Myth-Busting: "My current home is the best place to live in my retirement years"

“My current home is the best place to live in my retirement years.”

How many of you have thought that’s true? How many of you are sure there is no better option for you than remaining in the home where you’ve spent decades living? After all, this is where you raised your children, hosted parties for friends and family, celebrated holidays, planted your annual gardens and stored decades of fond memories. Often, when looking back, our minds gloss over the negatives, choosing to remember the happy times and moments.

If you are still living in this home, you have to consider that it is also where you had to pay holiday rates to a plumber because your son wanted to see if his toy car would flush down the toilet. It’s where you had to pay to have the leaking roof repaired just after you paid for your daughter’s first year of college. It’s where you had to shovel 18 inches of snow to be able to get to a doctor’s appointment, where you had to pay to have the fence repaired, the swimming pool liner replaced, and let’s not forget that you still have to make dinner, put away the leftovers and clean the kitchen every night.

With all that considered, your home—as chock full of good times as it has been—may not be the best home to spend your retirement years.

A Car, A Car, My Kingdom for a Car!

By Ann Burnside Love

With apologies to Shakespeare’s “Richard III,” transportation is a very big thing for most retirees. For years, as we retain our independence, driving our own car is one of the most important things we do. We drive to the mall and the grocery store, our physicians’ offices, to the golf course, tennis courts, bowling alleys, restaurants, and to our children’s homes if they live nearby. We drive to special events and meetings. We explore the national parks, spend the winter in warm places and drive there whenever it’s the right time.

Spring Cleaning: At your house or mine?

By Ann Burnside Love

Do I mean heavy-duty spring-cleaning, where you roll the rugs, carry them outdoors and beat them with a tennis racquet? Hardly. Though some of us may have traces of memory about that. For myself, I can’t remember when my mother did not have a vacuum cleaner, although the cooling process in the kitchen was by icebox, until the amazing Frigidaire came along.

When I think about spring cleaning, I’m certainly relieved not to still be living in the six-bedroom house where I raised my children, although it was emotional agony leaving it, or the three-bedroom house on the edge of the park I bought when they were grown, or even my first retirement house in a 55-plus community. I remember them all. And I remember spring cleaning in all of them.

Working on Your Moving Plans After This Year's Weather Extremes?

By Ann Burnside Love

While enjoying the fireplace in our lobby’s sitting room, a lovely neighbor came up to me with a friend who’s moving into our retirement community a few months from now. The friend said she enjoys reading the newspaper column I’ve written for years. When I heard her voice, I realized that I remembered her from a group we both belonged to in our 30s.

“I’m moving this year because I can’t stay on the farm through another winter,” she said. “I can’t do all the stuff required through as much snow and ice as we’ve experienced recently. Actually, I’ve been downsizing for five years, so it won’t be as big a deal to move as it might have been.”

So she’s positioned herself to make the move she really wants to make. And she’s taken steps to make it possible. She’s decided on a retirement community, gotten onto the waiting list, been what we call “right sizing” for years, and she’s recognized now is the time.

I'm Living in a Media Center! Who Knew?

By Ann Burnside Love

We’re not to call libraries “libraries” any more. They are now media centers doing much more than housing books. I know this is true truth, because two of my daughters-in-law are media center coordinators in public schools. One works in an elementary school in Northern Virginia, and the other in a nearly brand new Maryland high school. Both started out as teachers and later took extra masters’ degrees to qualify as media center coordinators. This is where I get my information.

How do I know that I actually live in the middle of a Media Center? Well, I already knew my retirement community had several libraries, for starters.

Olympians Fall More Gracefully Than We Do!

By Ann Burnside Love

The Olympics are reserved for the most masterful athletes, and over the last two weeks, we’ve watched ice skaters gracefully twirl and dance, and also gracefully fall to the ice on their hips, knees and sides. We’ve likewise watched skiers with medals and stellar reputations fly downhill around challenging turns and jumps — only to fly right off track into snow banks and forgiving fences.

Many of these athletes already endured multiple surgeries for broken bones and injured backs. They’re young. They know they will (probably, if they work very, very hard) heal enough to come back next season.

Seniors, on the other hand, have less chance to heal that successfully if our falls are serious. We will probably never climb a ladder again, much less get out on the golf course, tennis court or mountainside in hiking boots. Or even live by ourselves anymore, running errands and getting ourselves to doctor’s appointments in bad weather. Think about the challenging weather we’re experiencing this year alone. How often have you dared to leave the house?

At a retirement community, you don’t have to ask yourself the question: Is leaving the house worth the fall risk? Many of my neighbors — already surprised by the countless amenities available to them now that they are at a retirement community — were also shocked to realize the many ways communities work to keep residents safe. Whatever weather emergency is going on, we don’t have to worry about braving the elements and risking a fall since most communities provide indoor access to dining services, a wellness center and exercise pool.

Enjoying the Many Holidays Which Fill out Your Year

By Ann Burnside Love

You’ve been retired for a while. You’re doing well, or you’re doing less than well, but managing. Possibly you’re thinking about, or wanting, or needing to make a change to a community where your life will be more comfortable, safer, and where there will be both friends and prompt assistance when you need it. A place specifically dedicated to keeping life inviting and interesting, and generally helping you improve the quality of your life.

When I was still living alone, I was participating less and less in life around me because I was always tired, and frequently recovering from various health challenges. One example of the limitations on my energy was that I had virtually stopped decorating for holidays, except for a small pumpkin for Halloween and Thanksgiving, a few chosen ornaments at Christmas, and a wreath on my front door.

Seasonal decorating, which I’ve always loved, used to be a real pleasure. But now the thought of getting boxes out of storage, unwrapping, arranging, and then reversing the process, loomed in my mind as something definitely to be avoided. I simply didn’t care enough to expend the energy. Thus, along the way I lost interest in all but the major and family holidays.

Arriving By the Back Door

By Ann Burnside Love

This story is about the unexpected way I moved into the beautiful retirement apartment I now call home. As a hint — although my daughter and I had planned every detail together — when the day came I never even saw the moving crew.

Where are you when the weather is extreme?

By Ann Burnside Love

Without getting into a discussion of whose theories are right about climate change, during this last week we have been experiencing the coldest temperatures Americans under 40 have ever encountered. (The weather folks tell us this, so it must be so.) At the same time, they give us below-zero wind chill reports in all sorts of cities and communities unused to and unequipped for these extremes.

Since I’m primarily addressing my contemporaries and their adult children, I realize that we are several decades older than 40 years, and most of us have experienced lots of weather extremes in our lifetimes, no matter what part of the country in which we live. Even the southern states are experiencing one of the coldest spells on record.

Now, I’m prepared to believe that this “cold” is life threatening, and that my contemporaries and I had better remain indoors, period. The question then becomes: Where indoors and under what circumstances?

Adult Child? You Can Help!

By Ann Burnside Love

Are you, by any chance, the adult child or child-in-law, niece, nephew, sister, brother, cousin or very good friend of a senior who would benefit from a different living situation?

May I suggest that the recent holidays could have given you an opportunity to look closer at how your senior relatives or friends are doing in important ways, such as:

• eating nutritious meals, or having access to appropriate food?

• getting enough exercise?

• living in physically safe surroundings indoors and out?

• receiving sufficient and quick medical attention?

• living in an unhappy or limiting situation?

• needing more assistance in daily living — or would benefit from a simpler and less demanding lifestyle where they have fewer responsibilities and more choices in how they spend their time?

Or, from a less dramatic point of view, do you think that person is in good shape generally — and could benefit from being around people with similar interests, abilities, and tastes — plus diverse life experiences to share? Studies show that these are among the best benefits of senior retirement communities.

Resolved: In 2014 you'll find useful / rewarding / fun ways to volunteer

By Ann Burnside Love

You’re a relatively new resident at your retirement community, or you will be moving in soon, or you’ve been there for some time but haven’t yet found volunteer opportunities that really appeal to you.

You see others around you with meetings to go to that they find satisfying. There’s obviously a hospitality committee welcoming newcomers, engineering monthly birthday celebrations and supporting holiday parties. Other groups put on monthly meetings with lunch and outside speakers. A dozen standing committees oversee various aspects of community living, like the residents association, and informal groups and committees interested in wellness and exercise, safety, outdoor environment, travel, book clubs, card playing, choir, entertainment, and ever so much more.

Many people have urged you to “get involved,” and for some it’s automatic and simple. They plunge right in, meet people and put their skills to good use. If you’re one of these, congratulations! Have at it!

However, if that’s not you, you may prefer instead to chat with the director of volunteers, to find suggestions where you may be most comfortable and have the most to contribute. Many have made successful choices that way.

No More Snow Shoveling for Us!

By Ann Burnside Love

Right now as I’m writing, major areas of our country are dealing with heavy snow and ice, and The Weather Channel is constantly talking about, and showing us, places where the accumulation has made transportation particularly difficult and dangerous.

Accidents along major highways: 30-some cars skidded into a tight mess that looks, unfortunately, like a junkyard. Overturned 18-wheelers. People bundled up as they try to shovel snow that’s building up faster than they can shovel. Airports are delaying hundreds of flights, again experiencing massive tie-ups and stranded people.

And I’m looking out the window behind my computer, enjoying a gorgeous multi-day snowfall that’s made the trees into a fairyland. I can see my car down in the parking lot, the seventh totally blanketed mound from the left — and happily my name is already on the list to have my car dug out when it lets up. Soon I’ll go down to the dining room for a hot lunch and all the hot green tea I want!

Back in the early ‘90s, when Love & Company first became involved with senior living, one of the main features prospective residents were interested in was “No More Snow Shoveling.” Everyone talked about it in the same breath they talked about not having to cook. One of our newspaper ad series featured individuals gleefully listing all the things they no longer had to do related to snow and other challenges.

Measure Your New Retirement Home Before You Move!

By Ann Burnside Love

Well, you were given a floor plan when you chose your apartment or cottage, weren’t you? It showed the dimensions, didn’t it? Why should you have to measure it yourself?

20 Reasons I'm Thankful to Live in a Retirement Community

By Ann Burnside Love

• Someone else cleans my apartment regularly, changes my bed linen, and recycles my newspapers. (If this sounds wonderful, it is.) After certain breaks in health, I really can't do many of these things. And I'm most grateful for their services because they allow me time to continue my professional career at the level I do.

• At Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter and more holidays, our kitchen staff throws banquets for us so delicious that family members love to come. Thus I still have a turn in the family cycle for holiday entertaining.

• Vanessa, the cat, is happy here, has engraved all her habits, wishes and desires upon my brain, and she hasn't yet climbed from my balcony to the roof, as others’ cats have.

• When my garbage disposal broke down, all I had to do was phone maintenance and it was fixed by the next day.

• Someone else clears my car of snow and ice before I go out.

Seasonal residents: Now they’re here, now they’re away

By Ann Burnside Love

The new lady in the apartment next door moved in, then disappeared. Six months later she returned. Seems she owns a summer home in Maine where the community requires residents to be there for six months a year. Her brood is large, and each family loves to come there for a couple of weeks every summer. But there would be gaps if no one were in residence continuously.

Actually, she’s due back from her second and what she said would be her last summer away for six months, because she’s too tired to keep it up. So when she sold her house in our area, she established her new home in our senior residential community so it would be ready and waiting for her at all times. This is her permanent home.

The Dumbest Thing I Actually Worried About Before Moving

By Ann Burnside Love

It had to do with something I’d never lacked before and truly valued above much else. Actually, I felt guilty that I was even thinking about this possibility, but so it was.

Separately, I was happy and excited about the apartment I’d chosen. I was practical enough not to really worry about the actual moving process, once my daughter and I planned it down to the tiniest detail. A lot of the important-to-me worry stuff was being taken care of — having to do with possessions I was passing along to the next generations.

My oversize recliners, comfortable and beloved by all, went to No. 2 Son and his family, my piano to No. 3 Son whose young family loved music. The round dining room table and chairs, with carpet, went to No. 1 Son’s family. And the capacious mahogany buffet from my late husband’s family went to my daughter, along with a selection of the china, silver and linens that lived within. Then the whole family, including grown grandchildren, got to choose a share of the lovely things left throughout the house — bargaining with each other so politely I was stunned. My concern about fairness was resolved.

But when all that was settled, I was still left with inside-the-churning-brain worry, the dark kind: I was entering a group of a couple hundred people. Would I be comfortable with the established residents and they with me? I knew a few, but just acquaintances. Would there be people with whom to converse, think aloud, learn from … and laugh?