I have a friend whose mother used to say "You get to keep your health or your mind ". I am still on the fence as to which I'll go for. With the mind loss thing, my friends will remain cutting edge. Their stories always be fresh and amusing to me. The bad health seems so much more droll unless your doctor is Dr. McDreamy (of course after seeing me naked for an exam, he'll be Dr. Cannotrunfastenough from the city of Getmeouttahere). Before you start emailing hate letters, dementia is all around me . Friend's parents, clients, etc. It is an ugly disease. It is not a joke. Although sometimes life serves up laughter quite by accident to help pull you along. That said, onto my point, after I remember where this was going. Oh, yes....
It seems that sometimes both mind and health are awarded to a few special people. Although its hard to tell from Tweets and status updates how a person's mind is actually fairing. Talk to the daughter if you want the real scoop, I always say.
Today I read about a Ms. Ivy Bean who recently passed away at 104. She was blessed with a particularly long life. She also Tweeted until the day she died with a following of over 50,000 people and had a Facebook following of the 5000 maximum friends. Her example is that we are never to old to get to our UFOs in life. Granted, in her 100s her Tweets consisted of what was for lunch or that some one was having a pint out in the garden. Wait that was mine yesterday. No, sorry, that was hers. She took up social networking with a fervor that can only be viewed as competitive. Her followers included the past UK Prime Minister's wife, Mrs. Brown. She met via social networking, a slice of society that would have never been in Northern England to visit her managed care home. She has probably got to know far more people than I, not that Facebook or Twitter is a popularity contest (But do friend me!!!!).
So the glass blowing I want to learn is back on, writing a blog, on, and learning Spanish...no. I'll leave that at the level it is today (Donde es la biblioteca?) so as not to damage international relations. Like IvyBean104 (her handle) I think we should keep trying new things. Perhaps just a bit modified for our age range if it is physically a hardship but otherwise it's a go.
I was curious about how to keep it going as long and in touch as Ivy. Here's some of what I learned today.
1. We all have to move to Hawaii. I know it will be crowded but worth it. Livin' on Kona time will get you an extra 7 years over some states.
2. We have to convert to Mormon. Mormon men live 6.7% longer than non Mormon men. Is it the door to door youth ministry building muscles? Actually the lack of coffee, tobacco, and such account for that one. So we don't really have to convert just live healthier.
3. Married people outlive singles, but we knew that. What I didn't know is that there is a 15% higher life expectancy. Are those single people's cats tripping them in the dark? How else do you account for that one?
4. Women with husbands their own age outlive cougars, so take that you Botoxed braggarts! All that staying up late to keep up with a husband that didn't even know Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings gives you a 20% higher mortality risk then us old bags with men around our age. Ha!
I found about a hundred studies all with the same healthy messages of living right. The message for me was from Ivy, she should have been on a Nike commercial, just do it.
Ms. Bean is survived by her daughter.
Photo courtesy of AP
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