The Rocking Seniors..

"Seniors are worth a fortune. They have silver in their hair, gold in their teeth, stones in their kidneys and gallbladder, lead in their feet, and gas in their stomach."
or
"You really know you're getting old when you bend over to tie your shoes, and you wonder what else you can do while you're down there."

That has been the standard prototype of a senior citizen. And for years together, as you finshed celebrating the golden anniversary of your birth, you stood at the top of the inverted parabola graph, looking down, smiling bravely, wondering how fast the slide was going to be.

No more.

Research has shown that , "learning" , which was thought to enhance the quality of ones brains (in the form of increasing brain cells and pathways), was not restricted to younger folks. Age really had nothing to do with it. You kept your brain active. Learning something new. And your brain would develop those new cells and pathways.

Concurrent with the generations that grew up believing you were supposed to slow down as seniors, there has been a great outsurge of things like Alzheimers and other brain related diseases. Which has , then prompted a lot of research.

Consider the cabbies of London. You hail a cab in London, and tell him the address. (Mind you, cars have GIS's and GPS's now, but I am talking of the times when people were supremely thrilled if the car roof could move and let the sun shine in, or if the car was a convertible. And that was all that was automatic about it...) Today , cabbies are required to spend a minimum of two years learning the meandering geography of London and its landmarks. At the end of it, they must pass a test, that indicates, that they can take a passenger to his destination, by the shoretest route, without consulting a street map, paper, electronic or otherwise.