fair.

The question lurking in the shadows for all of us humans– but especially us octogenarians and older–is, of course, what happens next. This is where I get into trouble. Now as some may know, I am a “cradle Episcopalian” who has attended church regularly for my entire life except for a couple of lapses due to church fatigue. Embry has been more of a stalwart than me mainly because she loves singing in the choir. In any event we have hung in there through the various ups and downs, scandals and recoveries of the Episcopal churches we have attended. I even graduated from Union Theological Seminary in New York City and for a short while was a “postulant” in the Episcopal Church headed for ordination. Fortunately for me, my bishop was a feisty old guy with a big heart, a good sense of humor and a keen eye for people like me who had trouble with all the theological baggage and no business becoming an Episcopal priest. He did me a huge favor by advising me that for every year spent at Union— “that heretical Protestant seminary”- I would do “penance” at Nashotah House, an Anglo Catholic, hardcore, orthodox Episcopal seminary in the backwoods of Wisconsin someplace. Easy call and we parted ways.

Where I get into trouble is that even though I have stuck it out in church attendance, I continue to have the same nagging questions that so many others have about what happens next and what this short, fragile life is really all about.  We Homo sapiens are just one of many thousands of species who over a course of millions of years evolved and eventually clawed our way to the top of the food chain.  We live on one small, beautiful planet circling a run-of-the-mill star in a nondescript galaxy in a universe that scientists now believe contains something like a trillion galaxies. All this began with a “Big Bang” some 13.8 billion years ago and is still expanding with mysterious “dark matter” and black holes somehow holding it all together.

Can any of us Homo sapiens really figure out what all this means? Sorry, above our pay grade.

And yet we think we are it? That no “advanced life” exists anywhere else?  That a divine deity we call “God” created us in “His image” and that when we die—if we believe the “right things”—we will go to heaven and live with Him for eternity? Well, that is what many who call themselves Christians say they believe. And many of those people also believe that if you do not believe the same thing they do you are going to spend eternity burning in hell, which some still believe is located near the center of the Earth.

Please.

Now you know why I was not ordained.

This year I attended a funeral of a dear friend. At the end of the service, the Presbyterian minister proclaimed that he had no doubt whatsoever, “absolutely none,” that this fine person now deceased was sitting in heaven with God on his right and Jesus on his left. When I complained to a friend that I thought this was going a bit too far, he responded, “Joe, if you do not believe this, number one, you aren’t a Christian and number two, if you do not believe that, life is not worth living.”

I immediately changed the subject.

But what you don’t believe is not a substitute for what you do believe and here I have to admit I fall woefully short. I do not have an answer as to what happens to us after we die. The answer to this, I believe, is that we have no choice but to live with the uncertainty. What we can do is celebrate the lives of those we lose, mourn for their loss and comfort those in pain. And we can be thankful for our own lives and those we love on this extraordinary planet. 

I know that there are those reading this that are asking, ok, I get it, but why has this guy stuck with church all these years. I have been asked this question more than once. My answer is that religion in general–and Christianity in particular–offers glimpses of a dimension of human existence that falls into the category of the spiritual and that this dimension is real and part of what it means to be human. I am not giving up on that, and being associated with a church, warts and all, has been for me a pathway to access the spiritual dimension of life and to be part of a loving and supportive community. And the Chrisitan message of unconditional love, the call to love your neighbor, to respond to those in need, and to try to make the world a kinder, fairer, and gentler place is enough to keep me going.

At least for now. Before it is my turn to say goodbye.

 

  

 

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July 4, 2025 is now history. Our beloved country as a functioning democracy is officially on life support. All that Trump wanted he got and now officially owns the Republican Party. All kinds of postmortems are coming in, all of them bleak. Hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants will be rounded up in the months ahead, many sent to “dark prisons” in places like El Salvador and Sudan. The “Alligator Alcatraz” prison in the swamps of Florida is supposed to open immediately housing 5,000 undocumented people—in cages! Other similar giant makeshift prisons are planned around the country. There are more than 13 million undocumented people in the United States. Many industries—like construction, hospitals, long term care and assisted living, hotels, restaurants, and agriculture depend on them. If Trump’s goal is to get rid of all of them in four years, that would mean arresting, locking up, and deporting about 65,000 people a week or over 9,300 every day. That probably won’t happen but a lot of suffering will. The “Big Beautiful Bill,” which is now the law of the land, has  billions in funding for immigration and the expansion of ICE into what many describe as Trump’s personal police force and the largest federal police force in U.S. history. Trump now has the money to make a lot of this happen.

The immigration issue ranks at the top of my list of Trump atrocities because of the pain and suffering it will inflict on people whose only “crime” was to try to make a better life for themselves and their families. Embry and I are very close to several undocumented immigrant families. They now live in a world of terror.

But that is just the beginning. To make permanent and expand the massive tax breaks for the ultra rich, deep cuts will be made to Medicaid, the ACA (Obamacare) subsidies, and to SNAP (food stamps). What is going to happen to the people who depend on these services? The CBO estimates that over 17 million people will be affected. Many hospitals serving inner city neighborhoods and rural areas will likely close.

The irony here, of course, is that Trump and his allies now proclaim that they are now the party of the working class. The working class did shift in large numbers to vote for Trump, responding to his anti-establishment, populist rhetoric. Well, Trump’s policies will devastate many of the working class people who switched from Democrat to Republican. Classic bait and switch.

And then there is the dismantling of USAID and the termination of most of the vital aid to struggling people in Africa, parts of Asia, and struggling countries throughout the world. Experts estimate the lives lost could total hundreds of thousands or higher. And what about all the USAID workers who are now without jobs? What about the transformation of the government workforce from professional public servants to Trump sycophants and MAGA loyalists?

The list continues: ending subsidies for combatting climate change initiatives, providing subsidies for polluting industries, attacks on education, especially elite colleges and universities, drastically cutting funding for science and medical research, attacks on all things LGBTQ, trans gender, and “woke,” and massive amounts of dollars for expansion of the military. Trump’s excessive tariffs are supposed to start any day. And this is just for starters. With a Congress controlled by Republican Trump sycophants and a friendly U.S. Supreme Court, who knows what other nightmares Trump and his followers will come up with?

And, finally, there is prediction by the CBO, that these initiatives will add at least $5 trillion to the national debt, a dire situation which no reputable economist believes is sustainable without wrecking the economy.

Have you heard enough?

Well, what are you (we) going to do about it? Friends, we are witnessing the igniting of a five alarm fire. My generation has been lucky. We missed World War II, and most of those pursuing higher education got out of the draft during the War in Vietnam. The economy has prospered, and the country has made great advances in science, medicine and technology. We have started to address latent racism and have strengthened social and healthcare safety nets. Jobs have been plentiful for those seeking them. We have  avoided full scale war and a nuclear holocaust. And we also had the civil rights movement, which both Embry and I were involved in and which  we both see as a pivotal moment in our lives.

At the same time economic disparities have worsened starting in the early 1980s. Racism and prejudice against people with different appearances or sexual orientations stubbornly persist.  Working class incomes have stagnated, and there has been backlash from the working class regarding perceived elitism by those with college and advanced degrees.

I think that the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s followed by the Antiwar Movement of the mid 1970s may offer some hope for the future and some guidelines as to how to begin to extinguish the five alarm fire unleased by Trump and his Republican and Supreme Court allies.

 Here are the lessons learned:

Don’t expect the Democrats to put the fire out. Neither Democrats nor Republicans were part of the Civil Rights Movement until very late in the effort. The movement was grass roots and   started in earnest in 1961 with the  freedom rides to Alabama and the sit ins in Greensboro, NC, and quickly spread to many other parts of the South. However, these actions were not spontaneous. There were lots of people and organizations involved in the planning and execution of the resistance effort—the NAACP, CORE, SCLC, SNCC, the National Urban League, and several other groups. Progressive churches and other religious institutions were also important. To fight Trump and his agenda, we need organizations united behind the effort and we need money and sound planning. This is starting to happen. The No Kings Protests attracted over four million people. But more organizations need to step up  and more planning needs to happen. Organizations like the ACLU, CASA, SPLC are leading in pushing back on immigration, but more will be needed along with resources and money.

We also need strong, charismatic leaders. The leaders of the Civil Rights Movement made a huge difference. Martin Luther King was the most prominent but there were many more—James Farmer of CORE, Stockley Carmichael and John Lewis of SNCC, Whitney Young of the Urban League, Malcom X, Caesar Chavez and many others. Most of these leaders were at the time under 40. We need younger people to step up, speak out, and take leadership roles.

We need nonviolent mass demonstrations and nonviolent civil disobedience.

We need massive voter registration drives for the 2026 elections.

We need celebrities and progressive business leaders to speak out.

We need mainstream progressive religious groups—Protestants, Catholics, Jews and Muslims–to speak out.

Most important we need to win back the working class and motivate them to get Democrats elected in 2026.

All is not lost. Trump will surely overplay his hand. What he is doing is enormously unpopular. The charge for the Opposition is to broadcast what his policies are doing, how they are destroying people’s lives, and how they will ultimately destroy our democracy. Don’t give up hope. The 2026 midterm elections are just over a year away. I predict that with a strong resistance and voter registration and motivation effort Democrats will retake the House and the Senate and put an end to this madness before it destroys more lives and our democracy.

In the end, however, we all have to step up to the plate. There is a great quote from Margaret Meade, “Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

 

 

 

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There are several truisms that come to mind regarding continuing care retirement communities in general and Collington in particular. Everyone is old, many in their late 80s and 90s. The vast majority are women, mostly widows. And all are survivors. This also means those of us living in CCRCs have stories to tell regarding the ups and downs of our lives and most of us have experienced losses. The vast majority of single people living here have lost a spouse. Some of us have lost children.

You might think that given the experiences we old folks have had and the health issues and challenges that many at our age face daily that there would be grousing, complaining and “organ recitals” on a regular basis. Not so at Collington. Embry and I have lived here now for almost three months and have not heard a whimper or complaint from anyone about their health or personal challenges. You could say “Collingtonians” soldier on, making the best of the years we have left, squeezing the last few drops out of the lemon. Even though a fellow resident may not know you, you can always count on a smile and a nod and often an enthusiastic hello from someone you pass by on the way to dinner or an event. The only complaints that you hear regularly are about Trump, climate change and his assault on our democracy.

In this post I am going to break the code of silence regarding health issues and tell you about a recent health scare I had, which I have not breathed a word about to anyone at Collington to avoid breaking what appears to be an unwritten code of silence about such matters. About six months ago I was diagnosed with high blood pressure, which I explained to the doctor was a direct response to Trump and the discomfort he is causing to so many. For the past several months the doctors at Kaiser have been tinkering with the dosage of three new   blood pressure meds, which have resulted in readings both significantly above normal ( 180-200 systolic instead of 110-120) or way too low (60-80 systolic). Progress is being made, but so far they have not figured out the right mix that allows me to maintain a consistent relatively normal blood pressure. The most recent challenge has been that the pressure has been on the low side, which is good since it does not signal that I am not on the verge of a stroke but bad because it causes dizziness and could cause me to pass out resulting in a head injury. But, hey, this is just part of the aging process, and the good thing is that doctors have a lot more to work with using medications which were not available for my father who had his first (of several) strokes when he was about my age.

My turn came last Sunday, June 22, when walking to the Kennedy Warren, our old digs, following lunch after church with a fellow parishioner at All Souls. I was in search of a cool place where I could lie down for a couple of hours while Embry worked on stuff to close down her stint as senior warden. The temperature was close to 100 with heavy humidity and a blazing sun. I had not walked more than a dozen steps from the restaurant when I had to pause to keep on my feet, then another dozen steps and more dizziness. I took a deep breath and told myself I could make it through the zoo crowd the next 50 yards to the top of the hill and the entrance to the zoo where I thought I might be able to find a bench in the shade. I got about halfway to the top of the hill when I became very dizzy. At the very moment when the world was spinning around me and I could feel that I was going to pass out, two friends from the Kennedy Warren suddenly appeared before me on the crowded sidewalk, a retired family doctor and his wife, a retired nurse. He grabbed me under one shoulder and his wife under the other, and they guided me up the hill and then toward the Kennedy Warren as we nudged our way between the sweltering zoo goers. With great difficulty we made it to the lounge area in the cool lobby of the K-W where they sat me down on a comfortable couch. My doctor friend excused himself while his wife encouraged me to rest and stay calm. Minutes later he returned with a huge bottle of Gator Aid and a portable blood pressure device (like the one I have at Collington to measure my blood pressure several times a day), and after reading the numbers exclaimed in a panic that he was dialing 911. My systolic blood pressure reading was in the low sixties, a miracle, he said, that I had not passed out. But I surely would have if he and his wife had not come along at exactly that moment. The 911 operator asked what insurance I had and then passed the call off to the “emergency nurse” at Kaiser, who directed me to go to the nearest Kaiser Urgent Care Center. He offered to call a Lyft at their expense and promised that we would be first in line when we arrived. The Lyft ride did not show up, but my friend ordered an Uber, which he paid for, and drove both of us to the Kaiser Capitol Hill Urgent Care Center, about a 30 minute drive. As promised, we were first in line, got to see the urgent care nurse and then a very sharp doctor within minutes where they gave me more Gator Aid and cold water, checked my blood pressure and vital signs, with my friend by my side, monitoring every move and providing encouragement.  After a few minutes my blood pressure was up to close to 100 and in about a half hour, I was rested and was free to leave. He adjusted the prescription, called for a new one for me to pick up at the pharmacy before we left, and made an appointment for me with my primary care physician for early the next week. Embry picked us up in front of the Kaiser office, and we dropped my friend off and headed home. Dodged another bullet, as they say. My guess is that most of my fellow residents at Collington have dodged their share of bullets.

Now how lucky was that! Just as I was about to pass out on a crowded sidewalk leading to the zoo, along come two people I knew—a retired doctor and retired nurse—who knew instantly that I was in serious trouble and knew exactly what to do. What would have happened if I had passed out? What were the chances of hitting my head on the sidewalk? What were the odds of this miraculous rescue happening at this time and in this place?

As Embry drove me home, I remembered reading a line from (I think) A Gentlemen in Moscow which said that “a coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.”

 

 

 

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How afraid should we be at this moment? Let me count the ways:

Trump is going all out on ridding the country of undocumented immigrants. The needless pain and suffering he is causing is beyond the pale. There are all sorts of stories of kids five or six years old or younger whose parents were ripped out of the car by masked ICE workers fully armed leaving the kids alone and abandoned. Trump has taken control of the California National Guard and ordered  the marines to energize immigrant arrests and expulsions. While Los Angeles is getting hit the hardest, Trump has warned that this is just the beginning. No city is safe. Blue cities and blue states are next, and sanctuary cities are top on the list. Due process  is being  ignored and will continue to be ignored  as long as Trump can get away with it.  Top aid Stephen  Miller just announced that by the end of the year, one million undocumented immigrants will have been deported, and hinted that by the end of Trump’s  second presidential term they all will be gone. Friends, there are between 12 and 13 million undocumented people living in the U.S. They make up over five percent of the population and a considerably higher percent of the work force. Industries like construction, hospitality, agriculture, long term care, restaurants, landscaping, and many others on depend on them. They do the heavy lifting no one else wants to do. Not only is this unbearably cruel. It is stupid, will harm the U.S. economy, and will cost billions.

Israel has just bombed Iran in the most lethal bombing yet. Iran is retaliating. Many believe that this could quickly get out of hand leading to a regional war or worse. Trump is doing nothing for now. We could get drawn into this and do not know where it will lead, yet our diplomatic acumen is a thing of the past.

The war in Ukraine lingers on with more drones killing people in major Ukrainian cities and also in Russia. There have been over a million deaths and casualties on the Russian side, fewer on the Ukrainian side, but a higher percentage of the population. There is no end in sight. Russia has more nuclear weapons than any country including  the U.S. (which has close to the same number, just over 5,000). What are the chances that one mistake or miscalculation could lead to a nuclear holocaust?

The U.S. has given NATO the middle finger and told them in so many words that what is happening in Ukraine is their problem, not ours. Putin and Kim Jon Ung continue to be Trump’s buddies.

The largest military parade in U.S. history—with 7,000 soldiers, dozens of massive tanks and missiles, planes, helicopters and paratroopers)  will happen today, Saturday, June 14, celebrating Trump’s 75^th birthday (and, yes, the army’s 250th anniversary, but really does anyone think that this is a coincidence?). Trump has threatened dire consequences to anyone who protests.

The war in Gaza continues every day with body counts of innocent victims whose bodies are beneath the rubble of yet another building destroyed. And for what reason? Aid trucks are still on most days stalled at the border. Trump’s solution? Move them all out and build towering casino’s and hotels along with another Trump golf course and resort.

The health care system is now led by a nut case who does not believe in vaccines and has replaced  all the experts in the public health leadership team with people who agree with him.

Thousands of federal workers have been arbitrarily laid off by “genius” Elon Musk and a bunch of whiz kid, tech DOGE bros for no apparent reason except to limit the size of the federal  government and to cut costs including  aid to poor countries. If this stays in place, thousands will die. Many are already dying, and the desperate pleas for help you see on television news are heart breaking.

While it is becoming apparent that maybe extreme tariffs are not the smartest thing for the U.S. or the world economy, there is no assurance that the TACO President (“Trump always chickens out.”) will back off before scarcities of goods start to happen, U.S. businesses fail, and prices skyrocket.

Trump is doing everything he can to cut every environmental regulation he can and reenergize the fossil fuel industry.

Government programs like SNAP, the Affordable Care Act, and Medicaid are all on the chopping block in Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” and Medicare and Social Security are likely to follow.

The billionaire class is about to get the biggest tax break ever, resulting in massive federal operating deficits and adding between  three and five trillion dollars to the national debt, a  dire situation which no reputable economist in the country believes is sustainable. Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill if it becomes law will result in the largest transfer of money and wealth from the poor to the rich in the history of the Republic.

And Trump has declared war on higher education, withdrawing financial support from major colleges and universities, threatening to bring them to their knees. He has also gone after major law firms, most of which have caved and agreed to his bidding for free.

Watching over this is a morally and intellectually bankrupt Republican Party, which when the Boss says jump, responds with “how high.” And they are the ones who have the majorities in both the House and the Senate.

Few guardrails are left. The adults in the room during Trump’s first term are out and a group of sycophants and extremists are in with Trump’s cabinet labeled by many as the worst of all time.

What have I missed?

Oh, yes, Trump’s war on all things DEI and his overt racism.

The question is whether there is a silver lining. The courts appear to be (for now) the only hope we have for softening the blows, but six of the nine justices are Republican presidential  appointees, including three by Trump. The only two who might save us from catastrophe are Barrett and Roberts. Pray that they will save us. But will Trump obey a Supreme Court order he does not like? If he doesn’t, then the American experiment is over.

But there are signs of hope. Trump’s popularity is plummeting in recent polls. Massive demonstrations will happen in all 50 states today,  Saturday, June 14, proclaimed  “No Kings Day.” People are speaking out. Newsome’s resistance and comments are inspiring.  Despite the apparent disarray of the Democratic Party and its gerontocracy, people are starting to step up. Younger, fresher faces are emerging.

And most of all, we are not bad people in America. Yes, we are a nation in turmoil and discontent (much of which is due to social and economic inequalities), but there are many people who want to do the right thing and there are many MAGAs who must be beginning to realize that they have been sold a bill of goods. Trump has pulled the country’s biggest bait and switch. For now the courts have not caved, and in only a year and a half there will be new elections for Congress. A court ordered Trump to turn over control of the California National Guard to Newsome. There is hope. But it is likely to be a rough ride and could get worse, much worse, before it gets better.

So yes. We are inching closer to the abyss but it does not have to end that way. Fasten your seatbelts and fight the good fight. But keep it nonviolent. This worked in the Civil Rights Movement. It can work again.

 

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On June 3 The New York Times podcast, “The Daily” featured an interview with New York Times  political correspondent, Shane Goldmacher, who had just completed a voting analysis of how every county in the country voted in the last three presidential elections. Boy, was this an eye opener! The shift in voting behavior in this election was staggering. In counties where there were significant numbers of low income and working class people, Trump made huge gains—and not just from white working class voters. More African Americans and Latinos also voted for Trump and switched their votes in large numbers from Democratic to Republican. His conclusion: In 2024 the Republican Party became the party of the working class in America due to the charisma of Donald Trump and his message trashing the Democrats as elitist. Goldmacher’s message was this: Trump owes his victory in large part to this switch in voting behavior and since there are more moderate income and working class voters in presidential elections than there are professionals, intellectuals, and highly educated people, if the Democrats have any hope of recovering, they must reclaim their former role as the party of the working class.

I was not surprised about the white working class, but African Americans, Latinos, and others with moderate incomes? I was shocked. What are those who switched their votes to Trump thinking? What do they see in Trump?

Trump, of course, is a fraud. However, he also has talent in marketing and communicating, saw an opening and pounced on it. He sensed the anger and despair so many feel who live from paycheck to paycheck. His message of revenge and retribution resonated with many who are struggling and the Democrats allowed him to get away with the Big Lie that he and only he will right the wrongs that ail America’s working class.

I am hopeful that it will soon become obvious to many people  who voted for him that fundamentally his polices overwhelmingly favor the rich and the superrich, not the working class. He has tossed them a few crumbs like no taxes on tips or overtime work, but the thrust of the Trump/ Republican budget bill now being debated is a huge giveaway to the ultrarich, partially paid for with cuts to programs which help those with modest incomes—Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), the ACA, and affordable housing subsidies. In addition, Trump’s tariffs, the huge increase in the national debt due to tax breaks for the megarich and his trade wars will result in higher prices across the board along with higher interest rates, hurting lower income Americans the most. This is classic Bait and Switch 101.

Surely, when you lose your health care, your food stamps, and your rents go up and when the prices of essentials at the grocery store start to skyrocket, you are likely to ask the question, is this really what I voted for. It is only a matter of time. But how long will it take? And how much damage will have been done? Recent polls indicate that Latino converts are already having second thoughts as they see their neighbors handcuffed and carted away.

At this point it is not clear what will emerge out of the Senate. Trump can only lose three votes, and of the five or six Republican Senators who say they will not vote for the bill that came out of the House, it appears to be split down the middle between those who are against the cuts to Medicaid and SNAP and those who demand more cuts to social programs which help the working class in order to lower the deficit. How this ultimately works out is “to be continued,” but already there is pushback from Latinos who are terrified by the deportations and by others who depend on the social programs for survival. Good luck, Republicans, on keeping the new working class voters who helped elect you and Trump in 2024. So there is hope for the Democrats, but this  won’t happen until  the midterm elections in 2026 and lots of damage will have been done before the Democrats can regain control of the House.

 

 

 

 

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Turning back from life at Collington to the news we routinely read about or see on television ….

Every day it seems there is a new revelation of a Trump atrocity or excess. This week it was about all the money he and his family have made the past year, most of it after he was inaugurated—a net worth increase to the tune of $2.9 billion, according to Forbes (April 2025)—and we are now only at the beginning of his second term. Trump casinos, Trump championship golf courses, and Trump high rise luxury hotels seem to be on the drawing boards all over the planet, and there appears to be no end in sight. The new “Executive Branch” in Georgetown, a club just started by his oldest son, which hints of special access to the President for a mere $500,000 membership fee, is reportedly already a hot ticket item, and Trump’s bit coin business is booming. And having your own personal, multibillion dollar, luxury jumbo jet, compliments of Qatar, is shrugged off by the President as nothing unusual.  Nor has there been a peep of outrage among members of the Grand Old Party, which in days of yore has stood for good government, anti corruption, and fiscal responsibility. Fearing being “primaried out” by MAGA extremist candidates financed by Elon Musk and other billionaires, formerly moderate Republican senators and congressmen have caved.  Using Trump’s words, “The world has never seen anything like it.”

No, we haven’t.

The excesses, grifting, and pay-to-play Trump kleptocracy are not the worst of his presidency. There are more, even worse, disasters. The first is the Trump/House FY 2026 budget, fueled by more tax breaks for the rich, which if it becomes law or anything even close to its current form, will result in an increase in the deficit of the United States of between $4 and $5 trillion according to the CBO. No economist with a brain thinks that these horrendous deficits are sustainable. The deficits—due mainly to more tax cuts for the wealthy— will eventually bring us down.

Then there is the needless harm and cruelty inflicted on so many people both in the U.S. and abroad. Embry has been counseling on the phone people laid off from USAID and who live all over the world. These are good, hardworking people, people who were making a difference. A majority are not Americans. Few have any real options for a job that is anywhere near what they had at USAID. And what about all the millions of people that these programs were helping? Estimates are that thousands will die due to the AID money termination. Add to that the thousands of other federal workers and government contractors whose jobs have been eliminated.

Next is the harm caused by his targeting immigrants and the poor. We are very good friends with one undocumented immigrant family, who is terrified as are most of their undocumented friends fearing that knock on the door or the call into the office of their supervisor who has an ICE official standing beside him with a weapon in his hand. There are an estimated 12-13 million of these people in the United States. Trump has pledged to  rid the country of immigrants, an action which will destroy lives,  cost many billions of dollars to accomplish, and hurt the US economy.

What about the children, the poor, the elderly, and the disabled on Medicaid?  What will happen to them when Medicaid is crippled and the ACA subsidies vanish? How many rural and inner city hospitals, which depend on those subsidies to keep their doors open, will be forced  to shut down? What will happen to all the establishments that hire undocumented workers to do the work that no one else wants to do? To the farmers who depend on these workers to harvest the crops, to the restaurants, the hospitals, the landscaping and construction firms?

What about the millions of children who depend on SNAP ( food stamps) for a decent daily meal?

What about the tariffs, which economists tell us will surely cause inflation if enacted. Many economists believe it could throw world economies into chaos. And the attack on higher education and elite research universities? Where will this end?

This is insanity. It is as if some alien creature somehow clawed his way into the White House in the middle of the night while no one was looking. But we were looking. Our country voted for this guy. How did this happen and how do we claw our way out of this morass?

I suggest there are several reasons for Trump’s reelection:

The first is what I call “The Era of Great Discontent” caused by the increasing gap between the haves and the have nots in our country. Starting in the 1980s the income gap began to widen due to changes in the tax laws favoring the wealthy, diminished power of labor unions, technology causing disruption in the job market, and the exodus of American manufacturing to lower cost countries. A lot of people in the country are struggling paycheck to paycheck and are not happy campers. Many of these people are in the working class, or are people without a college degree. The average worker made more money (adjusted for inflation) in 1980 than he or she did in 2024. A CEO of a typical major corporation in 1980 made about 30 times the income of an average worker in that person’s company. In 2024 the number was over 300 times as much. The likes of Warren Buffet pay a lower tax rate than his secretary. Trump realized this malaise and anger and made a faux populist pitch that if elected he would be their president and right the ship that the Democrats sunk. This message resonated, even though it was a blatant lie that the Democrats were solely responsible for this. While the changes happened under both Democratic and Republic presidents, the tax cuts for the ultrarich and major corporations have been championed by the Republicans, not the Democrats, and are a major factor.

The second cause are  missteps made by Democrats. Over the last several decades the base of the Democratic Party has morphed from the working class to the “educated class.” There are lots of reasons for this –some related to the progressive thinking of people with college degrees and their (our) increased awareness of lingering racism. Whether fair or not, racism became associated mainly with working class white people. College educated, white people were perceived by many in the working class as snobs and elitists, who dissed those whom they considered racist and beneath them. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion was perceived by many in the working class as rubbing salt in the wounds of people who themselves were struggling. Shame on the Democrats for allowing Trump to get away  with proclaiming that now the Republicans are the working class party.

The third is “un-leveling” the playing field. Big money and gerrymandering are not limited to Republicans. Both parties are guilty. Yet the dark money in politics favors the Republicans. There is something basically wrong with our system when the likes of Elon Musk, Peter Thiel and other tech bros and billionaires can tip elections to right wing extremists by spending millions of dollars in races at every level they consider important.

And finally–and perhaps most important– we come to the age and health of Joe Biden. While he accomplished a lot in his first term, does anyone think (now) that he should have run for a second term? He pledged early on that he wouldn’t and clearly did not have the mental capacity or acuity to take on another four years. If he had announced at the midterms that he would not be running, there would have been time for a legitimate Democratic primary. I am an admirer of Kamala Harris but given the hand she was dealt and the limited time she had to win over a divided nation, the deck was stacked against her. It is remarkable that she did as well as she did.

So here we are, facing what could be the greatest crisis in the U.S. since World War II, not knowing how we will maneuver through these troubled waters or how our nation will recover. Stay tuned. And feel free to weigh in now in the comments section with ideas as to how we get out of this mess. That will be the subject of my next blog post.

 

 

 

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I have gotten questions from several friends asking for more information as to why we moved to a retirement community, specifically a “continuing care retirement community” or CCRC, and how it is working out for us so far after a couple of months.

Here is my answer:

Last time I checked, we Homo sapiens—like all life on the planet Earth–have a beginning and an end. On average in the United States our allotted life spans are around 75 years though factors such as income, education, genes, race, gender, lifestyle, and luck affect the outcomes. It is also a fact of life that as we get older, we can’t do many of the things we used to be able to do. For some this is physical and for others it is mental, but we all slow down. And we all die. And there is great variety in how the checking out process works. For some it could be fast and quick like a heart attack or stroke. For others it could be a long, slow, and often painful slog. A continuing care retirement community provides one option that tries to make the most of the remaining years we humans have left by providing a support structure that allows people to get through the aging and checking out process, minimizing the pain and suffering that often accompanies it, along with enriching the time we have left. I call it squeezing the last drops out of the lemon.

The definition of a continuing care retirement community or CCRC (now also called a Life Plan community) is a senior living community that offers a continuum of living/care options under one roof or on the same campus—independent living, assisted living, and long term care. The concept, however, has evolved over time. When it was first “invented” in the early 1950s, it was called “life care” (started by the Pacific Homes of the Northwest, a Methodist group in California, followed soon after in Philadelphia by several Quaker life care communities), there were only two levels– independent living and long term care–but this has changed over the years due to government regulations  and a better understanding of the aging process. Long term nursing care, for example, has morphed into rehab due mainly to Medicare reimbursement regulations, which provide government financial support for up to 90 days for seniors coming out of the hospital. Also, in the early 1980s when it became evident that people who were in the natural aging process did not benefit from being in nursing homes with a hospital-like setting, assisted living emerged and became a popular alternative to the traditional nursing home. In addition, in the 1990s when it became evident that people who were physically in need of support did not mix well with people with dementia, the concept of “memory care” was invented. So today what distinguishes a CCRC from other retirement options like a Sunrise or other assisted living or residential senior living communities is providing a continuum of living options under one roof or on one campus—independent living, assisted living, memory care, and skilled nursing care, now often relabeled rehab. Some communities provide three levels of living/care on site with access to skilled care/rehab offsite, though monitored by the community. Collington falls into this category with arrangements with nearby private rehab facilities, where residents stay for up to 90 days following a hospitalization before returning to Collington. The concept of having the full support system in place distinguishes a CCRC from other options like assisted living or service enriched, independent living, senior living communities. Collington also has on site a full service geriatric medical practice, which is part of the Medstar system.

Most CCRCs require both an upfront fee called an entrance fee and a monthly fee which is adjusted annually based on the cost of providing services and care. There are all sorts of options regarding how  entrance fees work. The early entrance fees (called “founders fees”) were amortized over a five year period so that if you died after that period your estate did not receive a refund. Due to the high cost involved in developing, financing, and operating a CCRC, the entrance fees have increased considerably though the higher fees usually have a refund provision, refunding up to 90% of the initial amount.  Also, in some CCRCs (“Type A” communities), the monthly fee does not increase significantly  when you relocate to a higher level of care. There are also CCRCs which are coops or condos. These communities all provide meals, housekeeping, lots of activities, and scheduled transportation. (Usually, the cost of a daily dinner is included in the monthly fee as are the costs of these services.) The vast majority of CCRCs, like Collington, are not-for-profit communities.

Because of the high cost of developing and operating these communities (which are passed off to residents), the resident populations tend to be relatively well off financially, but certainly everyone is not rich. At Collington because of the wide range of living accommodations, there is a wide range of prices of entrance and monthly fees, and the Collington population seems to me to be, for the most part, solidly middle class–and also highly educated. Collington has a large library with several shelves displaying books by current residents and another entire section for books by former residents. (I proudly placed a copy of Hard Living on Clay Street and Civil Rights Journey in the current resident author section.)

The preferred retirement option for most people, of course, is remaining in their own homes. Moving is extremely stressful and costs money, and most people do not want to leave familiar neighborhoods where many old friends remain. The senior village movement got started a few decades ago to help seniors remain in their homes, and local senior villages provide activities, transportation, and fellowship for seniors. Some CCRCs now even offer “life care at home.” Most people will slog it out and take their chances, bringing in home health care aides or getting help from their children if they need it. While sticking it out is the option that most people follow, however, it often fails to address the challenges of loneliness and isolation; and if you need in-home care from aides, it can be extremely expensive though long term care insurance provides some cushion on the cost issue.

There is no silver bullet or right way or wrong way to manage the aging process, and there are pros and cons with all the options. Ironically, Embry was the prime motivator for our moving to Collington rather than me, even though I was the one with professional senior living experience. I think that the thought of having to take care of a cranky, aging old husband in a small apartment was too much for her, and she was right.

What struck me immediately upon moving to Collington was how many really old people there are here. Well, duh. It figures. Collington is approaching its 40^th anniversary, and someone moving in in 1986 at age 75 would be approaching 115 in 2025. While Collington does have some people over 100, a whole lot of people are  in their mid 80s to mid 90s. Since new residents coming in are typically in their late 70s, there are really two generations of old folks living here. Also, like all CCRCs, the vast majority are single, older women. Another “duh.” Men in the U.S. typically marry younger women, and women outlive men. That is just the way it is.  I was surprised by my initial reactions when I ventured into the community center and entered the main dining room the first time and looked around seeing so many people using walkers and canes, and some in wheelchairs. “Oh, my goodness,” I thought, “These people are really, really old! I am not one of them! I don’t belong here. I am too young.”

Then I heard the voice of the better angle in my brain, “Yes, you do, Joe. You are 83. You may not be as old as some, but you will be in a few years, if you are lucky, and by the way, you too now use a walking stick.”

Shame on me! Plus, over the two months we have lived here, I continue to be impressed with the energy, determination, wisdom, community engagement, and cheerfulness of those using walkers or are in wheelchairs–and others who are considerably older than me. They are an inspiration.

And yes, in a community this large with over 350 old folks, you are constantly reminded of the fact that our lives on the Earth are limited. There is a display area that posts every week or so the names and photographs of people who have recently passed away, and there are memorial services that regularly happen. But people take this in stride, and out of this I think comes a wisdom of how short, yet how miraculous life is, and how blessed the survivors are–those who have lived long enough to be in a CCRC– to have had our short time on this small, blue planet in a vast universe containing trillions of galaxies.

 

More to follow ….

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