I just lost my Mom, at 97. We would go to lunch on Tuesday and then grocery shopping. She'd talk of the family and where they all were and what they were doing - it was MY day to catch up.
The last Tuesday we got back and she said "That was too hard. I think that was the last one." I agreed, and thought I'd call her next tuesday just the same and see if she'd changed her mind. But there was no 'next tuesday'.
Anyway, life is a gift and I miss her and Tuesday doesn't come but I feel the gap.
After my mother passed, I found an old essay talking about when her father (my grandfather) passed. She wrote that the last time we saw him, he seemed to know something was up, and then died that night.
My other grandfather figured it out after a blood test determined that he only had a few days left. His kids (including my dad) weren't going to tell him. He was 102 and otherwise healthy. Then, he wheeled himself across the nursing home into the meeting with the social worker, and announced the funeral home, church, and cemetery that his arrangements were with. He had such a big smile too. He "won" and couldn't ask for anything more.
The article states that a raising amount of people in the US still work, albeit their age and it feels a little strange to me. Ginny, probably got so old because she was working and had a purpose every day. Being 100 and still capable of working is a blessing
Many old people do valuable work even though they are not in the workforce. They are the backbone of many voluntary organizations, they are often the backbone of their apartment complex taking on janitorial work and administrative work, they are baby sitters, home work assistants, they taken on small jobs no one else want to like election clerks and exam monitors. Some start up a small business so the community can get access to their expertise. One guy I know closed his musical instruments repair shop a few years ago, but started up again in smaller scale because there were no one else local to do the work.
growing number of Americans who extend their working days well past the typical retirement age as the cost of living in the US has soared, wages have stagnated and many therefore have been unable to save.
Calling this a blessing in the larger context is unconscionable. The USA is the richest country in the world. If someone needs to work into their 100s, it is a sign of failure from our political leaders.
Additionally, "working" and "having a purpose" should not be conflated like this. These are separate things.
> Being 100 and still capable of working is a blessing
A much under-appreciated blessing. At any age.
Over the past half-ish century, I've visited any number of elderly relatives and friends who were living in the US's long-term care facilities. However bright the decor, or kind the care staff - there is a very bleak "people whose ability to do anything useful has died, waiting for the rest of death" aura to them.
She must have had so many interesting stories to tell. Such an amazing experiences - born in the early 1920s, being a young adult at the beginning of the Second World War, seeing mass commercialization of air travel, flight to space, miniaturization and age of information. And she even caught beginnings of AI (or pseudo-AI).
She "picked" a good place to live and observe the flow of time and events where she directly wouldn't be affected by various negative events throughout the century of her life.
I’m generation X. My grandmother will be 97 in March. Her memory is actually really good. She gets frustrated when she’s talking about family and doesn’t recall a specific name of a great- or great-great-grandchild (With five generations alive at the same time, that’s a lot of names. I call my kids and my granddaughter the wrong name all the time - ah the human condition), but her mind is doing well.
Many times, I have mentioned how things have changed in the last century, how most of the things we make use of now were developed and refined in the last 100 years - industrial machinery, communications, computers …
There’s a simpleness to her experience. She is most definitely a beneficiary of society. She has lived comfortably without the need to understand how everything works; and hasn’t had the curiosity to question.
I’m not sure I have a point, but I do personally find it a little disappointing to have someone who lived through so much without having the ability to discuss it at depth.
Some people lived through amazing change. My grandmother was born in the late 1890s in rural Wales, and died at 95. She remembered electricity coming to her village and the visit of the first motor car, the arrival of radio and telephones. She saw men land on the moon and towards the end of her life went to the USA on a 747. Yet when she was a girl she lived with older farm workers who had never been more than ten miles from where they were born.
When my family moved to Somerset from London in the 1970s our elderly next-door neighbour, after hearing we'd moved from London, said "I went to Bristol [25 miles away] once. Didn't like it much." Apart from that he'd stayed in the town we'd moved to. I think about that a lot and sometimes envy his contentment in staying where he was - he had everything he needed.
My grandfather was born in the 1890s. He watched the first moon landing with us. He had tears in his eyes and said "when I was a boy I carried flint and steel to start a fire".
It's the senescence that makes the fall, more or less, inevitable. Warren Buffet wrote about it in his final letter to shareholders [1] : "When balance, sight, hearing and memory are all on a persistently downward slope, you know Father Time is in the neighborhood."
Yeah. My Grandmother lived a pretty long time but she had a boarder named Lillian who at 95 was still walking 2 or 3 miles to the store every day. One day her daughter gave her a lift and managed to get into a fairly minor accident. (My Dad claimed that the daughter was herself too old to be driving.)
Anyhow Lillian broke an ankle. Went to hospital. And there was some complication. And then another. And 2 weeks later she's passed away, never having gotten out of the hospital.
I think people - especially when you're old - are more like sharks then not. If you don't keep moving nothing good happens.
Lobsters are long-lived, they don't age (in the sense of slowly losing their fitness - senescence) and they only die when they grow too big and suffocate during moulting, or possibly catch some infection, or get killed by other animals/people.
I went looking for information on the oldest known lobster, and found this article about a 20lb lobster named George who was estimated to be 140 years old. Neat!
* I just pulled up a family video of several kids, mine, my siblings, friends, making commercial marbles for sale pulling glass from a furnace and rolling them on a bench, using optic moulds, canes for decoration, etc .. at the age of five.
Sure, we weren't running them like chimney sweeps or coal mine donkeys 24/7 - that's what they wanted to do for pocket money - make their own, how ever many, and sell them.
I just lost my Mom, at 97. We would go to lunch on Tuesday and then grocery shopping. She'd talk of the family and where they all were and what they were doing - it was MY day to catch up.
The last Tuesday we got back and she said "That was too hard. I think that was the last one." I agreed, and thought I'd call her next tuesday just the same and see if she'd changed her mind. But there was no 'next tuesday'.
Anyway, life is a gift and I miss her and Tuesday doesn't come but I feel the gap.
They seem to know.
After my mother passed, I found an old essay talking about when her father (my grandfather) passed. She wrote that the last time we saw him, he seemed to know something was up, and then died that night.
My other grandfather figured it out after a blood test determined that he only had a few days left. His kids (including my dad) weren't going to tell him. He was 102 and otherwise healthy. Then, he wheeled himself across the nursing home into the meeting with the social worker, and announced the funeral home, church, and cemetery that his arrangements were with. He had such a big smile too. He "won" and couldn't ask for anything more.
I'm so sorry.
[dead]
The article states that a raising amount of people in the US still work, albeit their age and it feels a little strange to me. Ginny, probably got so old because she was working and had a purpose every day. Being 100 and still capable of working is a blessing
Many old people do valuable work even though they are not in the workforce. They are the backbone of many voluntary organizations, they are often the backbone of their apartment complex taking on janitorial work and administrative work, they are baby sitters, home work assistants, they taken on small jobs no one else want to like election clerks and exam monitors. Some start up a small business so the community can get access to their expertise. One guy I know closed his musical instruments repair shop a few years ago, but started up again in smaller scale because there were no one else local to do the work.
growing number of Americans who extend their working days well past the typical retirement age as the cost of living in the US has soared, wages have stagnated and many therefore have been unable to save.
Calling this a blessing in the larger context is unconscionable. The USA is the richest country in the world. If someone needs to work into their 100s, it is a sign of failure from our political leaders.
Additionally, "working" and "having a purpose" should not be conflated like this. These are separate things.
> Being 100 and still capable of working is a blessing
A much under-appreciated blessing. At any age.
Over the past half-ish century, I've visited any number of elderly relatives and friends who were living in the US's long-term care facilities. However bright the decor, or kind the care staff - there is a very bleak "people whose ability to do anything useful has died, waiting for the rest of death" aura to them.
Over my life I have learned “you must be useful to be valued” and I’m desperately trying to unlearn it.
Reason one is that I should learn to chill out and relax.
Reason two is that I know old age will hit me very hard once I feel “useless” and I should prepare for that
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She must have had so many interesting stories to tell. Such an amazing experiences - born in the early 1920s, being a young adult at the beginning of the Second World War, seeing mass commercialization of air travel, flight to space, miniaturization and age of information. And she even caught beginnings of AI (or pseudo-AI).
She "picked" a good place to live and observe the flow of time and events where she directly wouldn't be affected by various negative events throughout the century of her life.
I’m generation X. My grandmother will be 97 in March. Her memory is actually really good. She gets frustrated when she’s talking about family and doesn’t recall a specific name of a great- or great-great-grandchild (With five generations alive at the same time, that’s a lot of names. I call my kids and my granddaughter the wrong name all the time - ah the human condition), but her mind is doing well.
Many times, I have mentioned how things have changed in the last century, how most of the things we make use of now were developed and refined in the last 100 years - industrial machinery, communications, computers …
There’s a simpleness to her experience. She is most definitely a beneficiary of society. She has lived comfortably without the need to understand how everything works; and hasn’t had the curiosity to question.
I’m not sure I have a point, but I do personally find it a little disappointing to have someone who lived through so much without having the ability to discuss it at depth.
Some people lived through amazing change. My grandmother was born in the late 1890s in rural Wales, and died at 95. She remembered electricity coming to her village and the visit of the first motor car, the arrival of radio and telephones. She saw men land on the moon and towards the end of her life went to the USA on a 747. Yet when she was a girl she lived with older farm workers who had never been more than ten miles from where they were born.
When my family moved to Somerset from London in the 1970s our elderly next-door neighbour, after hearing we'd moved from London, said "I went to Bristol [25 miles away] once. Didn't like it much." Apart from that he'd stayed in the town we'd moved to. I think about that a lot and sometimes envy his contentment in staying where he was - he had everything he needed.
2 replies →
My grandfather was born in the 1890s. He watched the first moon landing with us. He had tears in his eyes and said "when I was a boy I carried flint and steel to start a fire".
1 reply →
It always seems it's a fall that ends it, I wonder if she could have made 100 years on the water if she hadn't fell. What an inspiring life!
It's the senescence that makes the fall, more or less, inevitable. Warren Buffet wrote about it in his final letter to shareholders [1] : "When balance, sight, hearing and memory are all on a persistently downward slope, you know Father Time is in the neighborhood."
[1] - https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/news/nov1025.pdf
had to check. glad he's still among us as far as i can tell.
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It’s not the fall. It’s the enforced idleness afterwards.
Yeah. My Grandmother lived a pretty long time but she had a boarder named Lillian who at 95 was still walking 2 or 3 miles to the store every day. One day her daughter gave her a lift and managed to get into a fairly minor accident. (My Dad claimed that the daughter was herself too old to be driving.)
Anyhow Lillian broke an ankle. Went to hospital. And there was some complication. And then another. And 2 weeks later she's passed away, never having gotten out of the hospital.
I think people - especially when you're old - are more like sharks then not. If you don't keep moving nothing good happens.
I sometimes wonder if VR is ever successful, perhaps in the 2050s, some of the idleness will be less of an issue.
The lack of movement rather than rich stimulation might remain the issuem I look forward to a study if there hasn't been one yet.
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Old family wisdom - "People fall at every age. But getting back up gets harder every year, and the time comes when you can't."
So Long, and Thanks for All the... Lobster.
She is a proof women should not be excluded from hard physical labour! They can handle anything. It is just patriarchy holding then back!
Rugged individualism. Rest in peace, Queen.
Who else reading the headline thought it’s about 100 year old lobster that died?
Lol me too
I wonder if there is a lobster that survived her.
Lobsters are long-lived, they don't age (in the sense of slowly losing their fitness - senescence) and they only die when they grow too big and suffocate during moulting, or possibly catch some infection, or get killed by other animals/people.
A 105 y.o. lobster is plausible.
I went looking for information on the oldest known lobster, and found this article about a 20lb lobster named George who was estimated to be 140 years old. Neat!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_(lobster)
Early reports by European colonists in New England suggest some of the lobsters back then were far bigger than today.
It says she died at 105 and spent almost a century fishing for lobsters. I doubt she was catching many at the age of five.
* Fishing's not catching,
* I just pulled up a family video of several kids, mine, my siblings, friends, making commercial marbles for sale pulling glass from a furnace and rolling them on a bench, using optic moulds, canes for decoration, etc .. at the age of five.
Sure, we weren't running them like chimney sweeps or coal mine donkeys 24/7 - that's what they wanted to do for pocket money - make their own, how ever many, and sell them.
> Fishing's not catching
Sounds like something from an MLM seminar. "Telling's not selling!"
I doubt she was doing much in this direction until at least the age of eleven and even then...
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Presumably that's why they said "almost a century" and not just "a century".
She started working at the age of 8. Which we both know from reading the article.
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why is this news
It's an amazing feat worthy of sharing?