Did you hear what I said you know.
Just be the best that Orion I said down not off it doesn't have to be so long.
You know your grandfather just can't stand the oyster.
But ensuring in Amiens you said yourself.
I didn't turn on yesterday the want you to a subject to get
to I never watched cowboy pictures no more post for employers living here
when you have become a applying. Don't you love your grandfather. I love him.
Alright but it's no fun here anymore. Bobby's right.
Jim I didn't hear you coming
and that's because I came in on tiptoes.
Old houses on tiptoe.
But Jim it's just that he's not well right now I know he's not well.
But this isn't his home.
It's Bobby's home
and it's Dorothy's home because he's sick they can't live here Jim please don't
hear you. Alice this is no good.
That we're losing our kids because I don't the man has come to live with us.
But he's my father. He's an old man.
It's all right. Dad I won't make any noise. It isn't all right.
I want you to make noise. What's growing up without making noise.
I'm left this is a house for our children not for I don't make him.
Please not so loud.
He can't stand it when it's loud and he can't stand the radio when it's loud
and he can't stand T.V.
when It's loud or
when you saw my recording it was always going to.
Don't you want to
buy him a place to live
a
merry
old age is memories enclosed in four walls.
But today has little nourishment
and meager appetite for are
old old age is sitting on a bench
and watching life starting by
old age is a lonely meal behind a plate glass window a window
that looked out upon a busy world
that somehow never took old age into its reckoning made the steps to steep
the curves to the face to see.
And it separates usefulness from old age by the hard sharp line of a single day.
There are two basic needs that time puts upon us something to do.
And a place to live.
Some are lucky through the continuing of their life's work.
They cross the line into old age with scarcely an interruption for them.
The thread of life continues unbroken to its am
but they are the few in the fortunate most by far passed over the threshold into
old age into a new world of which they are only dimly aware.
Uncertain and unprepared.
They're confronted as though for the first time by life's demands.
What will you do here where we live.
How will you spend your days. Imperative questions demanding answers.
And the answers are hard to come by
but there may be within the community those with training
and experience who can point the way.
So we thought we'd ask you this question must come up in lots of families so maybe
you can help us. Can I ask my question should I call him my husband right
when he said that having my father live with us is unfair to our children
and to him. You're asking me to be the judge.
That. We talk to.
Yes I guess you might call it that then we'll let you decide.
And I'm glad you feel that way but remember I'm not here is a judge.
I can tell you what our experience has been what some of the solutions are
but then you have to make up your own mind. All right.
But there's something I must know.
What's best for my children and my husband and what's best for my father.
What's best for my father is a question repeated a thousand times over in many
rooms like this by many people.
Sons and daughters who would be good children and would be good parents.
And who can find no single time to travel where they can be both.
What's best for my father.
What are the needs of a proud human being who comes to live in his children's home
disarranging the orderly in the stablished pattern of family life.
What about a room privacy a place to live when there is no room to spare.
What about food the preparation required by a special diet
when appetites weighed on the needs of the aging.
What about special care with nursing which you can't afford to pay for
and time you can't afford to give except at the expense of home
and family
but about communication between the young and the old they live together
but have no common language for no effort has been made to bridge the chasm between
the world of the aged and the world of the.
Young Brother is this distance wide when there is no work no responsibilities.
No reason for life for a human being whose years have been filled with work
and responsibility but what can be done for this man.
Where can he find the answer to his needs.
I wish there was some simple answer I can give you there isn't people don't come in
category least of all old people. Have you talked about this with you.
We haven't talked about it too much since mother died he hadn't been to well we
haven't talked about it with him at all.
Well our said could we take him in with us for a while till we can work something
out
that was about eight months ago you said that's right that's been getting worse every
day now. I know what fibro and why should it be.
She waits on him and him for fine for him a respected
and loved parent a worker who lived a fruitful and useful life and now finds
that life has no further use for him in a world where so much is being done
is have nothing to do.
Sorry old man. This is nothing new. These alone in a crowded street and two.
He's alone at home with only ghosts and memories as dependable companions.
But memories are poor company and even television needs to be shared.
So to those he loves is the problem.
And for both there is guilt as well as pain.
Right now he is not well he he needs help.
That's what I that's problems up the whole works.
You need something we can't afford to give him.
It's just not fair to your to the children or to dad.
What else can we do but sometimes given time
and good will these situations can be worked out within the family
when they can't the old person is just as on happy about it as his children in your
case your father's illness may make living with you on the rise for everybody.
That is it's going to cause too much friction. If it entails sacrifice necessary.
Perhaps so I'm reasonable. Does that to him live her that's our right side.
I know how you both feel is there any other member of your family someplace where
there are growing children perhaps you know I have a younger sister
but key couldn't her husband's in the Navy a career man any others maybe you have
some cousins who might why should they need you could contribute to the expenses of
the household sometimes I really hate
that I look there's one thing we've been shying away from
and I think we ought to bring it out in the US I can stand.
I was honey this is something we have to say you know
but maybe it isn't as bad as you think you are talking about a place beyond father
to live. I'm talking about our home and old people's homes.
It's even for you to talk to you my father is in the prison
that he's going to one of these places really so bad the picture is a great deal
brighter than it used to be that's of course it is like living in one's own home in
most cases an enlightened community can provide the kind of housing
that enables them to live independently.
But it's true that some older people need the protected environment
and train care that a home for the aged can get here they are.
Can start a new and satisfying life
and even establish healthier relations with their children.
There are some very good homes
that could provide a happy solution feel for them in your family.
He might be the first to agree. These homes within our means.
Oh yes their average income home.
Of course now days that means social security pension funds insurance
and also some community support but there are very few good homes
and they all have long waiting lists for some starch them.
Thank you ever be enough to go around public indifference for one thing.
Far too many people still seem unaware of the fact
that there is such a thing as Old Age community attitudes for another attitudes of
people like you Mrs Allen who shrink from what is probably the best solution for
some older people those who for one reason
or another need help particularly trained help very sought it.
My father would go. And I could make him.
One kind of a place.
Kind of place could be a place
that could make the difference between these eyes
and these between proximity you
and companionship between useless withering hand in the hands
that are both you school and need to put magic places this
that can take the wound and stated fabric of a life
and we bore it a strong new client with threads of them being useful.
What kind of place could it be here within the confines of this pleasant well
appearing house are the ingredients.
That impart to those who live here a sense of pride in where they live
and to its location close to a good community and neighbors them to come
and go as they please with easy communication among friends
and family the pleasant dairy rooms are clean
and comfortably appointed with a small
but essentially radiance of well being a bright world to look out on a radio
or television set linens but of fresh
and clean ample drawers space
and the pleasure of a good bed.
There are single rooms for those to whom privacy equates with personal dignity
and double rooms for married couples or where two in a room is desirable.
They are at home here living out their lives together with the special types of
care they need for their physical well being themselves
and burdening no one.
Old age may be memories enclosed in four walls
or it may be a zest for living this day with eyes fixed eagerly
and confidently on all the days
that lie ahead in such a place.
Little things too are important things like easy access to the telephone
unsupervised use of their own spending and the assurance that mail is received
and forwarded on the open they boast of the spirit
and ease the hour by hour round of everyday living how comforting
to know that special diet problems are in good hands and
that one is relieved of the worry and planning in preparation for that.
Eating is no longer a lonely hour.
But a time of pleasant association dining with friends and companions.
But there are skills and facilities here to care for the infirmities
that ages a lot of
that ninety year old arms are still worth fussing over with a friendly
and competent person interested
and happy to do the job ills of the body are an expect about
part of growing old
and such a place is this they are not allowed to infect the spirit
and the mind as well there are dozens of small
apes for slowing steps for sagging strength
that say more tellingly the words you are important to.
Is a world for the old as well as for the young
here in the living room one can proudly welcome one's family gone other feelings of
guilt and pain because of dependence and lack of self-reliance.
Now there's pride in one's children and grandchildren.
There's respect and love emerging from a new
and better relationship with age
to come increasing needs of the Spirit.
So within this home there is a place for prayer and meditation.
So do we begin to answer the needs that time but spawns a place to live.
And something to do nothing.
So burdensome
that it puts unfair demands on the sometimes limited capacities of age
but rather a chance to work in a group.
And enjoy the companionship
that comes from working living together a useful absorbing
occupation
that is carried on at one's own pace creative things useful things to
keep mentors no less engrossing at eighty than it is at eight.
In such a place recreation is a part of life not merely a substitute for it as it
is so often among older people playtime assumes its normal patterns across a chess
board.
On a card table
or over a player's shoulder
and on the light fantastic may have lost some of its lightness.
It has lost none of the Gayatri exhilaration and sense of wellbeing
that it brings with
small wonder that personal appearance has its proud place
and is no less meaningful of an era silver than
when it was gold in such a place as this there is trained
and integrated personnel.
Professions and skill and experience staff or consultant.
Each with
but one overriding concern the well being of each resident in the home
and to those residents here is both evidence and assurance
that old age can be a valued period of life rich in its possibilities worthy of
society's best care protection plan.
The grounds of the home are almost beyond the brazing so essential are they to
one's peace of mind the sense of a bond with the living world.
Even to walk out on your own grounds for an hour of sun is the difference between
being a part of life and being walled in awaiting death.
The peace of Earth can add infinite dimension
important to is
that within this thriving community of old people they have often a governing body
of their own elected representatives truly a body of elder statesmen
and stateswomen proud of their position worthy of their responsibilities.
So does the face of age reflect the world we make for so can we see in their eyes
the love and security the occupation and companionship
but to be found in a home like this there are many old people here varied in the
needs different from one another as all people are different.
Some are golden years only. Some are failing in mind and body.
But it may be that here in the course of years. Are you.
And it takes ingredients of many kinds to make a home for us all.
It takes the kind of planning and preparation
that is possible only in a community that's conditioned to it
and whose old people are conditioned to accept it when the need arises.
You don't acquire that kind of conditioning overnight.
Just because the calendar says you're great sixty five
or some other arbitrary age you have to start working on it. Many years before.
Yes I can see that in other words.
Dad should have thought about this conduct something about it when he was our age.
That's right. He should. And now may I ask you a question.
What are you doing about it. What are we doing about it.
How can we prepare for all our years for our children.
There's the assurance of a good start up a score of years of happy constructive you
all given them by a society.
Well aware of the importance of such a beginning
but there is movement there is another need.
There is the promise of the rich improve food all day the knowledge
that the last twenty years the gift of modern medicine
and science need not be spent alone unwanted useless.
Indeed the span of life is poorly built.
If it does not soundly reach to the far shore to
move
forward with who's.
Moving in the
mood
to who's more in the news with
poor
whose home during
war.