So many of my Boomer grandma friends refuse to read the AARP Bulletin. I find it fascinating and the information helpful to my life. Maybe my Boomer grandma friends just rely upon me to give them whatever information I find helpful in the Bulletin, or maybe just even picking up the Bulletin with the name American Association of Retired Persons makes them face the reality of our years. We ARE the forever young generation, in denial of our years.
For our grandchildren who may read this post, we also are the generation so great in numbers that our arrival in the first year of what has become known as the baby boomer generation, 1946, changed American life forever. We, as children, remember crowded classrooms, heavy competition in sports and trying to get into college, heavy competition in jobs and in life. I think we are called the Boomers because of the number of babies born. We arrived at the end of World War II, at a boom time in American life and culture. We created a boom time in American life and culture. All of that is why we should be called the Boomers!
We Boomers are the survivors of the Cold War as children, with drills where we climbed under our school desks to supposedly protect us against the threat of an atomic bomb dropped by Russia. Yet, we grew up in the safest time in the history of mankind, which allowed us freedom to grow and expand our horizons. We are the survivors of being among so many competitors for everything, and we changed everything. Maybe because we learned so early of the fragility of life, we did not accept things as they were. Because of our numbers, we impacted and changed race relations demanding opportunity for all, impacted and changed gender relations and the role of women in society, began the sexual revolution (I know, TMI regarding your grandparents), brought rock and roll into the forefront, and changed cultural norms, dress, and just about everything. When we spoke or acted in a common voice, our numbers overwhelmed the status quo.
We Boomers are in denial that we are about to hit a milestone birthday, age seventy. It hurts less writing it out than writing it in numerals. In our parents’ generation, everyone retired at 65. We refuse to retire at seventy. We want more out of life than our years. The good news is that seventy year olds can expect longer lives than our parents. We do not want to be limited by our years, and exercise and remain alive and vibrant in our communities. But in our denial of our years, we forget how much the world has changed around us. Maybe it is because we are so used to changing the world.
In the AARP Bulletin, January-February 2016, in “The Boomers Turn 70,” using the numeral rather than writing it out, Bill Newcott points out the changes in society today from the society of our birth.
In 1946:
*Caucasians were an estimated 90% majority
*most of us lived in a “nuclear” family, which existed of a father who went to work and a mother who stayed home
In 2016:
*19% of families are the “nuclear” family, and over 41% of babies are born to unwed mothers
*57% of women are in the workplace and 40% of households have the woman as the primary breadwinner
*by 2044, Caucasians are going to become a minority.
Mr. Newcott gives us a downside to our Boomer philosophy of live for today. He says that our longevity is going to mean we may not have enough retirement funds to last our longer lives. He says that by 2022, nearly 25% of us will be working, which is double the figure of those who worked at our age in 1992. This Boomer Grandma looks at this, as everything in life, as having an upside. Keeping our brains and bodies moving and alive means we are moving and alive . . .and forever young.
The article ends with a quote from the actual first Boomer baby to be born seconds past midnight on January 1, 1946 in Philadelphia, Pa. This Grandma is very impressed that she was found. Her quote is so relevant and representative of our Boomer Generation:
“You only have the moment. You can’t live in the past, and you don’t know what the future is going to bring.”
Grandchildren, if you read this post, remember this quote. It goes along with a quote from our parents’ generation:
“Man plans, and God laughs.”
The future is unpredictable. We worry. But worry is wasted. Yes, we must plan, but we have to be ready when plans will have to change. God, or whatever you believe in, may have some other plan in mind. Living a happy life means optimistically going with the flow.
There were about 3.4 million babies born just in 1946, the first year of the baby boom generation. There are 2.5 million of us born in 1946 living today. We Boomers have lived and continue to live our lives, with great changes and effecting great changes. We have survived and flourished, and this Boomer Grandma, the perpetual optimist, agrees that our generation has been a positive influence on America and will continue to be a positive influence on America.
After all, we have precious grandchildren and we want to leave them with an American that also brings them
Joy,
Mema
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